Lady Gaga has plenty of fans—especially in the gay community, which she has embraced so fervently. Gay Gaga fans at PETA loved her all the more when she came out against fur, telling Ellen DeGeneres, "I hate fur and I don't wear fur." But recent furry Gaga photos show that the Lady may be a turncoat. So PETA VP Dan Mathews has written to Gaga to find out if she's become a "Judas" to animals:

Dear Gaga,

Many of your gay fans, I among them, have long admired what you told Ellen: "I hate fur and I don't wear fur." I included a link because these recent photos of you in fox and rabbit and with a wolf carcass make it appear that you have amnesia. I'm also including this brief video hosted by Tim Gunn showing the violent cruelty that you promote when you wear fur. What happened? Are your stylists telling you that it's fake, or are you a turncoat? Many gays are animal advocates because we recognize that the same arrogance and indifference that some have toward animal suffering has at times been directed toward us personally because of our orientation. PETA has long participated in Pride events around the country, and just last week, we helped lead protests against Chick-fil-A. But by wearing those dumb furs in a heat wave, you're making yourself a target just like the mindless Kim Kardashian. As we plan our fall campaigns, please tell us whether what you gracefully told Ellen was heartfelt or just a pose.

We await your reply.

Sincerely,

Dan Mathews

Senior Vice President

PETA

What You Can Do

Gaga has refused to say whether the furs that she has been wearing are fake, so won't you chime in to try and get her to reply?

Furryscaly | cc by 2.0

Good news from the Grand Canyon State—students at Arizona State University (ASU) will no longer be cutting holes into hundreds of rabbits' necks, injecting them with drugs, and then killing them for biology labs. Other animals, including live frogs and rats, are still being subjected to hideous, antiquated, torturous experiments, though, so your help is still critical.

Since 2008, PETA has been working with members, supporters, and ASU students to end the use of animals in classroom physiology laboratories at the university. Last year, the number of frogs used was drastically reduced, and now comes confirmation that all labs that use rabbits have ended. These are victories worth toasting—but it's not time to rest on our laurels because more animals are at risk.

How You Can Help Animals in ASU Labs

Thank ASU officials for saving a significant number of animals from misery and death in school laboratories, and ask them to follow through on this compassionate decision by replacing all the remaining physiology experiments on animals with state-of-the-art non-animal teaching methods as has already been done at the University of Arizona.

Look at the photo below and you'll see her—in between the fertilizer spreader and the recycling bin. No, that's not a stuffed rabbit in the tiny cage behind the plastic toy truck—that's a living, breathing being consigned to a miserable, lonely existence along with the other things people stick outside and forget about. This rabbit was never allowed out of the cramped metal cage, and aside from her owner's tossing her some food and water once in awhile, she never received any attention at all.

A concerned person saw the bunny and knew that with the harsh northern winter already knocking on the door and only an open staircase for "shelter," the rabbit might not live to see another Easter. She tried talking the owner into surrendering the rabbit to her, to no avail. She called PETA for help, and working with local law enforcement, we put pressure on the owner to provide a suitable home for the rabbit. The owner soon tired of hearing from both PETA and the police and agreed to surrender the rabbit into her rescuer's waiting arms.

Now the bunny is living the sweet life indoors because of one woman's persistence and dedication to justice for animals. She is proof positive that even if you can't change the entire world, with a little work, you can change one animal's entire world. 

Written by Michelle Sherrow

PETA Europe's "Sexiest Vegetarian," Leona Lewis, proved why she deserved her crown when she rescued a rabbit from a life on the streets—a life that was bound to end on someone's dinner plate.

fashionindie / CC

While out and about in L.A. this week, Leona noticed a homeless man with a tethered rabbit. When she asked the man what his plans for the rabbit were, he admitted that he might eat the bunny. Um … come again?! As a vegetarian and a diehard animal defender, Leona struck a deal with the man: She gave him $100 to buy proper food, and he gave up the rabbit.

Now, Melrose (the rabbit was named after the street he was found on) is living it up in the "Bleeding Love" superstar's posh L.A. pad. Jealous much?

A friend of Ms. Lewis said, "She didn't think life on a lead was any way for a rabbit to live—then when he said he was going to eat it she knew she had to save it." Swoon. If only all celebrities had that kind of "Spirit."

Written by Christine Doré

DailyHamster / CC

OK, so a bit of good news for bunnies. For years, PETA has been pushing PETCO to end the sale of animals in its stores. This week, the company finally announced that it will no longer sell rabbits in it stores. The phase-out begins immediately. By early 2009, the only rabbits at PETCO will come from animal shelters or rescue organizations. Mad props to the House Rabbit Society, whose efforts helped make this happen!

