PETA Celebrates: Jim Irsay ‘Will Go to Heaven’ for Lolita’s Release

For Immediate Release:
March 30, 2023

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

Please see the following statement from PETA President Ingrid Newkirk in response to this morning’s announcement from The Dolphin Company, Friends of Toki (aka “Lolita”), and philanthropist Jim Irsay that Lolita the orca will finally be returned to her home waters after five decades in a tiny tank at the Miami Seaquarium:

It may be easier for a camel to pass through the eye of a needle than for a rich man to enter the kingdom of heaven, but Jim Irsay shows it can be done. May anyone with the resources to do good things like this open their heart as he has done, find a way to reduce suffering, and bring happiness to others, regardless of their race, color, gender, or species.

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 PETA.org, listen to The PETA Podcast, or follow the group on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.