A new fashion trend deemed “cute” has currently been on the rise.
With real fur being worn as hats, coats, scarves, you name it; it’s almost no surprise that people would wear the tail of an animal as an accessory. Celebrities such as Chris Brown and Kanye West have been spotted wearing them.
The keychain trend comes from animals with “fluffy and soft” tails. Foxes, wolves and raccoons are the most popular to wear, and each tail ranges from twenty to a hundred dollars. For the faux fur people, they cost about ten dollars and come in a variety of colors.
While many people think wearing real fox-tail key chains is “stylish”, attaching an animal’s body part to your purse or letting it hang off your jeans doesn’t quite impress.
Vartan Kazezian (’13) thinks the trend: “[is] a cruel thing to do. Humans are taking what’s vital to the animal and treating it like it’s something cool to have.”
It’s no rumor that animals used for fur suffer in the most horrible and agonizing ways. From foxes and raccoon dogs to minks and chinchillas, the list goes on. Eighty percent of the fur clothing industry comes from animals living in fur farms all their lives, crowded into tiny cages in filthy conditions.
In the end, they meet their death by being skinned alive and left in a pile along with other animals to die a slow death. They would never get to experience and live their life the way a free animal should.
Unfortunately, many fur-lovers are unaware of the treatment of animals before they are killed, and the type of fur is often mislabeled on the product, so you can’t be one hundred percent sure whose skin you’re wearing. No matter how much someone pays to wear animal fur, they’ll never know that the animal paid so much more.
Thank you for this well-written and important editorial. It’s time for people to think about the needless suffering that goes on in the name of fashion.