If PETA has its way, 86,000 youth members of the animal-rights group will send Mayor Kevin Faulconer their pennies, nickels and dimes along with a note that reads, “If you really need money, here’s some of mine. Let the orcas go!”
Faulconer “has been campaigning to improve SeaWorld’s tainted image by singing the orca prison’s praises at every turn in an upstream attempt to bring tourism to the city,” People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals said Tuesday.
“But peta2 — PETA’s youth division — hopes to hold the former SeaWorld PR man at bay by offering him money to stop spinning wild tales about the treatment of orcas and other marine mammals at the embattled facility.”
Peta2, a worldwide group that claims 2,003 members in San Diego, is being asked to send Faulconer whatever they can spare from their allowances and after-school jobs.
“The orcas locked in SeaWorld’s tiny tanks suffer every day of their lives,” says PETA Foundation Deputy General Counsel Delcianna Winders. “These orcas desperately need a change — and peta2’s young supporters are eager to fork over their change if it’ll make the mayor think twice about promoting SeaWorld’s despicable business.”
Peta2 is urging Faulconer to join its call to release the orcas to seaside sanctuaries and support the California bill that would ban the orca shows at SeaWorld.
Senior Youth Campaigns Coordinator Annie Leal says the action — “Use Your Change to Save Orcas” — is posted on the Peta2 website and will be promoted through email and its Facebook page.
Whose idea was it?
“PETA’s president, Ingrid E. Newkirk, came up with this … idea after Mayor Faulconer named March SeaWorld Appreciation Month,” Leal said in response to a Times of San Diego inquiry.
Peta2 members were being given this address to send their money:
The Honorable Kevin Faulconer
Mayor of San Diego
202 C St. #11
San Diego, CA 92101
Leal said she doesn’t recall money being sought in this way before.
“But in the past, peta2 has asked Street Teamers to send Halloween letters to the University of Wisconsin–Madison to urge it to stop killing cats in cruel experiments,” she said via email. “We’ve also asked them to send the Miami Seaquarium a printable ‘Freedom Ticket,’ asking it to release Lolita — an orca who has been in captivity for the past 42 years — to a sanctuary.”
The PETA spokeswoman said peta2 has 23,954 members in California.
How much money is PETA expecting to generate?
“The mission is meant to be symbolic, so people can send any spare change that they might have!” Leal said. “By doing so, young people are bringing attention to how SeaWorld separates orcas from their families and forces them to swim in tiny concrete tanks, denying them everything that is natural and important to them and reminding the mayor that making money from the exhibition of abused animals is not OK.”
The San Diego mayor’s office, asked for comment, has not responded.
