Although the Build-A-Bear Workshop has taken down the videos, Chief Executive Officer Maxine Clark defended it them a statement posted at the Web site, The St. Louis Post-Dispatch reported Wednesday.

“Our intention with the polar bear story was to inspire children, through the voices of our animal characters, to make a difference in their own individual ways,” Clark said in her letter. “We did not intend to politicize the topic of global climate change or offend anyone in any way.”

The videos include a polar bear warning Santa the North Pole might melt before Christmas. Clark pointed out the series has a happy ending with Santa Claus leaving for his Christmas Eve trip.

Conservative bloggers accused the company of aiming propaganda at children.

“It is one thing to use fear-mongering and scare tactics when attempting to win adults over to a particular point of view; it is quite another when using those tactics against very young, impressionable children,” Darren Pope of Examiner.com said in a letter to Clark posted on his Web site.

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