Former Grand Marshal Cloris Leachman Joins PETA in Protesting SeaWorld Float

TV actress and 2009 Tournament of Roses Grand Marshal Cloris Leachman has joined an animal rights group in its protest against SeaWorld’s float design for the 2014 Rose Parade.

Leachman sent an open letter dated December 19 to Tournament of Roses Association President R. Scott Jenkins saying she was disappointed that SeaWorld will have a float entry for the Rose Parade this year.

“As the 2008 grand marshal of the Tournament of Roses, I was thrilled to take part in an event that is older than I am,” Leachman said. “I hate to rain on this parade, but I was disappointed to learn from my friends at People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) that SeaWorld will have a float this year.”

The actress said that “beyond SeaWorld’s glossy ads,” the orcas it houses to breed in the park live painful lives.

“Many orcas at SeaWorld have been confined for decades to tanks that, to them, amount to nothing more than glorified bathtubs,” she said. “They have been deprived of everything that is natural and important to them and are forced to swim in endless circles, far away from their families.”

“It’s no wonder that orcas at SeaWorld have never lived long enough to die of old age. (And as someone who has lived a long, eventful life, I can vouch for the fact that they’re missing out.),” she added.

Leachman also said SeaWorld is only using the parade as a public relations scheme.

“SeaWorld is trying to recover from an exposé that showed its true colors. Please don’t let the company use the Rose Parade as a PR ploy,” she said.

PETA held several protests in the recent months against SeaWorld’s float design, which was built by Fiesta Parade Floats and designed by Stanley A. Meyer Design, LLC. The design in dispute features a little boy, apparently wide-eyed with wonder, who dives beneath a swirling wave.

PETA also sent an open letter to Jenkins in November asking him to require a change in the design of SeaWorld’s 2014 Rose Parade float.

The activist group claimed orcas swim as far as 100 miles a day in the wild, but were restricted to swim in circles in small barren concrete tanks at SeaWorld. The group said the theme park’s facilities in the country has over 23 recorded deaths of orcas since 1986, none of which died of old age.