To be upset with friend wearing fur?

[AnnaDarcey]

Hiya,

I reckon most people will say I am being the a hole in this situation. A quick bit about me - I really care about animal welfare. However, I am not at all preachy and never bring it up.

I recognise everyone will make their own decisions regarding the morality of eating meat etc. I cook with meat at least twice a week at my church’s soup kitchen. It doesn’t bother me and I don’t think there is anything innately wrong with eating meat. I do eat meat if I dispatch it myself on a shoot or if I catch it fishing. I just abhor the unnecessary cruelty of factory farming

The other day my best friend since we were in primary school together sent a text asking my opinion about a jacket made out of rabbit fur. Seeing as I have pet rabbits and the coat was from China where there were the most horrific conditions take place, with the animals skinned alive for their fur and then left to die I asked her to reconsider if it was worth it. She said okay.

About an hour ago she sent me a picture of herself wearing the coat, sticking her tongue out with the caption “Wearing your furry friends”. Already upset from an argument with my mother and upset she randomly sent me that photo I called her a sicko and blocked her. It has just occurred to me I have never argued with her and never blocked anyone before.

I am now really upset my best friend did that and a little shocked about how she could possibly be so immoral for the sake of fashion and by trying to upset me to the point I am questioning our entire friendship. I have already been kind of shocked by her morality as she has never bothered adhering to the Covid restrictions she goes to parties; hosts get togethers at her house etc. which annoyed me but I kept my mouth shut. I now think maybe it’s not possible to reconcile our differing moralities. Or am I overthinking it all and AIBTA here?

Just looking for outside thoughts.

Thank you :)

YANBU to be upset with her wearing fur, especially as she made a joke about it. I think YABU to be against wearing fur but okay with eating meat.

Not against people wearing fur, but would rather any new items weren't being made. She was a bit of dick for using that caption, though.

I wouldn't end a friendship over it, unless you just don't really like her.

She made the 'joke' to you, she can have dead animals as her friends now.

@ShalomToYouJackie Thanks for your reply - I get that a lot and understand why people find it confusing. It is because I think factory farming involves a huge amount of unnecessary cruelty and damage to the environment. However, I recognise animals eating other animals is just nature and it is up to individuals to decide.

I personally don’t usually eat meat more than once a year (venison) and that is only if I have dispatched it myself as part of a conservation effort. I haven’t eaten meat for over a year now. I don’t wear leather or buy anything tested on animals.

However, I understand people finding it confusing.

Yabu to not to have told her to fuck off and blocked her.

That's not a very nice thing for your "friend" to have done. Very immature

Real fur is something that should be consigned to history. Fake fur is available.

Your views are your views, and you are entitled to them.
Your friend sounds like a fool.

I don’t think YABU to be upset at all. Really not nice of her to rub it in your face, it’s disrespectful of something that she knows is important to you.

I can also see how it’s different to eat the odd bit of venison of fish if you are prepared to kill it and prepare it yourself, than to eat and wear farmed animals. Personally I have no issue with leather as I eat beef, I have an issue with killing animals just for fur and let’s be honest most people in this country don’t eat rabbit.

YABU / hypocritical if you eat meat, even if you slaughter the animal yourself although its definitely a less bad option than factory farmed meat with its disease potential and extreme cruel on an overwhelming scale.

I dont agree with fur. Neither do I agree with using or consuming animal product given the massive environmental damage we're causing in the process. I tend to pipe down about it though, as noone wants to think about the part they're playing with their tasty burger or ham sandwich, Sunday lamb roast or tortured chicken (look at the legs on your supermarket chicken - those black circles are burns from sitting in faeces with a body thats too heavy to stand up for much of their 35 day life).

Bloody Hell... what an awful friend. I’m vegan and I loathe the fur industry, so I’d be really upset too to the point that I would be reconsidering the value of that particular relationship. It’s not so much that she has chosen to purchase a fur jacket (that’s her choice), but to go out of her way to shove it in your face like that is just out of line. She must know you have pet rabbits.... I am literally gobsmacked for you.

