Faye Winter of ‘Love Island’: ‘Why I BEARed All for PETA’

Faye Winter of ‘Love Island’: ‘Why I BEARed All for PETA’

London – “When I heard that the iconic tall black caps worn by the Queen’s Guard are made out of the fur of slaughtered bears, I was gobsmacked and horrified,” writes Love Island star Faye Winter. “I wanted to do something that would turn heads and draw attention to this issue, so I decided to bear all for PETA.”

In an exclusive opinion piece for PETA, Winter reveals what happens to bears whose skin is used to make the Queen’s Guard’s caps, noting that it takes the skin of at least one bear to make each cap. “Bears, who ask for nothing from life but the chance to live it, are shot in Canada with guns – and sometimes even bows and arrows – for fun. Hunters pay for a licence to shoot them, then sell the pelts to auction houses from which they are purchased by the Ministry of Defence’s (MoD) cap makers.”

Winter, a lifelong animal lover, points out that in 2022, there’s simply no need for the MoD to continue to use cruel – and “old-fashioned” – animal skins and discusses how PETA and specialist faux furrier ECOPEL have created a fabric virtually indistinguishable from real bear fur.

Winter goes on to urge the public to support PETA’s campaign and calls on the MoD to stop using the fur of slaughtered black bears: “[I]t’s up to the younger generations – like you and me – to lead the way. … Do it for the bears!”

PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear” – notes that the MoD claims that bears are killed as part of Canadian government culls, but PETA has found no evidence that any culls of this sort exist in any province or territory of Canada. In addition, over £1 million of taxpayer money has been spent on 891 bearskin caps over the past seven years, even though ECOPEL has offered to provide the MoD with faux bear fur free of charge until 2030. A Populus opinion poll shows that 75% of the British public consider the Queen’s Guard’s bearskin caps to be a “bad use of Government funds”.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on Facebook, Twitter, or Instagram.

Contact:

Jennifer White +44 (0) 20 7837 6327; [email protected]

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