The last time you found yourself walking down Michigan Avenue—for whatever cursed reason—you might have noticed them roaming among the general hoi polloi of tourists, street performers and homeless people. They are a small, loose, local herd. Often they are made up of matronly types with armloads of designer bags, but not always. Whoever they are, what brings them together is the luxury furs they wear, sometimes down to the ankles, and sometimes with matching accessories. Once, I sighted a man wearing a ridiculous silver hairpiece. It blended in so well that I thought it was part of the fur coat that cascaded over his shoulders and down to his shoelaces. So thorough was this covering, that for just a moment, I mistook him for some beast-man—an unfortunate yeti that had wandered onto the Magnificent Mile.
I have no knowledge of the varieties of fur that undulate past me on Michigan Avenue. I only see a range of glamorous hues from silver to caramel to jet to cinnamon, but I understand that many sorts of wildlife find their ways onto the fluent, elegant soma of the discerning consumer of outerwear—from rabbits to raccoons, from sables to minks, from foxes to seals to various points down the line. (One can only speculate as to the fortunes of cold-blooded fauna like snakes and alligators.)
Fur-bearing hide: that substance generated by the elaborate slaughter and ritualistic flaying of certain creatures to make warm, stylish attire. It has to stop. You know it, and I know it. It is a human imperative, because we, as human beings, are the only creatures given the ability to grasp moral complexities and the facility to understand how we might best resolve them in a way that supports the Greater Good.
I believe the practice of killing animals and then harvesting their skin and hair to make luxury items not only should end, but must end. Before I begin my appeal to you, the reader, let me clarify my motivations for making it: I don't care about animals, no matter how cute or furry. In fact, I prefer homely, disagreeable animals, like cockroaches and squirrels that could give a rat's ass about human beings. They exist in their natural state just as they would without us, and that's the way it should be. How can one have respect for a dog or cow when they are so hell bent on winning your approval, or your care, at least? At heart, relationships between humans and animals are unnatural which is one of many reasons that the manufacture of fur garments should stop. All of the minks, rabbits, raccoons and their kindred that are farmed for this purpose have become indolent and do not live according to their true nature. (Seals do, but we must apply a methodical ethical approach here. Otherwise, we are no better than animals ourselves.)
Inter-species congress also weakens humans, as it encourages withdrawal from more and complex—and sometimes difficult—social relations with other men and women. Humans turn animals into proxies for their emotional needs—a warmth not provided by fur—“love,” a feeling that no animal can feel as we do, no matter how unhealthy we make both them and ourselves through coddling and over-feeding. Sickening as this phenomenon may be, transforming animals into emasculated puppets, or pets, isn’t much different from making elaborate clothing from them.
Unhealthy interactions with animals aside, a much more important reason for doing away with the luxury fur industry lies in the environmental precipice over which we are currently leaning. We find ourselves fighting for some sort of balanced footing, and the use of animal pelts in the construction of coats and stoles may not seem to be of great importance, but it is, in fact a major chink in the planet’s natural coat of mail: the diversity of global eco-systems.
One organism interacts with another, and the consequences spiral out, pulling in ever more life. Motivated by need, life fosters life, keeping even inanimate matter like air, soil and water alive. Alive to feed all and in so doing to complete the great organic cycle.
Science has delineated much of this cycle, but we are ever surprised by the damage caused by the depletion of even a single species to the larger environment it inhabits. As the new popularity of fur garments grows, it is foreseeable that our desire, if not our need, may outstrip nature’s power to replenish any raw materials involved. Our hunger may consume nearly all of the farmed species involved. Then we will be forced to turn to nature for more specimens, and eventually this supply may be exhausted as well, leading to disastrous consequences for various ecosystems.
These animals consume populations of other animals and of plants, keeping them from unhealthy growth. They are themselves consumed, maintaining the numbers of larger predatory animals. To remove an essential link from a chain like this can only lead to ruin. I might not be able to see all of the consequences of these animals’ extinction, but on Michigan Avenue, where this discussion began, I can see at least one nightmarish consequence looming large: with the absence of raw goods, the fur industry itself will collapse.
Think of the jobs lost, of the financial consequences. I abjure the fur industry to modify its practices, to greatly decrease the volume of product it is currently generating, despite soaring consumption of its wares. The danger is real, and not just to ecosystems around the globe, but to the industry itself. It has lit the candle of supply and demand—so clearly a recapitulation of nature's own cycles of need—at both ends. Supply will be lost in the disproportionate destruction of animals, and demand will be lost in the loss of fur consumers.
Like the makers of fur garments, their wearers, too, endanger themselves, albeit through an inverted mechanism. Again, we find reflections—we are lost in a House of Mirrors, wherein the human bearers of fur threaten themselves through over-proliferation. The depletion of furs intensifies, not just through the growing hungers of existing consumers, but also, and perhaps more disastrously, through a swelling of their numbers. It is an escalating trend, as can be seen in the fur flowing over Michigan Ave. And one can only speculate as to what might happen to fur enthusiasts if new pelts become unavailable.