How would people feel if I went and bought a jacket made out of cats and dogs then went out of my way to rub it in their faces through sending them goady pictures with insensitive captions?

I would be having a serious honest discussion with this ‘friend’ about why this behaviour is inappropriate and how it made you feel. If she can’t understand that, then she’s not your friend.

Gosh I thought this was just going to generally be about your friend wearing fur, and I was going to say I think I'd be uncomfortable with it, but what she's done 😱 shocking behaviour from a so-called friend.

Stop saying you dispatch animals, you kill them for their meat. You're being incredibly two faced about the issue.

I was all set up say YABU from the title, but actually you sound very nice and your friend sounds like a cruel, obnoxious twat.

Keep her blocked and hope her fur gets moths.

@Meowchickameowmeow

Stop saying you dispatch animals, you kill them for their meat. You're being incredibly two faced about the issue.

No, she isn’t.

She is entiteld to buy and wear despite your views - she is not entitled to disrespect you in that way purely because of your beliefs not aligning with hers

[quote AnnaDarcey]@ShalomToYouJackie Thanks for your reply - I get that a lot and understand why people find it confusing. It is because I think factory farming involves a huge amount of unnecessary cruelty and damage to the environment. However, I recognise animals eating other animals is just nature and it is up to individuals to decide.

I personally don’t usually eat meat more than once a year (venison) and that is only if I have dispatched it myself as part of a conservation effort. I haven’t eaten meat for over a year now. I don’t wear leather or buy anything tested on animals.

However, I understand people finding it confusing.[/quote]
As a vegan I don’t find it confusing at all and I applaud you for your ethical consistency. There is a world of difference between buying from a supermarket and hunting your own animals. I couldn’t kill it, I refuse to pay someone else to do it on my behalf, so I don’t eat it.

As a vegan I don’t find it confusing at all and I applaud you for your ethical consistency. There is a world of difference between buying from a supermarket and hunting your own animals. I couldn’t kill it, I refuse to pay someone else to do it on my behalf, so I don’t eat it.

I agree.

Some people are being deliberately dense on this thread. Wearing a rabbit fur coat from China is a special breed of egregious behaviour.

(As an omnivore)

I think YABU for being hypocritical about meat / fur, but not nearly so bad as your friend, who has been a dick. She didn’t need to rub your face in the decision, especially given your pets

@nosswith

Real fur is something that should be consigned to history. Fake fur is available.

Please research. Wear artificial fibre, burn wood, go on non essential travel, buy anything new when you could repair or buy second hand, or go without, breed multiple children, buy plastic, especially single use, use chemicals, contaminate our beautiful perfect planet as much as you can, but first, either find another private planet to do it, or at the very least do the research.

Every time artificial fibre is washed, it helps poisons the ocean, helps fill the bodies of fish with plastic, helps destroy the biosystem. Cotton is involved with a lot of planet-problems. Second hand is best. Wool is fine. Imports and new clothes are not. Sheepskin is fine. Leather and fur from animals who have died in any case is fine. Factory farming, intensive farming of any kind, is not good.

Dogmatic extremism is not good when it replaces thought and logic. If an animal is killed on the road, dies of age, or has been eaten, or has required to be culled because it has reached a population explosion, then it makes no sense to give the skin a funeral. It is more respectful to recover and use parts of it. Just as, one hopes, people gladly donate human organs to save others.

I was all set to say Yabu until I read what a tw@t your friend had been , there was no need to upset you and torment you she sounds vile. You were clear that it was upsetting for you and she did this? Horrible person keep her blocked and if she whines or comes asking why tell her exactly why @AnnaDarcey

If that happened to me - that would be an ex- friend.

Really gross 😟

About an hour ago she sent me a picture of herself wearing the coat, sticking her tongue out with the caption “Wearing your furry friends”

That in itself is enough reason to end a friendship and block someone.

I eat meat, I don't wear fur but that's about the acid-throwing that went on from animal-rights types, but I think the comment from your ex-friend is despicable. And so nasty to send it to you when she knew you would find it upsetting.