Killing Animals for Fur [For or Against]?

[Radical]

Before you post, please watch http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jv_S1SPIXME

Discuss

[ellipsis]

First, don't tell me what to do. I only have dial-up.

Second, I do not support killing for clothing material, especially bourgeois luxuries like fur. I do own leather and a bone necklace but didn't buy any of it. I am a textile freegan.

[the last donut of the night]

Second, I do not support killing for clothing material, especially bourgeois luxuries like fur.

Whoa there, cowboy. This isn't 1966 China. There is no such thing as a "bourgeois" object. It's just an object (which workers make, btw). So stop the whole lifestylism crap.

[chegitz guevara]

Fur or synthetics? Fur is a rewable and sustainable resource, properly done. It's much more environmentally friendly than making clothes out of petroleum. Plus, minks are evil, nasty creatures, and we're doing them a favor by killing them.

[ellipsis]

This isn't 1966 China. There is no such thing as a "bourgeois" object. It's just an object (which workers make, btw). So stop the whole lifestylism crap.

It isn't? There aren't? They are?

Many object are made by non-living mechanical tools called machines. Others are made by well paid artisans who own means of production. If a mink coat/stole, segway or diamond skin cream aren't bourgeois, then I guess I should start an NGO to supply the workers who are very deprived of these basic human rights.

I was only being half serious about "textile freeganism." I would think that the sheer absurdity of me saying that would clue you into my sarcasm.
Anyways, I wish I could be authentic enough to throw derogatory buzz words which don't really mean anything, like "lifestylism." Oh wait I can, you sound like a middle-class reactionary!

[proudcomrade]

Stuff like this is an unnecessary distraction from the revolutionary struggle; it is truly the stuff of liberals in search of a hobby. That disabled factory worker in the freezing-cold apartment in Buffalo would be only too happy to bundle up in some toasty-warm mink ass if the opportunity arose.

[ellipsis]

Very true comrade. But I wouldn't underestimate the depth that revolutionary changes will have to reach in order to make a truly utopian/egalitarian society.

[Yazman]

We don't expect a utopian society, that is a derogative term and can be applied to anything. Capitalism is utopian - the idea that via a free market everybody will become equal? Oh yeah and the only reason we're not all equal right now is because the market isn't free enough? LOL

Egalitarianism isn't utopian, theredson. Different doesn't mean "perfect", and neither does better.

[Saorsa]

As long as the animal isn't endangered, I couldn't care less. I eat meat, wear leather, don't have a problem with people wearing fur and what's more I support experiments being done on itsy-bitsy-cutesy-wutesy animals if it may lead to scientific progress that benefits humans.

Honestly, nobody ever makes a fuss about cruelty to animals unless the animals in question are cute at some point in their lives. If most scientific research using animals was done on cockroaches nobody would care.

[LOLseph Stalin]

I say it would be best to use the fur off an animal that is either already dead or close to dying(of course you would have to put it out of its misery first). In many cases, making products out of fur rather than other things can be more environmentally friendly. JUst make sure you're not taking it from an endangered species! That seems to be the problem with animals such as Leopards, Tigers, etc. Too many people are killing them for fur. Also, if you're killing an animal for food, you might as well make use of all parts.

[Jimmie Higgins]

Fur, food, whatever - as long as an entire species or ecosystem (even a small one) isn't being destroyed then it's fine by me in a worker's society. If we allow hunting, I'd rather someone make something from it than mount it on a wall or whatever - but that's just my personal tastes.

[Saorsa]

I say it would be best to use the fur off an animal that is either already dead or close to dying(of course you would have to put it out of its misery first).

Why?

Would you prefer to eat a steak that came from a cow that was already dead or close to dying of natural causes?

[LOLseph Stalin]

Why?

Would you prefer to eat a steak that came from a cow that was already dead or close to dying of natural causes?

I see that as a different scenario. You're eating the steak so you would expect that the animal is healthy when it gets sent to the slaughterhouse for best quality. If you're also the using the same animal for meat and fur, then go ahead and kill it. However, I just don't see the purpose of killing an animal solely for its fur.