Clearly, pointing out their plight to them will do no good. Anyone so committed to wearing such bizarre and reviled clothing will not relinquish it without a vicious, possibly mortal, struggle. Assaulted and spit upon in the open streets, publicly splattered with blood or red paint, the fur wearers’ chutzpah is titanic and pathological. They keep their furs. And now, as trends have shifted, they have thrown off any pretense to shame, liberated their favorite garments from mothballs—and their demonstration of courage has won new converts to the practice of wearing fur. So now, as long-standing fur-bearers openly wear and demand more wardrobe items, they bring newer enthusiasts with them, forming a vast swarm with an ever-growing hunger.
Again, we are human beings, and it is a moral imperative that we maintain the Greater Good. We must then, somehow, find a way to save luxury fur enthusiasts from themselves.
Fortunately, the wheel has been invented for us, and we need not re-invent it. I would suggest an exploration of time-tested methods used to address similar problems. Throughout the United States, federal, state, and county authorities have employed various tactics to control wildlife populations. The re-establishment of natural predators in depleted areas and incentives for increased hunting by humans have met with some success, but it is absurd to suggest them here. The hunting of another human being is murder, and while that might be an amusing satirical notion, it leads us nowhere. And of course, the natural predators faced by humans—and there are virtually none, as we are now the alpha-carnivores of our world—are too large and indiscriminately dangerous to be reintroduced to Michigan Avenue.
A more humane—and less ludicrous—solution is called for—and does exist in the practice of trapping. The efficacy of trapping need not be considered. It has been used by humans across cultural and millennial divides to successfully subdue game or of unwanted “pest” animals, and as a human endeavor that has existed in some form in virtually every area of the world for thousands of years, it has certainly stood the test of time.
The ethics of trapping may be more troubling for some. Thankfully, its moral complications are not nearly as thorny as those provided by the practice of wearing furs. Over the last several decades, the operation of animal traps has served as a flashpoint in the ongoing struggle between hunters and animal rights activists. The latter have cited numerous consequences of the placement and design of traps, and of the laws governing these matters. They have pointed to studies like the USDA in 1992, which claimed that up to 45% of coyotes caught in certain foot traps were moderately to severely wounded, due to broken legs, prolonged exposure and other incidental factors. On the other side of the coin of husbandry, fur trappers have pointed to investigations which bear obvious significance, including one that indicated that during the five year period after 1998, when foot traps were banned in Southern California, coyote attacks on humans rose from 4-10 per year—more than a 100% increase.
At times, this debate has grown quite tense, but faced with the impending luxury fur crisis, all of us have no choice, but to set our idealistic concerns aside and yield to practical necessity. We must agree on this one approach, as it has proven so successful over the years, in terms of numbers, if not of simple answers. Sadly, there are none when faced with an issue of such gravity.
Having accepted the necessity of trapping, we must now arrive at some general agreement as to how we will trap and what with—obviously, the particulars of such a complex operation will call for considerable plotting. The second question is far easier to answer than the first: foot traps are the most sensible choice, as they are extremely effective tools when dealing with large animals. They consist of an interlocking set of jaws that are left open on the ground. When an animal steps into these jaws, it triggers a small catch. The jaws abruptly close, clutching one of the animal’s appendages.
Much has been made of the occasional accident that occurs when an inappropriate animal—not the sought after species—wanders into the trap and is unintentionally held or hurt. But when one considers the efficiency of these devices, it becomes clear that their benefits far outweigh their costs. Foot traps are not just productive, but simple to use as well. They can be easily baited—perhaps with edible or drinkable matter found appetizing to most targets, such as frappucino. Baiting with false fur garments is also possible, assuming that genuine products are absolutely avoided—our basic motivation is to reduce the need for authentic pelts. Quality replacements would be easily mistaken for real furs without close examination, and our only intention is to cause the fur-bearer to approach.
What happens then? We are dealing with human beings, not animals, so it is important to note that there is some small danger of injury, when the trap closes. If traps are set up correctly, however, the possibility of injury is minimized. Additionally, fewer trap models contain softer jaws that should further diminish problems, while other, more conscientiously designed mechanisms, like the “coon catcher,” can help ensure that the wrong sort of animal is not caught in the trap.
Once the fur-bearer is trapped, he or she must be subdued, removed from the trap, and then taken to a remote facility for processing. What happens there would depend on the choices made by the community and its representatives. If the fur-bearer is to be returned to his or her environment, he or she should be anesthetized, so that any fur items may be removed. Electronic “tagging” of disrobed fur-bearers for continued study may be pursued in areas where the goal is to study and attempt to modify their behavior.
Sadly, given the magnitude of the danger presented by fur-bearers to the global environment, and given the pity each of us must feel when viewing them, stumbling at the verge of extinction, the best solution is probably the simplest: humane euthanasia. We reach a grim conclusion here of course, but we can be comforted by the fact that we could always maintain the spirit of the fur-bearers and of the meaning they bore for us by having them stuffed and mounted. Personally, I wouldn’t mind having the head of one of those matronly types, with grotesque, death-distended lips, staring down at me from above my mantle, like a departed deer, meeting my eyes with her own glassy orbs, as she never would, if she were stepping on my toes on Michigan Avenue. It is a tragedy. God bless the rich… And the people who want to look like them.
