Naked and floating in a tiny tank of water next to a “Welcome to SeaWorld” sign, Toronto-born Smallville star Laura Vandervoort is putting herself in the place of captive orcas for a provocative new PETA ad campaign.
The print ad directs viewers to SeaWorldOfHurt.com by proclaiming, “Come see Laura as she’s confined to a tiny tank and forced to perform tricks for your entertainment! Learn the truth behind the show and Boycott SeaWorld!”
“We wanted to express the confinement and the torture and the agony and the anxiety that the orcas go through in a tank, for them, the size of a tub,” Vandervoort says in an exclusive video interview with PETA. “I had seen the movie Blackfish and not only did it make me cry … but it impacted me in a way that I wanted to do something, and I wanted to help.”
While orcas in the wild travel up to 100 miles per day, SeaWorld confines them to tiny tanks in which they break their teeth and endure chronic pain from snapping and gnawing at the pool gates as a result of stress and aggression. At least 25 orcas have died in SeaWorld facilities since 1986—and not one died of old age.
Vandervoort joins a long list of celebrities — including Bob Barker, Krysten Ritter, Behati Prinsloo, Joan Jett, Kathy Najimy, Tommy Lee, and Eli Roth — who have teamed up with PETA to speak out against amusement parks that keep intelligent marine mammals in captivity.