[Saorsa]

I see that as a different scenario.Different in specifics, but it's underlying characteristics are pretty similar. An animal is being killed so that humans can benefit from it.


Your eating the steak so you would expect that the animal is healthy when it gets sent to the slaughterhouse for best quality.You're faith in the standards of the meat industry is touching. :lol:


If you're also the using the same animal for meat and fur, then go ahead and kill it. However, I just don't see the purpose of killing an animal solely for its fur. I'm sorry but this is just ridiculous. For one thing, the purpose of killing the animal for its fur is pretty obvious - for it's use-value, the fact that the fur can then be worn to stay warm and look stylish, and for it's exchange-value, the fact that the fur can then be sold for a profit. I fail to see how killing an animal soley for it's fur is any worse than killing an animal solely for it's meat. In both cases there's a use-value and an exchange-value, so it's not pointless, and I don't see how in either case it's morally wrong.

And come on, the animal is just as dead if you eat it's meat after you've skinned it. Eating it as well as taking it's fur doesn't change anything.

[NecroCommie]

Hunters are propably the most sadistic and cruel lot I have encountered, and believe me, I have encountered. If it were for me, sport hunting would be banned outright. These are usually the same wankers who get a boner when looking at a machine gun and daydream about killing humans. (In the context of war ofcourse, after all is war not "heroic"?) I am speaking out of my own extensive experience with hunters, whom populate half of my class at the moment.

As to animal industries, they are indeed cruel and immoral in my oppinion, but as said before the working class still needs certain products. Which is why animal industries should be abolished. Too much food and effort is placed on raising animals only to kill them afterwards to gain fur that is stylish. This goes especially when artificial fur is available, and can be made of high quality. I happen to own an artificial fur coat from an unnamed eastern-bloc germany, and I have not noticed any dramatic differences between the warmth of that coat, and the authentic fur coat of my mothers.

The last paragraph can be confirmed by taking a look at the energy consumption of the food chain. Everytime something living (like plants) are eaten by something other living (like animals), energy is wasted. This goes especially to animals, who "waste" energy by moving about and producing heat. This means basically that every year thousands after thousands of acres of farming products are farmed merely to make minks move about, which is absurd since we don't let them move more than inches at a time anyway. Then they are killed for products that could be replaced with products which take much less farming area to make.

http://lgfl.skoool.co.uk/uploadedImages/12.2_energy_food_chains.gif
All farming products are primary producers in this diagram, since all plants, and only plants are capable of photosynthesis. In retrospect, most fur animals take their place in the secondary consumer lot, if not even further down the food chain.

As it happens, also vegetarian food and artificial leather are cheaper than authentic one, proving once and for all that real animal products are mere luxury goods made to satisfy self-important bourgeois.

[ellipsis]

We don't expect a utopian society, that is a derogative term and can be applied to anything.

Poor choice of words. It was late and my 24 oz can of Pabst didn't help either.

[Muzk]

Every market is fucking imperialistic and exploiting in capitalism.... or else there would be no profit
if you really want to save those animals...
we need a new revolutionary theory, such as "marxist-nudist"

[Pirate turtle the 11th]

For.

[Uncle Hank]

As long as the animal isn't endangered, I couldn't care less.
This. Also it's preferable that the animal be put out of its misery quickly and efficiently, but the likelihood of that happening seem to be slim according to that video.

[Wakizashi the Bolshevik]

I ama against the fur trade as it exists in capitalist nations, and against industrialised fur trade in general.
The only time I don't mind fur is when indigenous, "primitive", tribalist peoples use the fur of their prey for clothing.

[FSL]

what's more I support experiments being done on itsy-bitsy-cutesy-wutesy animals if it may lead to scientific progress that benefits humans.



