Jason Momoa Joins the Fight to Save the Ocean, Immediately Gets Dragged by Marine Biologists for Drowning a Tuna
Aquaman, the actor who literally plays a guy who talks to fish, has decided to throw his chiseled jaw and mane of shampoo-commercial hair into the conservation ring. Jason Momoa, fresh off his latest role as the planet’s most aggressively handsome environmentalist, announced a new partnership with a non-profit to “protect our oceans” or whatever. Cool. Noble. Absolutely performative in the way that only a millionaire with a $20,000 truck can pull off.
But here’s the kicker: within 24 hours of the press release hitting the internet, marine biologists and Reddit’s finest armchair ecologists unearthed a video from 2019 where Momoa is clearly, unequivocally, and with great enthusiasm, drowning a massive tuna on a deep-sea fishing trip. The clip, which has since been scrubbed from his Instagram but lives forever in the depths of the Internet Archive like a cursed artifact, shows the actor reeling in a 300-pound yellowfin, laughing like a man who just discovered he can write off a yacht as a business expense, and then beating the fish to death with a gaff.
Oh, but it gets better. The caption on the original post? “Aloha, catch of the day. Mahalo to the ocean for providing.” Sir. You just pummeled a sentient creature with a metal hook while wearing a $5,000 custom wetsuit. The ocean did not “provide.” The ocean did not sign a waiver. The ocean is currently looking at your PR team like, “Bruh, really?”
The internet, as it always does, smelled blood in the water. Twitter exploded with the kind of schadenfreude that usually reserved for CEOs getting pelted with milkshakes. “Jason Momoa wants to save the ocean but also wants to personally thank each tuna for its sacrifice by caving its skull in,” one user quipped. Another posted a side-by-side of Momoa’s conservation announcement and the fishing video, captioned: “Aquaman: ‘I protect the sea.’ Also Aquaman: ‘Fuck that one specific fish in particular.’”
And then the scientists weighed in. Dr. Sarah Turnbull, a marine biologist at the University of California, Santa Barbara, told reporters that while recreational fishing isn’t inherently evil, the optics of a “save the ocean” campaign launched by a guy who just went full caveman on a fish are “a little bit like Greta Thunberg getting caught burning a coal mine for warmth.” She elaborated: “It’s not that he can’t fish. It’s that he’s framing himself as a guardian of the ecosystem while actively participating in the extraction of its largest predators. It’s the equivalent of a firefighter posting a GoFundMe for a new hose while you catch him torching a Wendy’s.”
The backlash has been so swift and so vicious that Momoa’s team went into full damage control mode. Within hours, the actor released a statement that was so vague it could have been written by a ChatGPT bot trained on empty apologies. It read, in part: “I have deep respect for the ocean and all its creatures. I also acknowledge the traditions of sustainable fishing that have sustained my ancestors for generations. I am learning and growing every day.”
Translation: “I’m sorry you guys found the video. Please stop ruining my Aquaman legacy.”
And look, I get it. The man is Hawaiian. Fishing is cultural. But there’s a difference between subsistence fishing with a spear and a handline and chartering a deep-sea boat to bludgeon a fish that’s larger than most Dobermans while your GoPro rolls. That wasn’t a tradition. That was a flex. A flex that now looks real bad next to your Save the Oceans™ press release.
But here’s where the AITA energy really kicks in. Some people are defending him. “He’s just a guy who likes fishing. Y’all are canceling him for eating meat?” they cry. And okay, fair. But the problem isn’t the fishing. The problem is the branding. Jason Momoa doesn’t get to be both the guy who fistfights a tuna and the guy who asks you to donate to marine sanctuaries. You can’t have your fish and eat it too. Yes, that pun was intentional. No, I’m not sorry.
The real tragedy here isn’t the dead tuna—it’s the complete lack of self-awareness. Momoa built his entire public persona around being a chill, eco-conscious, ocean-loving dude. He’s been photographed picking up trash on beaches, he’s spoken at climate rallies, he even has a tattoo of a shark. But the moment his image conflicts with a single, well-documented lapse in judgment, the whole house of cards collapses. Because that’s the internet, baby. We don’t care about your journey. We care about receipts.
And the receipts are brutal. There’s also a 2018 video of him cracking open a lobster with a hammer. Another clip of him posing next to a dead marlin. He’s not just a guy who fishes. He’s a guy who makes sure you know he fishes. Which is fine, except he’s now positioning himself as a marine conservationist. It’s like finding out the Dalai Lama runs a cockfighting ring on the side. The cognitive dissonance is dizzying.
So where does this leave us? Probably exactly where we started: with a bunch of angry marine biologists, a viral clip that’s about to become a meme template, and a celebrity who is currently Googling “how to delete the internet.” Momoa will survive this. He always does. He’s too handsome to fail. But the next time he posts a photo of himself hugging a whale shark, just remember: somewhere in the Pacific, a yellowfin tuna’s ghost is laughing its scales off.
And honestly? I’m here for it. Cancel culture is exhausting, but hypocrisy? That’s a classic. That’s a rerun I
Final Thoughts
Jason Momoa’s career arc—from Khal Drogo’s brute force to Aquaman’s reluctant heroism—feels less like a Hollywood calculation and more like a man rewriting his own mythology in real time. What strikes me is how he uses his towering physicality not to intimidate, but to advocate: for environmental causes, Indigenous representation, and a softer, more vulnerable masculinity that defies the action-star mold. In an industry that often mistakes loud for strong, Momoa reminds us that the most compelling presence is the one that knows when to lower its voice.