Filed under: Fur Free
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No one actually thinks that they are contributing to animal cruelty if they buy a fur coat or fur-trimmed boots. It is hard to imagine that the fur on your jacket once kept an animal warm, before it was killed. Everyone knows that fur comes from animals, but what most people don’t realize is just how inhumanely these animals are killed, just for their fur - just for human clothing and extravagance. Each year over fifty million animals are killed for their fur. They aren’t just euthanized (wouldn’t that be nice) they are beaten and clubbed and stabbed and skinned alive. The animals don’t just suffer in death, they suffer throughout their entire lives, from being trapped in extremely painful and bloody traps, to living in small cages until they are eventually brutally murdered - Ending their misery only after they are killed.
Another largely hidden aspect of the fur trade is that these animals being killed for their fur are not always wild. In fact millions of cats and dogs - domestic cats and dogs- are killed every year for their fur. This fur trade is extremely common in China and other parts of Asia. They are stuffed together in small cages and beaten to death just like the wild animals. Can you imagine your pet dog or cat being beaten to death, with a club, or your dog or cat being picked up by its hind legs and having its head slammed on the cement? The dogs and cats are raised in parts of Asia, but their fur is sent worldwide.
In fact, a lot of this fur is labeled “faux fur”. It wasn’t that long ago that P. Diddy’s clothing line was found to contain real fur, even though it was labeld “faux”. P. Diddy issued an apology of sorts, but he didn’t know that the fur was real. So basically, even if you already wear “faux fur”, there is a slight chance that it may be real anyway.
Its not only in Asia that dogs and cats are affected by the fur trade. Many dogs and cats in America get caught in snares and bear traps set up for wild animals. Go to the website below to see a picture of someone’s pet dog pinned by a bear trap, with the metal digging in its skin.
http://www.hsus.org/furfree/dogs_cats/dog_and_cat_victims.html
If you want to make sure you never buy fur, go to this website. It has a list of retailers that refuse to sell real fur. Some common fur-free clothing lines include: Abercrombie and Fitch, Aeropostale, American Apparel, bebe stores (starting january 2008), Delias, Foot Locker, Forever 21, the Gap and H&M. The list goes on and on, so you won’t be limited in your choices by going fur-free.
http://www.hsus.org/furfree/fashion/retailers/furfree_retailers_designers.html
If you happen to own any clothing made of real fur and you no longer want it, you can donate it to the Humane Society of the United States, and they will use it to help nurse orphaned wild animals. The baby animals snuggle up to the fur and believe that it is their mother.
http://www.hsus.org/furfree/campaigns/c4c/
I am including a link to a video called “the life and death of China’s Racoon Dog” and it shows the brutal killings of these animals- millions of them - they are bashed on the ground and literally skinned alive (all shown on the video) . Click on the link that says “Play the Video”. I watch many of these videos, that is how I keep up with all the new animal rights issues, but this video was a bit much for me, I had to turn it off.
http://www.hsus.org/video_clips/life_and_death_of_chinas.html
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