/thread

[rebelmouse]

I am against killing of animals, we should care about them and make homes for them and give them food. even hunters give them food, but just to make them more weight for hunting later.
in any case, capitalism don't let peasants to have normal life, so of course, they will sell animals to make money. people in villages are always interested for price of meat because it is one of the most important source of money for them. that's result of capitalist market. with abolishing of such market, peasants will become friends of animals, because they live beside animals and know them much better than people from cities. peasants like animals but everybody prefer himself more than other species. therefore today they use animals for making of better life, but in anarchism it will be different at majority of people.
beside it, we are not born as meat eaters than we are learned from parents to eat meat, so it is social construct. it can be changed when we have enough food from agriculture. it is the same about fur for clothes, it is capitalist social construct (about luxury-status-prestige).

[NecroCommie]

I ama against the fur trade as it exists in capitalist nations, and against industrialised fur trade in general.
The only time I don't mind fur is when indigenous, "primitive", tribalist peoples use the fur of their prey for clothing.
Well, yes that is a good point. Who are we to deny their very culture. But then, these nomadic peoples usually treat their victim animals with much more respect, and possibly treat them better in other ways too.

[Wanted Man]

I don't approve of it (nor of vivisection, seal clubbing, etc.), but I don't think it's subject to my approval. Moral opposition to it is well and good, but should not affect policies on it.

Some people want to deal with it by using the parliamentary road, others only want to videotape and prosecute "bad" hunters, and yet again others want to sabotage hunts and firebomb the shit out of "bad" scientists. So it's not a decisive social issue, but a moral issue that works as a nice sideshow while business goes on as usual in capitalist society.

[A New Era]

Against.

[Comrade B]

Before people can be wearing luxury coats made of fur, every person should have a coat. Still, fur coats take so much to make that it is still ridiculous to even think that they should be made in communism. The main purpose of fur clothing now anyway is to distinguish yourself from those who cannot afford fur coats.

Also, my completely non political answer to this question - I think it is kind of fucked up to take something's life for the sake of looking good.

[Uncle Ho]

Fur is quite silly when we have access to better, cheaper materials for warmth.

I eat meat and wear leather clothing, so it would be quite hypocritical for me to oppose the slaughter of animals for moral reasons.

[the last donut of the night]

It isn't? There aren't? They are?

Sarcasm. Funny.


Many object are made by non-living mechanical tools called machines. Others are made by well paid artisans who own means of production. If a mink coat/stole, segway or diamond skin cream aren't bourgeois, then I guess I should start an NGO to supply the workers who are very deprived of these basic human rights.

You are confusing terms here. Certainly, there are objects which the bourgeois use. But that's because we all can't afford them. By your logic, then decent healthcare, a car, or organic food should be thrown away for the revolution. One facet of capitalism is that workers are denied objects which would make their life easier and more enjoyable. Hell, many in Harlem would love a mink coat during the cold New York winters. Many would love a segway too.

And you sarcastically mention an NGO. Our goal isn't to just hand out high-end products, but to attain a system that provides them if they are needed. Note to self: reach a socialist society.


I was only being half serious about "textile freeganism." I would think that the sheer absurdity of me saying that would clue you into my sarcasm.

You did get me there, fine.


Anyways, I wish I could be authentic enough to throw derogatory buzz words which don't really mean anything, like "lifestylism." Oh wait I can, you sound like a middle-class reactionary!

The term '"lifestylism" sadly does mean something. The anarchist movement, for instance, has been crippled by smelly, dreadlock, black-rag wearing punks whose idea of class struggle is being a squatter and listening to RATM.

[Revy]

Fuck fur. If someone likes how it looks, they can get an artificial form. but it must be the fact that an animal was skinned alive that turns them on.

Very few people that have it actually need it for warmth. There are more than enough used fur coats out there to provide for all those people that need it for warmth anyway as well as enough faux fur being produced already.

[Saorsa]

I understand some people have moral uneasiness about fur, but so far I don't see how killing an animal for fur and wearing a fur coat is any worse than killing an animal for meat and eating a steak.

[Manifesto]

I understand some people have moral uneasiness about fur, but so far I don't see how killing an animal for fur and wearing a fur coat is any worse than killing an animal for meat and eating a steak.
It is killing an animal for no purpose maybe?

