Alternatives to fur

Dear Editor,

The other day I was at a hair salon waiting for my grandmother, when I encountered an older lady wearing a long fur coat. Of course, the coat became the topic of conversation with everyone ooohing and aaahing, and the woman was positively glowing.

I felt obliged to speak up and give my opinion as well. I told them I thought the coat was horrible and cruel. Perhaps I should have also mentioned that the fur probably looked much better on the back of whatever animal it was stolen from, but I didn't get that far.

A woman who worked at the salon and piped up and announced that there wasn't an animal on the earth that she wouldn't kill to have a fur coat, and then proclaimed that that's what they're there for. How cold and indignant! What high regards we hold ourselves in, to suspect that mother animals birth their children purposely to be exploited for the fur industry!

Looking from a scientific perspective, crocodiles existed long before man, so perhaps we exist to serve them? In fact, many animals precede humans by centuries! Maybe we should turn ourselves into human skin boots for the crocodiles, and human hair scarves for the minks?

My point being, why does anyone feel the need to wear fur? Why are people willing to pay outrageously high prices for an animal to have their lives taken, and their very skin ripped off their backs? Why is it somehow glamourous to wear the skin from a dead animal? It isn't because we are lacking materials (such as cotton) to make cruelty-free clothing. It isn't because cruelty-free clothing is expensive (actually it is much cheaper). It is because they are careless. Perhaps they have never thought about it.....or don't have the capacity to comprehend the pain caused to another living being in lieu of that fur jacket. Perhaps they are just terribly sadistic and enjoy the thought that they are wearing death itself.

Of course those animals feel pain (some of them are actually skinned alive, which is perhaps a relief in comparison to the filthy, crowded, deplorable conditions they live on in fur farms). It is scientifically impossible for something that has a central nervous system, much like ours, to be unable to feel pain. The mere existence of a nervous system is proof in itself. As long as the nervous system is functioning, the nerve endings are sending information, and the brain is interpreting it. Scientific, biological evidence makes it impossible to dispute that animals indeed have feelings. As for wild fur collected by commercial slaughters such as the Canadian seal hunt, lets just say you will hear from me again in a couple months when THAT atrocity starts. Heritage...tradition ....puleeze! Imagine the beauty of belly dancing in Hawaii....now compare it to scarlet covered ice pans covered in thousands of skinless bodies, eyes bulging from uncovered skulls staring at nothing in particular. Which tradition would you be proud of? In closing, I would like to simply state that fur is an outdated, barbaric concept. There ARE synthetic alternatives which do not involve ripping the skin off anther creatures back.

Amanda Green

Lewisporte