Animal Cruelty - Real Fur

The overall topic of this essay is animal cruelty, but it will focus mostly on the recent revelations into the faux fur industry. In the last year is has come to light that a lot of faux fur items that are sold in high street retailers and online stores are actually made with real fur. This came to light after an investigation by animal protection charity Humane Society International (HIS) claimed to have found cat fur on a pair of Missguided shoes. The telegraph released an article in April 2017 stating that items sold at Missguided and House of Fraser, that were marketed as faux fur, were actually found to contain real fur (Telegraph, 2017: Online). This essay will discuss the ethical implications of this and will look at the differing opinions on this. This issue matters to me because I wouldn’t like to buy something thinking it was faux fur to find out its real fur, as I am personally against animal cruelty. But just from a consumer point of view people don’t want to buy something thinking it’s one thing to find out its something else especially in today’s society where we have seen a rise in ethical shoppers and retailers. Often if people are buying fake fur it’s because they don’t want to have real fur not because they can’t afford it, so the question is, ‘is it really ethical to sell fake fur when in actual fact its real fur?’, this is a question that will be asked throughout this essay.

Retailers that were found to have been selling real fur marketed as faux fur were, Boohoo, T.K. Maxx, Missguided, House of Fraser, ASOS, Forever 21 and Debenhams, but HIS estimate there will be many more retailers who are selling real fur unbeknown to them as this problem is widespread and most retailers as well as consumers are unknowing to this problem. Most of the retailers that were found to be selling real fur have a no fur policy so once told about this issue they have removed the known items containing real fur from shelves and have said that they are looking into these claims and discussing it with their suppliers (HIS, 2017: Online).

Fake fur has risen in popularity in recent years as consumers are now more aware of ethical consumption and the conditions animals are kept in for our gain. Fur farms have been banned in the UK since 2003 and the selling of dog, cat and seal products is illegal (The Guardian, 2017). Imported fur from other animals such as fox, rabbit and mink are still allowed. Most of the retailers that have been found to be selling real fur disguised as faux fur get their products from Asia where there is a massive fur farming industry but there are other places that fur is coming from such as Poland and Canada. This is a growing problem as consumers associate fur with ‘luxury’ so often think that the low price means that it must not be real, due to the conditions that these animals are kept in it means that their fur can be sold cheap, it is often cheaper to sell real fur then to make faux fur, but should items be labelled if it is real as people might be vegan or be against animal cruelty so are expecting to buy fake fur and don’t want to spend money on real fur as they don’t want to support that.

This is happening as there is no legal requirements for the word ‘fur’ to be on items that contain real fur. EU regulations state that items should be defined as ‘textile products’ and to have ‘contains non-textile parts of animal origin’ but this wording is very confusing and often is not followed. Items that are sold online do not have to include any of that wording, footwear and non-garment accessories are also exempt from the above wording, so it’s no wonder consumers have no idea they are buying real fur when it does not even have to be labelled as such. According to consumer protection legislation it is illegal to mislead consumers, but with the sale of animal fur it is often poorly enforced and ‘an honest mistake’ is considered a genuine excuse, because of this the retailers are rarely prosecuted (HIS, 2017: Online).

Many people have differing opinions on this issue, especially due to the fact that items don’t have to be labelled stating that they include real animal fur. YouGov carried out a poll in 2016 that shown that 9 out of 10 Brits believe that it is unacceptable to buy and sell real fur, averaged across 9 species (HIS, 2017: Online). Most people believe that it is wrong to cause non-human animals needless pain and death, but these same people often still contribute to the suffering of non-human animals. So why is it wrong to cause an animal pain and suffering to get their fur but it’s not wrong to cause them the same pain in order to kill them to make food? This is a question that is asked many times in arguments about fur farming. ‘There is an inconsistency between people’s beliefs about their moral duties, and their behaviours which fail to conform to the constraints imposed by those duties’ (Wyckoff, 2015).