[Saorsa]

^ But as I said earlier, there is a purpose.


the purpose of killing the animal for its fur is pretty obvious - for it's use-value, the fact that the fur can then be worn to stay warm and look stylish, and for it's exchange-value, the fact that the fur can then be sold for a profit. I fail to see how killing an animal soley for it's fur is any worse than killing an animal solely for it's meat. In both cases there's a use-value and an exchange-value, so it's not pointless, and I don't see how in either case it's morally wrong.

[Invincible Summer]

Given technological progress, there isn't really a need to kill animals for fur, assuming one is using it for warmth.

There are plenty of man-made materials that are able to keep one warm and dry in harsh conditions - like most things in capitalism, it's the distribution of these goods and technologies that is a problem.

Although I share NecroCommie's position on fur & hunting, I understand and respect certain peoples' use of fur and hunting (nomadic, primitive tribes etc), as they require it for survival.
Assuming socialist/communist society is somewhere on the horizon, the need for such practices for the sake of luxury (conspicuous consumption) would diminish, as superior man-made materials due to technological advancement would be available to all

[bricolage]

I understand some people have moral uneasiness about fur, but so far I don't see how killing an animal for fur and wearing a fur coat is any worse than killing an animal for meat and eating a steak.

You are assuming that everyone here eats meat.

[ellipsis]

You are confusing terms here. Certainly, there are objects which the bourgeois use. But that's because we all can't afford them. By your logic, then decent healthcare, a car, or organic food should be thrown away for the revolution. One facet of capitalism is that workers are denied objects which would make their life easier and more enjoyable. Hell, many in Harlem would love a mink coat during the cold New York winters. Many would love a segway too.
To me a bourgeois object is one whose purchase is driven by mostly commodity fetishism and not it's use value, one which has an exchange value far disproportionate to it's use value and one which requires a disproportionate amount of resources to produce it's intended use value.


The term '"lifestylism" sadly does mean something. The anarchist movement, for instance, has been crippled by smelly, dreadlock, black-rag wearing punks whose idea of class struggle is being a squatter and listening to RATM.
Do those people exist, yes. Do they cripple the movement, I have never seen any evidence to that end but it is possible. Do many people use the term as a derogatory term to put down potential comrades and make themselves feel like a more authentic revolutionary, IMHO yes.

[chegitz guevara]

I don't have a problem with fur at all. Seriously. I don't want animals to be cruelly treated, but that's not inherent in the production of food or fur.

[Invincible Summer]

I don't have a problem with fur at all. Seriously. I don't want animals to be cruelly treated, but that's not inherent in the production of food or fur.

Are you even aware of what happens in factory farms and fur farms?

[chegitz guevara]

I've been to a mink farm, yes.

You ever seen what petroleum does to the planet?

[Manifesto]

^ But as I said earlier, there is a purpose.
Meat serves a purpose in order to live and is a cheaper alternative right now to being a Vegetarian. Fur serves no purpose that fake fur would not do not the best material is used though.

[BrokenDown]

AGAINST. I believe you should do onto others as you would like them to do unto you. And this applies to animals as well.

[Invincible Summer]

I've been to a mink farm, yes.

You ever seen what petroleum does to the planet?

Yes, and I ride my bike and use public transportation as a result.

I don't see how cruelty is not inherent to the production of fur and meat.

[NecroCommie]

and is a cheaper alternative right now to being a Vegetarian.
It is clear to me that you are not a vegetarian. I know this because according to my own experiences your statement is wildly untrue.

[chegitz guevara]

Yes, and I ride my bike and use public transportation as a result.

I don't see how cruelty is not inherent to the production of fur and meat.

Then there is no point having a conversation with you, obviously.

[Die Rote Fahne]

I am against. If the animals meat is not being used especially.

If a local wants to go kill a seal, feed his family and make some seal skin clothing, they are welcome to do so.

[Manifesto]

It is clear to me that you are not a vegetarian. I know this because according to my own experiences your statement is wildly untrue.
Yeah I am not a vegetarian but I have seen how much it costs to eat vegetables and fruits only for food and has not been very cheap besides corn that is.

[bricolage]

Meat serves a purpose in order to live and is a cheaper alternative right now to being a Vegetarian.

