PETA sues SeaWorld for Shamu slavery

PETA fights to have Shamu freed for it is violating animal rights

By Dillon Jacobsen



Published: Thursday, November 3, 2011

Updated: Thursday, November 3, 2011 20:11



Fellow USD students, San Diegans and tourists, get ready to say good-bye to Shamu. PETA is at it again.

One of the effects of living in San Diego is being graced with the presence of tourists all year round. The beautiful weather, scenic beaches and attractions such as the San Diego Zoo and SeaWorld are a few of the reasons why tourists flock in high numbers to San Diego. This week, one of the most popular attractions, SeaWorld, became involved in a lawsuit.

People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals, known as PETA and supported by over two million people, filed a 20-page lawsuit stating that the killer whales at SeaWorld are involuntarily being forced to work. Based on the 13th Amendment, which is famous for outlawing slavery and forbidding involuntary servitude, PETA alleges the whales should be freed. Essentially, SeaWorld is being accused of holding whales captive and forcing them to work as slaves.

According to the lawsuit filed by PETA, "Plaintiffs were forcibly taken from their families and natural habitats, are held captive at SeaWorld San Diego, SeaWorld Orlando and SeaWorld San Antonio, denied everything that is natural to them, subjected to artificial insemination or sperm collection to breed performers for defendants' shows and forced to perform, all for defendants' profit."

The allegation that SeaWorld mistreats the animals is baseless. SeaWorld employees take extensive measures to take care of the animals and to provide them with livable environments.

Furthermore, SeaWorld has provided valuable research about life in the oceans and has even taken steps to help expand the population of killer whales in the wild. The real issue, however, is that PETA continues to be a cancerous organization.

The lawsuit is absurd. PETA is an extremist activist group with little reverence for facts or common sense. The fundamental issue with the lawsuit is that it is trying to apply human rights as given by the U.S. Constitution to animals. In the eyes of the current law, animals are not seen in the same light as humans and are not afforded the same rights. And they never should be given the same rights, because they simply cannot be held to the same moral standards that humans are.

If the Constitution were applied to animals, then chaos in the legal system would follow. For example, whenever an animal killed another animal, there would have to be a murder trial. This isn't a joke; it would require the whole deal: witness, judge and jury.

Don't forget property rights either; allocating certain plots of land to certain animals should follow. The mere fact that PETA is attempting to apply the Constitution to animals should be insulting to Americans.

This isn't the first time PETA has pulled a publicity stunt. Browsing the organization's web site provides the other ridiculous notions upon which PETA has acted.

In 2008, PETA insisted that Ben & Jerry's use human breast milk in its ice cream products, instead of the traditional cow's milk, so that cows wouldn't suffer on factory farms.

In 2003, PETA opened exhibits that had pictures of suffering Jews from the Holocaust next to animals from farms, trying to assert that the two circumstances are analogous.

PETA consistently seeks attention from the public. While some of the organization's objectives might be fundamentally valid, the organization itself is a bane. Seen by many as an extremist group, the ways in which PETA goes about seeking its goals are not going to change that image.

The lawsuit against SeaWorld is no different from any previous stunts, and any rational judge should dismiss the case because of the obvious and offensive misapplication of the Constitution.


http://www.theusdvista.com/opinion/peta ... -1.2683033


By the same people that kill 94% of animals brought into it's shelters. Their argument seems to only apply to the Orcas and not the seals or sea lions. Perhaps the seals can retain their own counsel and enjoin? As well it only seems to apply to " wild" animals and not seek to extend those Constitutional protections to domestic animals. On it's face their suit seems to be discriminatory.