CLUB SANDWICH 79

AND IN THE GREEN CORNER

"Fur is back" is the slogan being touted by the perpetrators of the seemingly glamorous but actually gruesome fur trade. Although never eradicated, fur as fashion has been in decline for a decade but there are signs of its return, and the trend is worrying Mark Clover of the British-based worldwide organisation Respect for Animals

            Each winter for at least the last five years the fur trade has tried to convey one simple message - "fur is back". It has said it in press releases, in its own trade papers and to anyone it could find who would listen.
            But until now this annual clarion call has been little more than hype and public relations puffery, lacking in accuracy. Perhaps it was just an attempt to boost the morale of a morally bankrupt and declining industry. The grim truth, however, is that there are ominous signs that fur sales are on the increase, in the UK and elsewhere around the world.
            "Fur is back" is a slogan with terrifying overtones. More fur means more animals trapped and more animals reared in fur factory farms, just for the skins off their backs.
            Each year some 40 million animals are killed to supply the demands of the fur trade, and - if indeed "fur is back" - this figure will be on the increase. Forty million animals is already more than one animal for every second of every minute of every day of the year. The number of fox bred in captivity during 1995 was 3,384,000 - up by ten per cent on 1994 - and the number of animals trapped in Canada during the winter of 1994-95 was 1.3 million -an increase of 27 per cent over the previous year - including more than three thousand bears, almost a third of a million beavers, 4875 lynx and even 21,132 otters, true horror lying just under the fur trade's thin skin of glamour, and all sacrificed for the vanity of people.
            The most-used trap to catch animals in the wild remains the outdated and barbaric steel-jawed leg-hold device. Banned throughout Europe because of its extreme cruelty, it is used to target animals such as beaver, often set in a way that the animal, once caught, will drown. Obscene research carried out in laboratories far away from public gaze has shown that a beaver can take as long as 25 minutes to lose its struggle for life when held under water in this way. This is the harsh reality behind an industry promoted with glossy photographs and glitzy catwalk shows.
            Animals bred in captivity for their fur are treated just as appallingly. They are kept in tiny, barren, wire cages for the entirety of their miserable lives. More than 25 million mink are bred in this way each year, in addition to 3.3 million fox. They are kept in cages measuring less than three feet square and spend their entire existence pacing on a wire floor, denied access to the water in which they would - if only they had the chance - swim and play and experience what life for a mink really should be like.
            Mink and fox are unlike other farm animals. They are predators, territorial and, in the case of mink, solitary; they are intelligent and inquisitive, similar in size and nature to cats and dogs. Except that they are still wild animals, and to incarcerate them in the way we do, and in such huge numbers, for something as trivial as a fur coat is surely unacceptable as we approach the end of the 20th century.
            This coming winter the fur trade will again try to ply its bloody wares to those who either don't know or don't care about the cruelty. The industry is a past master at hoodwinking the public and, as it blithely casts the suffering to one side, it has even developed its own callous language. The animals killed each year are referred to as a "crop" and are "harvested". The huge number of unwanted animals caught in the traps, killed or discarded to die later in agony, are "trash". Fur trapping is "wildlife management".
            While the arguments against the wearing of fur are comprehensive and, thankfully, widely accepted, the fur trade has vast sums of money with which to combat and overturn collective common sense. Retail fur sales in the US alone amount to $1.2 billion and this sort of sum generates very large PR budgets. More and more, fur is being seen in the fashion columns of British newspapers and magazines in a way that would have been rejected out of hand just two years ago. Allegedly, models are being bribed to be seen clad in fur.
            For the sake of decency and the sake of the animals we have to fight back.
            Not withstanding the imminently expected revival, it is in Britain where the most progress has been made in the campaign against the fur trade. Since 1985, when Respect for Animals' predecessor, Lynx, launched its advertising campaign, the UK fur trade has, quite literally, been decimated. Fur shops have closed in their droves as the demand for fur has fallen, and the number of fur factory farms has been reduced from 70 to 12.
            Like whaling, and the clubbing of seals, the fur issue is a worldwide concern. It is a catastrophe that knows no national borders and, similarly, the struggle against it must strike out across the world. To that end, Respect for Animals is keen to expand its highly successful campaign to the areas of the globe where fur is still worn without criticism, as well as ensuring that the battle in Britain remains effective. We need help if we are to succeed. An organisation like Respect for Animals cannot campaign without the backing of those who care.

            To find out more, contact me at Respect for Animals, Dept FT, PO Box 500, Nottingham NG1 3AS, England.