Really? Since I stopped eating meat I've found I've spent a lot less money on food, in fact I know a lot of people who are what we call 'economic vegetarians'; http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=Economic%20Vegetarian

To be honest if you are getting meat cheaper than it would cost to not eat meat then I'd recommend turning vegetarian anyway because the meat you are buying is probably god awful :D

[chegitz guevara]

I dunno. $1.99 per pound ground beef is scrummy! I'd have to eat an awful lot of bell peppers at $1.99 a pound to get the same nutritional value.

[NecroCommie]

Yeah I am not a vegetarian but I have seen how much it costs to eat vegetables and fruits only for food and has not been very cheap besides corn that is.
Only vegetables and fruits? How about wheat products (or grain, which one is which, tell me?), or roots, like potatoes or carrots. One may still eat eggs and milk, since we are talking vegetarians, not vegans. Mushrooms are available as well as berries.

If you only eat your daily fruit salad a'la tropical mix and consume it with your taiwanese rice then hell yes is it going to cost. Perhaps one might consider more traditional options like tomato soup, potatoes with brown sauce and my favourite, pea soup, even with mustard. Oh yes, and the timeless classic: Bread! Trust me, vegetarian cuisine is full of cheap receipes, most of which are good too. Oh, and when you add these main dishes with different salads (which can be good too) and perhaps some homegrown fruits for dessert, then what do you need?

Besides, meat simply cannot be very much cheaper in capitalism, because if farm products were more expensive the farmer would sell it straight instead of feeding it to his domestic animals. Considering how much farming products he must feed his animals before they turn to cash (watch my first post), it is simply outrageous to claim that vegetarian food is more expensive.

[Invincible Summer]

Then there is no point having a conversation with you, obviously.

Well maybe you could explain yourself more so you can get the responses you want.

[NecroCommie]

I dunno. $1.99 per pound ground beef is scrummy! I'd have to eat an awful lot of bell peppers at $1.99 a pound to get the same nutritional value.
If you only eat beef or only eat bell peppers the nutritional monotomy is quite the same. They are just different nutrients. Beef is indeed rich in protein yet weak in vitamin and carbon hydrates.

[Manifesto]

Only vegetables and fruits? How about wheat products (or grain, which one is which, tell me?)
They cover different things like wheat is for flour, cereal and grain is for popcorn, rice and is a type of grain which covers a wider area if that is what you are asking. And yeah I guess if you go for regular stuff it would be cheap but then why the hell did it cost 5 bucks just for few apples and oranges?

[ellipsis]

Meat animals are just no 2 feed corn from monsanto, plus other dead animals of the same type. It is very cheap to produce crappy and cruely raised meat.

That said, there are ways to eat veggie on the cheap. Dumpster diving and other acts of freeganism make it almost free. You can also save money by growing some of your own food, even if it is just a window box of lettuce.

[the last donut of the night]

To me a bourgeois object is one whose purchase is driven by mostly commodity fetishism and not it's use value, one which has an exchange value far disproportionate to it's use value and one which requires a disproportionate amount of resources to produce it's intended use value.

Sure, fur isn't especially easy to make or harvest. We could easily use other materials. However, most of the talk in this thread has involved hypothetical situations (i.e "if it's needed, then yes..."). So I agree that if fur is needed, then we can't simply reject it because it's a bourgeois object (still kinda broad).



Do those people exist, yes. Do they cripple the movement, I have never seen any evidence to that end but it is possible. Do many people use the term as a derogatory term to put down potential comrades and make themselves feel like a more authentic revolutionary, IMHO yes.

Really? Well, I do know I could be a better leftist (not that Marx in the sky is watching over me, maybe). However, a lot of people are lifestylist. And it sucks, because the average American worker still sees communists as either evil Jews out to kill them all or as hippies wearing hemp and having piercings through their eyebrows.

[Vendetta]

Hunters are propably the most sadistic and cruel lot I have encountered, and believe me, I have encountered. If it were for me, sport hunting would be banned outright. These are usually the same wankers who get a boner when looking at a machine gun and daydream about killing humans.

