While I'm told there was thunder booming throughout London early yesterday morning, the real storming was taking place around St. Paul's cathedral, where 100 PETA Europe demonstrators sprawled across the steps wearing nothing but blood-red paint and bear masks.

The naked demonstrators were there to protest the continued use of real bearskin for The Queen's Guards' ceremonial caps. Bears killed for the caps may suffer for days in traps or die of blood loss or infection after being shot. When mother bears are killed, their orphaned cubs are easy prey for predators—if they don't starve to death first.

Written by Shawna Flavell

peoplequiz / CC

We all know what a friend beloved TV host Bob Barker is to animals. From ending every episode of The Price Is Right with a plea to spay and neuter animal companions to keeping the showcases fur-free, he's never been afraid to speak up for animals.

Not to get all "the price is wrong" on you or anything, but in Cherokee, North Carolina, there are three "tourist attractions" that keep bears in grossly inhumane conditions. The neurotic, hungry bears are confined to desolate concrete pits in which they pace back and forth, walk in endless circles, cry and whimper, fight with one another, and beg tourists to toss them a morsel of food.

What do these tourist traps have to do with Bob Barker? As a compassionate person of Native American descent (he spent much of his youth at the Rosebud Indian Reservation in South Dakota), Bob has requested a meeting with the principal chief of the Eastern Band of the Cherokee Nation to discuss an end to the town's displays of bears in pits and cages.

As he wrote to Principal Chief Hicks, "Cherokee has so much to offer, such as its beautiful mountains, museums, cultural and historical exhibits, Native American shops, friendly residents, and casino. The caged bears may have been a big attraction at one time but are now seen as an embarrassment to the community and should be permanently closed down."

To join Bob in asking that the cruel bear pits be closed down, please send a respectful letter to Principal Chief Hicks letting him know that bears should be respected, not left in a pit to languish.

Written by Amanda Schinke

Hey, everyone! You may remember my previous post about the bearskins investigation. Well, this has generated a ton of media coverage, which is excellent, but this article in particular really caught my eye.

A spokesperson from the Ministry of Defence (MoD) was quoted in the article as saying, "Some alternatives to real fur are already in use by the Royal Artillery and others, and we are in discussions with PETA to identify an improved fake fur."

Wha?! If by discussions, they mean PETA Europe talking and the MoD isn't listening, then yeah … I guess you could say there've been some awesome discussions.

Thanks, MoD, for pulling out the PR train on this one, but we know better! Click here to see the letter that PETA Europe sent to the MoD today, and don't forget to take action on this issue!

These pictures kind of tell their own story, which, as I interpret it, is that a lot of MPs are pretty hacked off with the MoD for being so bleeding stroppy about the Queen's Guards' kit, innit? Or, translated into American, dozens of British politicians gathered outside parliament yesterday to call on the Ministry of Defence to ban the use of bear fur in making the well-known caps worn by the palace guards. Either way you look at it, it's pretty damn wonderful—and it's a big coup for PETA Europe in its quest to save Canadian black bears from a horrible fate. Great to see so many politicians getting involved in an issue on behalf of the British public, which—like most reasonable publics—is overwhelmingly against turning bears into hats without a bloody good reason.

Glenda Jackson, Mike Hancock, George Galloway, and dozens of other cross-party MPs protest the use of bear fur in The Queen's Guards' caps outside the Houses of Parliament

Mike Hancock, David Lepper, and David Taylor standing up for bears

Oscar winner turned MP Glenda Jackson with a Canadian black teddy bear