Vanilla Ice, Jesse McCartney Draw PETA’s Ire With SeaWorld Shows

For Immediate Release:
July 8, 2021

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382

Armed with signs reading, “Stop, Collaborate, and Listen: Animals Suffer at SeaWorld” and “A Beautiful Soul Doesn’t Support SeaWorld Dolphin Abuse,” PETA will protest Vanilla Ice’s and Jesse McCartney’s concerts at SeaWorld on July 10 and 17, respectively, putting the performers on blast for supporting the abusement park.

“Vanilla Ice and Jesse McCartney can choose to perform at a marine park, but the orcas and other dolphins at SeaWorld can’t choose where to go, what to eat, whom to live with, or anything else that matters to them,” says PETA President Ingrid Newkirk. “PETA is encouraging would-be ticket buyers to skip all of SeaWorld’s shows, from the sad dolphin displays to the throwback concerts.”

In nature, orcas and other dolphins swim long distances, form complex relationships, and choose their own mates. But those at SeaWorld are crammed together in small tanks, where they can’t escape attacks from other frustrated, aggressive animals. More than 40 orcas have died on SeaWorld’s watch so far, and although the park stopped breeding them under public pressure, it’s still breeding other unwilling female dolphins, sometimes by drugging them so that they can’t fight back.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment”—opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information, please visit SeaWorldOfHurt.com or follow PETA on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.