The United States should pass a federal law banning whales and dolphins in captivity and should establish a global whale and dolphin sanctuary.

By signing this petiton I recognize and agree that whales are under threat: commercial whaling worldwide is pushing them to the brink of extinction, and theme parks like SeaWorld keep them in capitivity out of their natural habitiat leading to physical and psychological problems.  We need to take action to help them before it’s too late.

The next critical steps in whale conservation is to 1) Ban bringing new whales and dolphins into captivity from the wild and to 2) establish a global whale and dolphin sanctuary to create a whaling-free zone and a safe place to release previously captive whales and dolphins back into the wild. 

I am adamantly opposed to keeping cetaceans in tanks and aggressively support the development of retirement sanctuaries for performing animals. Cetaceans are not suited to captivity no matter how spacious or well-designed the facilities. They are wide-ranging, highly intelligent and social animals which suffer acute sensory deprivation in any kind of unnatural confinement. Keeping cetaceans of any kind, even when there is some educational merit, is a vastly different proposition to the display of fish and other marine creatures.

I have signed this petiton to express the strongest possible opposition to keeping cetaceans in captivity.