Can you believe that it takes as many as 40 animals to make just one fur coat? It’s true! Every year, millions of animals such as coyotes, bobcats, lynxes, opossums, beavers, muskrats, otters, foxes, minks, bunnies, and raccoons are trapped, drowned, or beaten to death in the wild and strangled, gassed, or electrocuted on fur farms. “Fur farm” is the name given to farms that house animals just for the purpose of turning their fur into clothing. Some trappers use painful steel-jaw leghold traps to catch wild animals to be sent to the fur farms. Dogs, cats, birds, and other animals are often caught in the traps, and many actually chew off their legs to get free. It’s horrible how these animals are treated and just for somebody to wear a piece of clothing.
Animals that are farmed for their fur live in filthy conditions and are fed meat byproducts which is food that’s not considered fit for humans to eat. Minks, chinchillas, foxes, hamsters, raccoons, and other animals on fur farms are stuck in cages where they’re exposed to all sorts of weather conditions, including the blazing hot sun, pounding rain, and snow. They are treated like garbage. These animals suffer from numerous physical and behavioral abnormalities induced by the stress of caging conditions. These animals are treated like machines and not like the living breathing beings that they are.
Farmers can house and slaughter animals any way they see fit and frequently these animals live miserable lives and have excruciatingly painful deaths. Workers at these fur farms frequently skin these animals while they are still alive and struggling desperately when they are flipped onto their backs or hung by their legs or tails to skin them. When workers on these farms begin to cut the skin and fur from an animal's leg, the free limbs kick and writhe. Workers stomp on the necks and heads of animals who struggle too hard to allow a clean cut. When the fur is finally peeled off over the animals' heads, their naked, bloody bodies are thrown onto a pile of those who have gone before them. Some are still alive, breathing in ragged gasps and blinking slowly. Some of the animals' hearts are still beating five to 10 minutes after they are skinned. Killing animals for their fur is murder and should be illegal.
Ways of preventing the use of animal furs are endless. You could use other things such as cotton, polyester or other synthetic materials that can be made into a substance that looks like animal fur, buying and wearing clothing that contains faux or fake fur or just completely eliminating all fur clothing from your wardrobe. The only way that this animal cruelty will stop is if fur farms and using real animal fur in clothing is completely banned. I hope somebody somewhere will learn something from this essay and stop buying fur clothing. The smallest things will help stop this horrible fad.
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Where and how is your food grown and where do your clothes, shoes, and personal items come from.
I only ask these questions to see whether or not you're ok with slave labor and big agriculture.
Do you own or use anything that was made in China? If yes, thank you for supporting the genocide in Darfur.
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"We cannot redeem evil, we must combat it." -- Jean Paul Sartre
Not that I support or buy fur...
... but do you really think their product would be worth anything if they treated the animals as you describe? Only healthy animals have nice fur coats.
If you believe killing animals is murder... then you better stop enjoying your leather belts and sneakers, and also stop eating meat.
There is a difference between abuse and humane slaughter. Stereotyping any type of agriculture (and fur farms are a form of agriculture) is just as bad as stereotyping people.
Straight from the FICA (Fur information council of America) FAQ website:
engkatiemarie also brings up a valid point--unhealthy animals do not have pretty furs. Thin, dull furs don't sell nearly as well as full, shiny ones. Mistreating animals is bad for business.
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/sawaboof
"...There is a crushing guilt that comes with being a Catholic. Whether things are good or bad or you're simply... eating tacos in the park, there is always the crushing guilt."
-30 Rock-
Do you have an unbiased source for that claim?
People have worn leather and fur since the beginning of time. Why stop now? The problem is not with wearing animals, it's with treating them inhumanely BEFORE wearing them.
I'd much rather an animal doesn't go to waste. What about cow hides, for instance? I'd rather they don't all go to waste after people eat the meat.
Do you have an unbiased source for that claim?
You mean, like PETA?
...
sorry.
My smart ass fingers shall now stop their typing.
http://www.progressiveu.org/blog/sawaboof
"...There is a crushing guilt that comes with being a Catholic. Whether things are good or bad or you're simply... eating tacos in the park, there is always the crushing guilt."
-30 Rock-
I just bought a cow hide leather jacket for a co-worker and have a wallet made of cow hide in my pocket. very little goes to waste anymore, look up the ingedients for hot dogs(unless you like to eat them).
I didnt realise this would cause so much conteversy. But I like hearing other peoples ideas and opinions.
I just wanted to add...
Fur is the longest-lasting animal product. You eat something - the energy lasts you a couple hours, maybe a day or two. But a fur coat can keep you warm for - literally - decades.