Why is real fur coats better?

Answer 1

The fur ads you might see in magazines and commercials portray fur coats as a symbol of elegance. But these ads fail to show how the original owners of these coats met their gruesome deaths.

Millions of fur-bearing animals including foxes, raccoons, minks, coyotes, bobcats, lynxes, opossums, nutria, beavers, muskrats, otters, and others are killed each year on fur farms by anal and vaginal electrocution and in the wild by drowning, trapping, or beating.

To kill the animals without damaging their fur, trappers usually strangle, beat, or stomp them to death. Animals on fur farms may be gassed, electrocuted, poisoned with strychnine, or have their necks snapped. These methods are not 100 percent effective and some animals "wake up" while being skinned.

Many animals are endangered or extinct because of this practice.

Fur is not 'green'. Marketers of fur products have always compared the bio degradation of fur to only fake fur. It is important to realize that the alternative to fur is any and every fabric and textile there is. Fur is no better than the many fabrics out there that also decompose easily. The term, "biodegradable", remains unregulated in Canada.3 It may be surprising to note that certain types of plastic bags are also being marketed as biodegradable. According to Don Jardine, Director of Pollution Prevention with PEI's Department of Environment, "Companies are using their own standards. It may say biodegrade, even if it takes 15 years." 4 It is also interesting to note that marketers of fur products contradict themselves claiming that fur biodegrades and lasts for generations. How long, exactly, does it take for the chemically soaked and treated fur coats to break down in the landfill - Generations?

Buzz words, such as "organic" or "natural" have also been misleadingly used by the fur trade. To describe a product as "organic" or "natural" is to imply that the production of such product involves neither artificial chemical treatment nor disruption to our eco-system. The washing, drying, tanning, dyeing, and trimming of fur require extensive chemical treatment. The trapping and removing of millions of wildlife from our environment is disruptive to our eco-system. And there is certainly nothing natural or green about cruelly ripping the skins off the animals' backs.

Not purchasing fur from animals will decrease the demand for it and therefore hunter's will have no need to kill animals for their fur.

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http://www.crueltyisnotgreen.com/

Answer 2

There are many reasons why a real fur coat is better than faux fur.

Real fur is denser with a leather base layer, dense underfur, and protective guard hair layer making it much warmer and more weather proof than faux, also it prevents windchill, but allows the skin to "breathe" naturally through the leather. Faux is basically a "plastic" material and is not as efficient as leather in terms of breathability.

Whatever your views are on killing animals for our use, the fact is that animals reproduce indefinately and therefore real fur is an infinately renewable resource, whereas faux fur is made from petrochemicals and is therefore non sustainable.

A real fur coat is hand made, and therefore tends to be better quality. A real fur coat can last more than a lifetime and be passed to the next generation, and can be remodelled as required. A faux fur coat tends to last a few seasons and then will begin to look scruffy, and out of style. It is then discarded where it will remain in landfill or the oceans for centurys. (see next paragraph).

A real fur is made from protein and will break down naturally and quickly in the soil through the actions of moulds and bacteria, and the ingredients then pass back into the food chain. A faux fur coat is an organic petrochemical and will not break down for hundreds if not thousands of years. Even then it just breaks down into smaller and smaller particles, the totally man made chemicals will remain in the environment fot ever.

Synthetic microfibres originating from synthetic clothing washed in washing machines are now found in sea water sample taken from any ocean in the world. These are ingested by algae and zooplankton, and work their way up the food chain becoming more concentrated as they do so. This is a real and serious problem and at the moment is only the tip of the iceberg. We HAVE to try and reduce our use of synthetic clothing

The manufacture of faux fur requires oil, high temperatyres and pressures, and an immense drilling, transport and factory infastructure to make it. It's manufacture produces many many toxic, man made chemicals that leach into air, soil and water. It requires dyes and fire retardents, and many "plasticing" chemicals to make it useable and wearable, most of these chemicals are toxic or produce toxic byproducts in their manufacture.

If you count up the unseen slaughter of wildlife, and destruction of habitats that results from the production of faux fur, and related synthetic fibre clothing, it causes far greater damage to the environment and biodiversity than real fur ever can.

Real fur is produced naturally requiring only food fed to the animal, (usually waste food from humans). Because real fur is produced on a tiny scale compared to faux, the byproducts of tanning are controllable, and are a lot more benign than than the byproducts of faux manufacture.

The texture of real fur is totally different to faux (one is protein, the other is organic hydrocarbons). Real fur is therefore much more pleasant to touch. it feels smoother and does not have the slight "sticky" texture that faux fur often has. It therefore feels more comfortable and luxurious to wear.

Real fur is not only usefull in extreme temperature conditions. On any cold day, fur's wind proof qualities mean that you can wear a fur coat with minimal layers underneath and still stay warm and snug. This is ideal for today's modern shops which are usually kept very hot in winter. Taking off and carrying the coat means you can shop comfortably wearing just a light top in a warm shop instead of having to carry around a coat, sweater, possibly scarf etc. all of which you have had to discard in order to cool down.