Hey, don't diss, I love hunting.

[Uncle Ho]

It is clear to me that you are not a vegetarian. I know this because according to my own experiences your statement is wildly untrue.

There's a difference betwen eating vegetable based foods and getting a nutritionally complete diet from them.

Also, you must consider that Americans have access to much cheaper meat than you do.

[Tablo]

I think it depends on whether there is a serious need for the furs. In a situation like this absolutes should be avoided. If we can easily create alternatives that can be provided to everyone then I seee no need to slaghter animals for fur. However, we do have people living poorly(like in Mongolia), who may need these things. Whether for warmth or for improving living conditions the slaughter of animals for fur can be justified. In Mongolia many make a living off of selling furs and without it they could starve.

[ellipsis]

However, a lot of people are lifestylist. And it sucks, because the average American worker still sees communists as either evil Jews out to kill them all or as hippies wearing hemp and having piercings through their eyebrows.
Commies are genocidal Jews? That's a new one. Granted a lot of people are lifestylists. Still though I have no evidence that the have any negative impact on the efficacy of the movement as a whole. And I am pretty sure that people have negative images of anti-capitalists because of bourgeois cultural hegemony and capitalist propaganda/brain-washing, not because some guy in a che t-shirt smelled bad in line at whole foods.

[the last donut of the night]

Commies are genocidal Jews? That's a new one.

I was kidding.


Granted a lot of people are lifestylists.

What I've been saying the whole time.


Still though I have no evidence that the have any negative impact on the efficacy of the movement as a whole. And I am pretty sure that people have negative images of anti-capitalists because of bourgeois cultural hegemony and capitalist propaganda/brain-washing, not because some guy in a che t-shirt smelled bad in line at whole foods.

Of course, lifestylism hasn't been the main reasons for why the American communist movement is weak. We know that other factors have also played a huge part. However, we need to appear serious to the average worker. That means no frivolous sectarianism, no intellectual arrogance, and no lifestylism. It makes us look childish and reinforces the belief that only young and idealist college students are anti-capitalists.

[chegitz guevara]

Dumpster diving and other acts of freeganism make it almost free.

I'm not a rat. I don't eat out of garbage cans.

[chegitz guevara]

If you only eat beef or only eat bell peppers the nutritional monotomy is quite the same. They are just different nutrients. Beef is indeed rich in protein yet weak in vitamin and carbon hydrates.

You missed the point entirely, which is that cheap meat is available and isn't of that low a quality when compared to cheap vegetables. In other words, there's not a real basis for economic vegetarianism, at least not in places where meat is plentiful. Sure, you won't be buying porterhouse steaks, but if you're smart, you can find good deals. For example, I will buy chicken leg quarters in bulk when I find them at $.79 a pound.

As for carbs, you only need about 20 grams a day, so your brain has energy (neurons only burn sugar, not fat or protein). The rest of your body can happily subsist on protein and fat as fuel sources.

[chegitz guevara]

Well maybe you could explain yourself more so you can get the responses you want.

If you define killing animals as cruelty, which you seem to do, then there's no discussion to be had. It doesn't matter if the animals have cruelty free lives and are killed humanely, if the act of killing is considered cruelty in itself.

[Invincible Summer]

If you define killing animals as cruelty, which you seem to do, then there's no discussion to be had. It doesn't matter if the animals have cruelty free lives and are killed humanely, if the act of killing is considered cruelty in itself.

When I say that cruelty is inherent to the production of meat and fur, I'm referring to the current state of the meat and fur industries where, generally, cruel practices go unchecked and are accepted as the de facto method of producing meat and fur products.

[Uncle Hank]

I went through the thread and didn't find this (http://socialistworker.org/2009/10/26/socialism-and-animal-rights) posted and I figured it could be useful to this discussion. My apologies if it has been mentioned already, I've had a long day. :lol:

EDIT: Shit, someone posted it in Theory (http://www.revleft.com/vb/socialism-and-animal-t120722/index.html) already.