This is an important step in the right direction, because dogs and cats aren't the only animals left homeless in mass numbers by breeder- and "pet" industry–driven overpopulation. Rabbits are often bought on the spur of the moment—especially at Easter—by people who are unprepared for the huge responsibility of caring for them. By working with shelters and rescue societies to adopt rabbits instead of selling them, PETCO has joined a number of other companies that have already made the responsible decision not to add to the bunny overpopulation crisis.

But still …

PETCO, like PetSmart, continues to sell countless other animals who are bred, born, and warehoused in cruel animal mills such as Rainbow World Exotics (RWE). We met with PETCO last January before breaking our RWE investigation to show its representatives footage of the horrific conditions we found during our investigation at RWE. Though PETCO pledged to make some improvements, it continues to buy small animals from RWE.

RWE and other suppliers are so awful, and animal shelters and rescues are bursting at the seams with animals of all shapes and sizes. We hope that PETCO will continue to move in the right direction and soon stop selling all animals in its stores—and that PetSmart, Petland, and others will follow in PETCO's footsteps.

Written by Jeff Mackey

After receiving a call from a concerned member informing us that arts and crafts superstore AC Moore was selling rabbit pelts (the skin and fur of a whole rabbit), PETA wrote to AC Moore CEO Rick Lepley about this issue, and immediately received the following promising response:

Just three days later, AC Moore sent us this letter confirming that they are removing the pelts from their stores and online catalog, and have adopted a permanent no fur policy! Not to get all cheesy on you, but this is a beautiful example of how one person can make a huge difference—thanks to one alert activist, a chain of events was set in motion that resulted in a big victory for animals within a week.

Thank you to AC Moore for their speedy, understanding, and compassionate response. If every company were this easy to work with, we could all retire early. Or at least take, like, a long weekend every now and then.

Bebe's recent announcement that it is going fur-free is nothing short of a cheap media stunt, since they're still planning to sell the skins of tortured bunnies through the winter. For the past year, we’ve been negotiating with the clothing retailer to pull the fur from their shelves, and today, in a clear attempt to stop a forthcoming boycott campaign, the company sent out a news release that they must have hoped would ward off protests. Unfortunately, while it's a step, it doesn't go far enough.

The rabbits killed to be made into cuffs and collars for bebe spend their entire lives in tiny, filthy cages, and die gruesome deaths at the hands of fur farmers, who break their necks or smash their skulls—more concerned about preserving the pelt than they are about the welfare of these tortured animals.

All of bebe's competitors have stopped selling fur including Ann Taylor, Charlotte Russe, Donna Karen, Express, Gap, H&M, J. Crew, Jones Apparel, Polo Ralph Lauren, Talbots, Tommy Hilfiger, Urban Outfitters, Wet Seal, Zara, and more. Plenty of choices for shopping this holiday season!

Please click here to contact bebe and ask that they pull the fur from their shelves immediately. Even one more day of bebe selling rabbit fur is too long.

It's time for your WTF of the day, this one courtesy of Trinity Christian Academy in Jacksonville. Evidently, a biology teacher at the school invited students to attend an after-school session in which he fed a live rabbit to a student’s pet python. The teacher dangled the helpless animal in front of the snake and moved her from side to side to encourage the snake to attack. A video of the vicious little act was posted on YouTube, presumably so that other students around the country can be desensitized to animal suffering as well. You can check out some of the press coverage here, and we've written a letter to the school asking them to make humane education a priority at Trinity Christian Academy and enclosing a "Kindness Kit" (look, I didn't come up with the name, OK?) with some handy tips, educational videos, and information on how to teach kids to interact with animals—like not killing bunnies in the frickin' classroom, for a start. You can read that letter here.

Employees at a Burberry in Philadelphia were surprised to come into work yesterday morning and find these two lovely ladies painted from head to toe in Burberry's signature plaid design and a little fake blood to drive home the point that Burberry tortures animals for fur. Glorious.

Just weeks after Pepsi announced that it would stop testing on animals, Coca-Cola has sent a letter to PETA announcing that it will no longer fund or conduct animal experiments. Coke had something of a history of invasive animal experimentation—including cutting open chimpanzees’ faces in order to conduct taste tests and force-feeding chemicals to rodents to test “caramel color”—so this compassionate decision by the company is a huge step forward, and it sends a powerful message to all companies that still test on animals about how a responsible, progressive company does business. Here's what Coca-Cola's senior vice president, Danny Strickland, said in his letter to us announcing the company's decision:

Strickland also talked about a deadly physiology test on taste reception in rats that PETA had discovered Coca-Cola was funding through the year 2008, saying, “Recently senior management became aware that research involving rats was being conducted as part of a grant we had funded at Virginia Commonwealth University to study taste reception. We have contacted the University and have discontinued our funding.” This is a big victory for animals and an encouraging sign that animal experimentation is rapidly on its way to becoming another chapter in the history of severely messed-up stuff we wish we had never thought of in the first place.