I recently received a message from my boyfriend telling me I should be very proud of him. I immediately called him back, anxiously awaiting the good news. When I heard his response, I couldn't help but roll my eyes: He had refrained from buying a rabbit fur coat.
While shopping with his mother, my boyfriend became enamored with the coat upon touching its luxurious fur. When the salesman said he'd cut the price in half, my boyfriend's mother agreed to buy the item. Though having a fur in the closet was tempting, my boyfriend thought of me, declined the purchase and avoided facing my wrath.
While I was happy with his refusal, I can't exactly say I was proud. He lives in Los Angeles, after all. The only time the fur would even see the air would be during his family's ski trip. Instead of jet-setting on my boyfriend's back, the fur should be hopping around the world on top of a rabbit.
I see no reason to wear fur. Unlike our ancestors, who were deprived of central heating and remote-control fireplaces, our generation has no excuse.
According to the group In Defense of Animals, you must kill 30 rabbits to create a single rabbit fur coat. Other types of animal-fur coats require "at least 55 wild mink, 35 ranched mink, 40 sables, 11 lynx, 18 red foxes, 11 silver foxes, 100 chinchillas, nine beavers, 30 muskrats, 15 bobcats, 25 skunks, 14 otters, 125 ermines, 30 possums, 100 squirrels or 27 raccoons."
So why cause pain when there are an abundance of fur alternatives available?
Fashionable designers, including Stella McCartney, Betsey Johnson and Todd Oldham, refrain from using animal products in their designs, substituting synthetic materials for fur and leather. For more affordable options, H&M, Forever 21 and Gap all supply fake fur alternatives.
And for those studying abroad, the United Kingdom's immensely popular fashion chain Topshop has the decal "All our Fur Is Fake" prominently displayed on their store windows.
Fake furs are also accessible online. Purrfect Fur, featured in Allure magazine, offers fur accessories such as headbands, cuffs, handbags and mufflers. Fashionable-Furs, seen in magazines like InStyle, Cosmopolitan and People, offers faux fur worn by celebrities such as Ice-T, Tiffani Amber-Thiessen and Patti LaBelle. Jennifer Love Hewitt even ordered a faux-fur doggie coat for her pup!
The prices of faux fur make your wallet happy without compromising your warmth. According to Fashionable-Furs' Web site, "the R-value, how heat retention is measured, of faux fur and animal fur is actually about the same. Individual fibers trap body heat, whether they're fabric fibers or an animal's skin."
Furthermore, faux fur, once thought of as cheap and trashy, is now a global fashion statement. Celebrities including Rachel Leigh Cook, Shannon Elizabeth, Mena Suvari, Robert Downey Jr., Rosario Dawson and Anne Hathaway all dress fur-free.
With so many other options, it is illogical and cruel to buy real fur. According to the Fund for Animals, roughly 40 million animals are killed yearly for the fur trade. And they meet their death in unseemly ways: "Standard killing methods in fur factories are gassing and neck-breaking for mink, anal electrocution and poison injection for foxes, and neck-breaking and genital electrocution for chinchillas."
Despite the ruthless facts, after a ten year hiatus, people are returning to fur. As reported by the Fur Information Council of America, "fur sales figures for 2003 were the highest reported since 1991."
Many attribute fur's rising sales rates to its new popularity among younger generations. In the past, fur was seen as a luxury item for wealthy older women. In the 1990s, fur became unfashionable - somewhat due to the stock market crash of 1987 and partly as a result of PETA's powerful campaigns. I'm sure everyone remembers Christy Turlington and other models' naked bodies in the "I'd Rather Go Naked Than Wear Fur" advertisements.
Of late, however, fur trends have skewed younger. The Southwick Association reported that "over 55 percent of [fur] purchases in 2003 were made by consumers under 44 years of age."
One reason is the recent affordability of fur. You can buy a fur-trimmed hoodie from Bloomingdales for $80. While you may rationalize this purchase, thinking the lavish fur is just scraps from another coat, think again: Animals are exclusively murdered for trim. According to The Fund for Animals, if "trends continue, more animals may soon be killed for fur trim than for full-length fur coats."
Now, I'm not asking you to throw away your Juicy Couture fur-trimmed parka from last season. I would be a hypocrite - my leather coat will most likely make an appearance this weekend. Nor am I requesting that you toss a tofu pie at fur-wearers, like PETA demonstrators did to Vogue editor Anna Wintour during Paris Fashion Week.
I am simply asking that this winter season, you take a step toward animal activism by trying not to fall into the season's fur-frenzy. Not only will you save money by going faux, but you will more importantly give a fox, bunny or bobcat the best Christmas present in the world: life.
