Do you own/wear a real fur coat?

[Sumsummer]

Can I ask you a few questions?

Is it vintage and does it keep you warmer than a normal coat?

Also, my stray cat gave birth to her kittens on it. They all loved snuggling in it.

You have me worried. I have a faux fur gilet which people often ask/challenge me about as it really does look and feel like rabbit.

Any tips on how I could tell for sure?

@IHaveNeverLivedintheCastle What’s nonsense?

I am very anti-fur - new fur that is. I can't see any issues with wearing vintage fur. Those animals died years ago and it's not supporting the current or recent fur market in any way. It's ridiculously wasteful to throw them away, which is the alternative!

Didn't used to be eggs in the olden days. I lived somewhere a lot of people wore fur. 'Hippies' used to go around with a handy tin of depilatory foam and 'accidentally' bump into people. You want to spend hundreds on furry corpses you can wear, at least wear second hand.

I don't necessarily think that wearing vintage is completely harmless.
The more it becomes commonplace and acceptable to wear fur, the more new fur will be produced.

Exactly.

The hypocrisy about "oh it's such a shame not to use it" is breathtaking

People use vintage things judiciously. It's ludicrous to suggest that there's no value in the argument for wearing old coats unless you never get a new TV.

I appreciate you have strong feelings on the subject, but I'm not going to let hyperbolic arguments sway my judgement. It makes sense to use a coat with a unique feature. Not doing so isn't bringing any animals back to life. Burying it doesn't do any good to anyone either. There's no recompense possible apart from at least making use of the hide.

As for the argument that it encourages others to buy new, I really don't think you can tell the difference visually, especially not these days when there are very high quality fake fur alternatives worn by the vast majority of people. I have an expensive Japanese fake fur coat and it looks identical to a real fur. Is that coat equivalent to a real fur coat? Not at all. It looks the same but the difference in insulation is oceans apart. So the next time I'm in a very cold climate, I will wear real fur again.

I have some rabbit items. My mum has lovely rabbit coat. It's sooo warm. It was handy in - 20.
They were actually reared by us.
Fur, leather, shearling are simply superior to plastic fakes.

I have an elderly friend who owns a full length mink coat (its 60 years old or close to it). She wears it to my house every year at Christmas, so I get to “pet” it! It weighs a ton and is the softest thing ever. You could never mistake it for fake. Also incredibly warm.

I wouldn’t be a wearer of real fur personally, but I enjoy my once yearly cuddle with the coat before I hang it up!

How much plastic does your average person use (and dispose of)? How many creatures die as a result of the petroleum-chemical industry from which the plastic came? How long with the plastics (recycled or otherwise) be in the environment? I'd take ethically farmed fur over microplastic shyte any day.
Are millions of seabirds drowning in oil and the destruction of whole ecosystems better than animals slaughtered for fur?
No doubt some animals suffer terrible deaths, but it's possible to ensure ethical slaughter and most people making a giant fuss about fur don't give a shit about how the animals that make up their leather shoes, jelly babies or hamburgers lived and died.
The weird hyper-ethical focus on fur baffles me.
(I don't own a fur jacket because I don't need one.)

Glad to see this thread as someone may be able to advise me.

my mum has a fur coat she inherited. It’s been in her wardrobe my entire life. Used only as a child to pretend I was entering Narnia.

they are now moving and so decluttering, but where does one get rid of these?

don’t particularly want to donate it as that means someone will buy it and wear it and therefore give the impression that it’s acceptable which my mum doesn’t want.

but do you bin them? Bury them? Keep it in the next wardrobe for another 40 odd years?

Ahhh... My reply to this is that some animals are electrocuted, some skinned alive, etc.
Anyway the point is just two key words: painful death...
Please let's have more sympathy... Every little helps.

That's just never going to happen here in the UK

People get so weirdly rabid about fur.

Of course I won't support inhumane practices.

However, no synthetic I've ever found compares with my vintage shearling coat. Shearling is a by-product of the meat industry. As it comes from sheep, you don't get the same ethical issues that you get with farming carnivores.

I also have possum skin boots. Possums are an ecological disaster for New Zealand, so humanely trapped possums are a good financial incentive to reduce numbers. The boots also breathe like no synthetic ever will, and still look like new after years.

I'm not a vegetarian, but I try to minimise the amount of animal products I use. I think the above products are far more humane than meat or eggs from battery farming, and far better environmentally than plastic.

@Eminybob That's like the whole cobalt-in-EV-batteries argument. The answer isn't to ban the product completely- the answer for fur / shearling would be to enforce humane animal husbandry and slaughter.

@IHaveNeverLivedintheCastle That is incorrect. Fur from animals adapted for cold climates does not require piloerection in order to create an insulating layer.

I wear fur coats and they are fabulous in cold weather - when it's below 2 degrees the fur "puffs up" on them and they help stop you getting too hot or too cold.

I tell people mine are fake to stop any judgement and I'll have them for next 60 years hopefully and pass them to my children so very sustainable.

Just a question for anti fur posters on here - do you wear leather?

Because if killed and sourced ethically fur is no different - leather is not a by product of the meat industry and its much better for the environment than awful plastic faux fur.

Sorry but why are we putting the warmth of a coat above what an animal goes through to make said coat?!
Just vile 🤢

Sometimes animal rescues will take them for rearing orphaned animals

are you suggesting that leather is made from cows specifically raised and killed for their skin?

@TheAlchem Because that's not the equation. If you are using a vintage coat, then you aren't the one creating the market for fur, and therefore creating the demand for the suffering.

The equation is do I use this very sustainable fur coat that will last a lifetime and keep me comfortable, or do I freeze in a coat that will only last a year or two, and create a demand for more plastics production and pollution when I have to replace it in a year or 2?

It's a tricky one for me... the conservationist in me screams no but the environmentalist says yes as more sustainable than the oil based fakes....
Ethically wouldn't touch a new one but I think I could a vintage as I could justify it as the animal died many years ago and if it's not worn/used in some way the animals unwilling sacrifice has been in vain..

It's easy to have ethics and make these pronouncements I guess when we are not in a survival situation - at least we have choices

Up to you and how you justify your choices

Fur, no.

Sheepskin, yes.