Pamela Anderson’s Birthday Wish: Freedom for Orca of Same Age

Pamela and PETA Urge New SeaWorld CEO to Send Corky to Seaside Sanctuary

For Immediate Release:
July 1, 2019

Contact:
Moira Colley 202-483-7382

Pamela Anderson’s birthday is today, and the only gift that she wants is freedom for Corky—an orca the same age as her—who was captured in 1969 off the British Columbia coast near Anderson’s hometown and is currently being held captive at SeaWorld.

“Please don’t let her die in a tank that, to her, is comparable to the size of a bathtub,” Anderson writes in a letter to new SeaWorld CEO Gustavo Antorcha. To illustrate her point, she appears in a new PETA ad, posing in a tub in her birthday suit beneath the words “Could You Live in a Bathtub for Decades?” The ad can be viewed here.

“Corky’s brother and sister are still alive and flourishing in the wild,” Anderson writes, “and a Canadian scientist who has been studying her family wants to bring her home. It’s within your power to release this long-suffering orca to a seaside sanctuary in a protected bay of her home waters.” The orca was used in a now-illegal breeding program in which all seven of her offspring died within weeks.

There’s global momentum for SeaWorld to create sea sanctuaries. The National Aquarium is retiring the dolphins it held captive—including one who was born at SeaWorld—to such a habitat, beluga whales are being moved from a Chinese marine park to a sanctuary in Iceland, and the Canadian Parliament just voted to ban dolphin and whale captivity outright.

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment”—notes that in the wild, orcas form complex relationships and swim up to 140 miles a day. At SeaWorld, they swim in circles inside shallow tanks filled with chemically treated water, where the high level of sun exposure can cause them to develop skin and eye disease.

For more information, please visit PETA.org or SeaWorldOfHurt.com.