‘Elephant’ to Ask Queens Schoolkids to Skip UniverSoul Circus

PETA Demonstration Outside Elementary School Will Be Led by Former Student

For Immediate Release:
April 20, 2015

Contact:
David Perle 202-483-7382

As UniverSoul Circus prepares for its stint in Queens, PETA’s lovable costumed “elephant” will greet schoolchildren outside the Cambria Center for the Gifted Child with activity booklets that encourage kids to stay away from circuses that use and abuse animals. Members of PETA—including former Cambria Center student Atiya Lily-Gassaway, now a young adult—will inform kids and parents that UniverSoul’s elephant exhibitor and a UniverSoul representative currently face criminal charges in Georgia for abusing an elephant with a bullhook, a weapon that resembles a fireplace poker with a sharp hook on one end.

Where:           Cambria Center for the Gifted Child, 23310 Linden Blvd. (near 234^th Street), Cambria Heights, Queens

When:             Monday, April 20, 2:45 p.m.

“Kids who learn that circuses beat elephants and keep them in chains know that the right thing to do is to stay away,” says PETA Foundation Deputy General Counsel Delcianna Winders. “PETA is telling parents that if their kids love animals, the last place they should take them is to see UniverSoul Circus.”

PETA—whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to use for entertainment”—also protested UniverSoul’s appearances in the Bronx and Brooklyn this year.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.