To Fur or Not to Fur

Humans do not eat fox and mink, the two most popular furs for fashion. This means that the animals are raised or hunted and killed solely to harvest their fur. An inhumane practice that was boycotted by supermodels such as Naomi Campbell, Claudia Schiffer and Elle Macpherson, who proudly posed for PETA nude, proclaiming that they would "rather go naked than wear fur".

This was a time when the cruel killing of a living creature just for a luxury fashion piece was thought of as nothing more than a needless waste of life. Fur was taboo. Fur was unacceptable. Fur was viewed as ethically wrong. And unfortunately, times have changed, they have changed in the wrong directions. Fur has crept back into fashion but spared of the outcry of controversy. In the autumn/winter 2013 runway collections alone, according to British Vogue, nearly 70 per cent of fashion designers used fur. The Head of International Marketing for Saga Furs, one of the major fur manufacturers worldwide, claims this is "almost the golden age in fur".

So, where is the fur coming from? While many pro-fur lobbyists have argued that fur is simply a by-product of the meat industry, this justification is mostly unfounded. The world's fur trade is largely sourced from animals such as minks and foxes. Unlike some areas of the leather industry, these animals are bred purely for their skins alone. Traditionally fur is mostly sourced from fur farms, where animals are born and raised in the confines of small cages.

"Eighty-five percent of the fur industry's skins come from animals raised in 'battery' cages, where animals are deprived of quality of life and of the ability to perform their natural and instinctual behaviors," says a spokesperson for Animals Australia.

So, how can we actually persuade people to say no to this cruelty and stop wearing fur for the sake of preserving animals? Arguably, it seems that the only way to ensure the buyer will not be supporting an industry of cruelty is to turn to faux fur instead. Luckily the faux fur industry has been increasingly expanding, with the quality and range of furs growing by demand, but unfortunately high fashion labels don’t seem to collaborate in that case.

According to Mark Oaten, the CEO of the International Fur Trade Federation, high fashion labels such as Fendi, Marc Jacobs, Mulberry and Gucci are putting fur at the forefront of what is considered fashionable, the global sale of fur has increased by 70 percent to around $15 billion in the past decade. As the demand for fur increases, one may wonder, where are those same supermodels of 1994 that once proclaimed they would never wear fur again? They have all since reverted unashamedly back to wearing fur once more, suggesting that maybe taking a stand against the fur trade in the 90s was merely just another passing fashion trend.