I have a real problem with wearing fur… You will not see me with it on, ever. The level of cruelty is just horrible and I just don’t see the need to wear fur in a modern society. Yes, I’ve heard the argument from my Russian and Scandinavian friends and they may be right, it probably is a bit warmer, but even in -20ºC, I’ve managed without fur. Being a little bit colder than those around me but knowing that I’m not wearing the fur of an animal who has lived and died in an inhumane manner seems a very, very fair trade-off.
Here’s a very strong video from PETA (People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals). Notice I said ‘strong’? I meant it, so don’t watch it if you don’t want to see what really goes on.
H/T to Queers United
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Tags: animal cruely, fur trade, PETA
The level of cruelty is spinned by organizations like peta. In Denmark the welfare for mink is well documented, whereas all those peta movies show pictures from China that are horrible – but not at all representative for the fur industry. Think twice before leaning to much towards what peta and the like claims – they are rather radical:
Even if animal research resulted in a cure for AIDS, we’d be against it. — Ingrid Newkirk, President, PETA (Vogue, September, 1989).
To those people who say, `My father is alive because of animal experimentation,’ I say `Yeah, well, good for you. This dog died so your father could live.’ Sorry, but I am just not behind that kind of trade off. — Bill Maher, PETA celebrity spokesman.
The life of an ant and the life of my child should be accorded equal respect. — Michael W. Fox, Vice President, The Humane Society (The Associated Press, Jan. 15, 1989).
PETA is useless and a joke at times. They also can be insensitive (prime example: the bus murder in Canada this year where PETA used the same example to mimic slaughterhouses).
No matter how the animal is treated, however, still results in the same thing: being killed as a piece of property for you to wear or eat. I don’t think the animal, if they actually had a say in the matter, likes this. One of the reasons I’m vegan.
Linus’s last blog post..Happy Holidays — see ya in a week.
thanks for re-posting, I am vegan after watching http://www.meat.org
queerunity’s last blog post..Word of the Gay: "Trans-sistah"
Kenneth,
Thank you for your feedback. Like all activist organisations, I can understand that PETA is very radical and your quotations are a good balance to my article. It doesn’t change my feelings about fur, I do believe that it is outré in a modern society, but I don’t believe that all of PETA’s arguments are valid. I do still eat meat, though I try to buy from local farmers I trust so that I don’t buy meat from animals which have been treated industrially and I do wear leather, but don’t buy leather goods from companies without an ethical stance on where the leather comes from (plus avoiding exotic leathers).
However, going back to the fur trade, the vast majority of fur comes from Russia and China and none of these countries have animal rights laws plus the majority of the fur trade is far too industrialised, with animals caged before killing which focusses primarily on maintaining fur quality rather than reducing animal stress and pain. The source of furs is extremely difficult to ascertain for the majority of consumers and the risk of buying fur from a source which treats animals terribly is just too high.
Were wearing fur a life-saver, I could understand finding ethically sourced fur a valid idea. However, wearing a fur is not comparable with having lives saved from a global pandemic (AIDS or virulent influenzas, for example). Wearing fur is a fashion statement where there are completely replaceable alternatives, functionally speaking.