Bella is now encouraging people to make their voices heard and join the theme park demonstrations on Tuesday.
- Jul 24, 2018
AceShowbiz - Actress/singer Bella Thorne has become a new poster girl for PETA's Boycott SeaWorld campaign after regretting posing for an advertisement for the theme park as a kid.
The Shake It Up star poses as a chained mermaid with an orca tail in the new People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) promos, which debuted on the eve of the organisation's annual Boycott SeaWorld Day, July 24, when protestors demand officials release the whales they have held captive for years.
Bella's ad calls on fans and fellow animal rights activists to "Break the Chains: Boycott SeaWorld," something the 20-year-old wishes she had done as a child.
"When I was a little girl, I did a commercial for SeaWorld, and even then, I knew there wasn't something right...," she confesses. "These beautiful animals are in so much pain. They're taken away from their community, their homes, their mothers, and they don't have a choice. They're locked in there".
Bella is now encouraging people to make their voices heard and join the theme park demonstrations on Tuesday.
"F**k SeaWorld...!" she declares. "Don't be afraid to show up with your signs and make your point".
Bella is the latest star to join forces with PETA to put pressure on SeaWorld bosses to do the right thing. Last month, pop star Pink called on park executives to build coastal sanctuaries for the orcas in captivity, where 41 of the animals have reportedly died to date.
The Trouble singer submitted an online question on behalf of PETA during the theme park's annual board meeting in June.
"As a mother, I would never take my kids anywhere that keeps intelligent, sensitive beings in intensive confinement," she wrote. "Children are impressionable, and the last thing I would want to teach my kids is that might makes right or that it's OK to bully and exploit someone just because they look different from us.
"But that's exactly what SeaWorld does by locking up animals who, in their ocean homes, would swim up to 140 miles a day, dive to great depths, co-operate with their pods to find food, communicate in their own dialects, and transmit their own culture from generation to generation.
"At SeaWorld, all these animals are able to do is swim in endless circles. Some are so frustrated that they break their teeth by gnawing on the concrete corners and metal bars of their tiny tanks".
She urged SeaWorld chiefs to "change that", asking, "When will SeaWorld transfer its orcas and other marine mammals to seaside sanctuaries to save them - and itself?".