Real fur needs only occasional cleaning using natural ingredients such as sawdust, Faux fur requires cleaning using organic cleansers, or detergents and water which then leaches chemicals and micro-plastic particles into the water courses. These micro particles are becoming quite a problem to wildlife, they are ingested, and cause all sorts of health problems, cancers and death.

On these counts real fur is infinately preferable to faux. It boils down to how animals are treated for fur production. Most fur farms in the West, (contrary to what animal rights groups would have you believe) follow very strict animal welfare practices, ensuring the animals are brought up healthy and happy and despatched quickly and painlessly. Stories about animals used for their fur have to be skinned alive are completely untrue.

The biggest irony is that the actions of animal rights groups in the West are causing many well run fur farms to be closed down, sending much of the fur farm business to China, where the potential for animal abuse is far greater than in the West.. For the first time, and in some way helped by the animal rights groups, the Chinese fur industry is just about to overtake the Western fur industry. The fur industry worldwide is growing, and China is not going to go away. It has a huge potential for growth which it is already capitalising on. Until China tightens up its regulations, this is putting far more animals at risk of abuse than if they were being farmed in the West where the fur trade is conducted to very high standards.

Thankfully China is taking great steps to regulate it's fur industry, so this is becoming les and less of a problem.

Many people go to the animal rights websites such as PETA for their information about fur. This information is usually prejudiced, misleading, and in many cases outright lying. People who believe this information have usually already made their mind up about fur and believe these websites because they can cherry pick information that supports their pre judged beliefs. This is the wrong approach. For information about ANYTHING you go to the experts first (in this case those working in the fur industry) and learn from them BEFORE making a judgement.

It maybe that some people are against the killing and the farming of animals. This is their belief and it is fine for them to believe so. They can chose therefore not to wear fur. But it doesn't mean that fur production and the use of fur is wrong either morally or ethically. And it certainly does not give them the right to criticise, abuse or attack others over issues based on the lies and misinformation they have read on extremist animal rights websites.

Many many people wear fur because they believe that it is morally the better alternative. Fur's sustainability, production, practicality, and long lifespan make it infinitely better than faux fur on many counts, and the bonus is that it is also luxurious and supremely warm to wear

Answer 3

Faux means false or fake, so a faux fur coat is better because no animals are kill. There is a myth that faux fur is bad for the environment and that real fur is a greener alternative. In reality, criticising faux fur only for the reason that it comes from the petrochemical industry is nonsense. We don't live in a petrol-free world. So many things are 'made of oil' that is almost impossible to list them all.

Everything around us is made out of 'oil'! Plastic and synthetic fabrics are derived from oil. Even if you don't own a car yourself, it's what's used to deliver and package everything. It's used to make your laptop or your mobile or your tv.

A comprehensive study that was made public last year showed that the environmental impact of natural mink fur coats and trims is higher than the impact of faux fur coats and trims.

Ecologists state that all farming activities have a negative impact on our environment.

That is why real fur has one of the biggest carbon footprints on our planet in the textile sector. 1 kg of mink fur requires on a minimum basis 750 / 1000 L of water to produce. It is considered as a huge waste in natural resource when you know that 66 millions of mink were raised and killed in 2013 alone.

The thing is that we simply do not need fur. Fur is sold in most places where it is not necessary, often as a frivolous decoration. Even in a non-vegetarian world, wearing animal fur when alternatives are widely available is an ethical nonsense. In the coldest places in the world you can meet people wearing high tech fabrics, smart textiles and modern clothing. They actually are warmer than real fur and offer better protection from humidity or heat loss. Those fabrics are made by scientists. You won't see someone climbing the everest in sable coat!

Then there is the issue of animal welfare. In our modern civilization the question of animal rights is becoming increasingly important: a true civilizational challenge.

In the media, discussions are frequently opened by intellectuals about the way we consider animals. Veterinarians, ethologists, and neuroscientists remind us that animals are still treated as disposable products, no different from cars, furniture, or any other human-owned property, while they are sensitive creatures capable of feeling pain and distress.

Facts only.

Even if we are indeed in a meat eating world the simple fact to not wear real fur will spare the lives of millions of animals. In fur farms, animals are caged during their entire lives. Studies show that fur-farmed mink suffer from captivity frustration even after 70 generations. One study published by the zoology department of the University of Oxford clearly suggested that mink kept in cages were enduring immense distress and anxiety. Within the framework of a non invasive experiment, mink deprived of natural activities for 24 hours, like swimming in a pool had a 50% increase in the stress hormone.

Another fundamental study concluded that enriched environment has no effect on animal welfare. enrichments were not sufficient to decrease or interrupt stereotypic behaviours. There is evidence that animals still need to perform natural activities as it was emphasised in a recent study:

"farm mink still use water basins for swimming voluntarily, willingly and extensively although the animals are considered to be domesticated and this is often used as an argument that the behavior of wild mink can not be compared to the behavior of farmed mink."

We acknowledge that some might believe that the animal perspective is not easy to interpret. That is why we must err on the side of caution.

A greener fashion industry is possible. Promoting more sustainable society, that is fairer to animals. Using recycled fabrics, organic and sustainable textiles, which do not imply the killing of millions of animals.