[GatesofLenin]

.. Honestly, nobody ever makes a fuss about cruelty to animals unless the animals in question are cute at some point in their lives. If most scientific research using animals was done on cockroaches nobody would care.
Good point, comrade! May I suggest we start doing experiments on fat- overweight capitalists like Bernie Madoff or Warren Buffett. :D

[SocialismOrBarbarism]

I don't care if they're killed first, but skinning them alive? Is there even a practical reason for that?

Also, it's not totally related, but this discussion has become pretty broad. Everyone is talking about the effect on animals, but what about the effect on workers?


For her book Slaughterhouse, Gail Eisnitz, chief investigator for the Humane Farming Association (HFA), interviewed slaughterhouse workers in the U.S. who say that, because of the speed with which they are required to work, animals are routinely skinned while apparently alive, and still blinking, kicking, and shrieking. Eisnitz argues that this is not only cruel to the animals, but also dangerous for the human workers, as cows weighing several thousands of pounds thrashing around in pain are likely to kick out and debilitate anyone working near them.[12]

According to the HFA, Eiznitz interviewed slaughterhouse workers representing over two million hours of experience, who, without exception, told her that they have beaten, strangled, boiled, and dismembered animals alive, or have failed to report those who do. The workers described the effects the violence has had on their personal lives, with several admitting to being physically abusive or taking to alcohol and other drugs.[13]

The HFA alleges that workers are required to kill up to 1,100 hogs an hour, and end up taking their frustration out on the animals.[13] Eisnitz interviewed one worker, who had worked in ten slaughterhouses, about pig production. He told her:
“Hogs get stressed out pretty easy. If you prod them too much, they have heart attacks. If you get a hog in the chute that's had the shit prodded out of him and has a heart attack or refuses to move, you take a meat hook and hook it into his bunghole. You try to do this by clipping the hipbone. Then you drag him backwards. You're dragging these hogs alive, and a lot of times the meat hook rips out of the bunghole. I've seen hams — thighs — completely ripped open. I've also seen intestines come out. If the hog collapses near the front of the chute, you shove the meat hook into his cheek and drag him forward."

[Stranger Than Paradise]

No way do I condone skinning animals alive for their fur. I think fur is sort of a rich person's trophy to show superiority. But there are some cases where people need fur to stay warm. So i'm half and half really.

[Chicano Shamrock]

Hunters are propably the most sadistic and cruel lot I have encountered, and believe me, I have encountered. If it were for me, sport hunting would be banned outright. These are usually the same wankers who get a boner when looking at a machine gun and daydream about killing humans. (In the context of war ofcourse, after all is war not "heroic"?) I am speaking out of my own extensive experience with hunters, whom populate half of my class at the moment.
What is wrong with admiring a nice machine gun? You are just mad because you are a loser and your classmates are badass.

As for fur... eh what are you gonna do? I wear leather gloves at work, I drive on leather seats on the road and I wear snake skin boots walking around. Animal skin just makes everything that much more enjoyable.

If I could I would wipe the sweat off my forehead with cat fur or a rabbit pelt but I have yet to come across a rabbit handkerchief.

[NecroCommie]

You just proved the point you quoted. You seem to make a great effort to appear as vain as humanly possible.

[RadioRaheem84]

This what I love about the true left! You guys are practical and understand the need for certain people to survive.

I, myself, am opposed to wearing fur as some sort of luxury statement. But I am not against working class people (or anyone) wearing leather and furs to stay warm. Sometimes I think the bourgeoisie liberals have WAY too much time on their hands and pick silly little projects to make themselves feel superior and holier than thou.
They love to tell people to buy organic foods and other stuff that are way out of the price range for most ordinary working class folk. They hate people who hunt but don't mind natives who live off of hunting. Their crazed environmentalist schemes shut down farms because they might be a potential threat to an endangered bug!

This is all fodder for the right wing to group these liberal do-gooder groups in with leftists that support the working class.
I remember telling a high level Vegan that I believed in hunting for food and she looked at me like I was Charlie Manson! :laugh:

It's like Gordon Gekko said, "WASPs love animals, but hate people".