Road Kill Furs?

[benburch]

If one were to buy pelts from road-killed animals, and make them into fur coats, do you think PETA would have a gripe with that?

The animals were not raised for fur, or imprisoned, and were already dead when harvested, and were not killed intentionally.

So what would their objection be?

[jilln]

1. Can't speak for peta...

but as an animal rights activist I would have mixed feelings. True, no intentional harm was done, but by wearing the coat you would still be saying that animals are clothing and others might think the coat was cute and go buy more fur... these things go by trends and all it takes is for one person to wear some for someone else to think it's OK.

Besides, you said "buy" road-killed animals ... if there truly were a market for that, how long do you think it would be before whoever was doing the selling found out that it was easier to farm animals than find them?

[benburch]

5. One would intentionally pay so little that farming and trapping...

are not economical options for this material. Also, it would be pretty obvious what was and was not road kill. The intention here is to use a "by-product" that would otherwise simply be landfilled.

[LiberalEsto]

2. How could a buyer tell road-kill from regular fur?

Tire tread marks?

That's the first objection I thought of. Confusion over the actual origin of a fur piece could lead to fur farms sneaking purposely-killed animal furs into the market.

Second, the entire idea of people wearing fur is bad and contributes to a bad mind-set in which people think it's okay to use and abuse animals.

[bertha katzenengel]

19. "the entire idea of people wearing fur is bad . . . " how about leather?

:shrug: I'm wearing leather shoes....

[unhappycamper]

3. Paint can also spoil the pelt. You would need a pretty good seamstress

(or seammeister) to use this one......

http://talk.xboxsolution.com.nyud.net:8090/gallery/data/500/thumbs/27187roadkill.jpg

[benburch]

6. Clearly, one would deal in small pelt pieces.

A smashed animal is a mess, usually.

They would need to be sheared to a consistent length and dyed to match each other.

But furriers deal with Chinchilla pelts all the time and they are quite small pieces.

[flvegan]

4. Couple of objections.

First, it would take hundreds of "road kill" animals to make a coat. Not likely there would be many buyers for possum-fur coats, or squirrel fur trimmed jackets. Not many wild mink or chinchilla running around. Secondly, the pelts would be damaged by the "impact" or deterioration after just a few hours in the sun, and being picked at by scavengers.

"Animals are not ours to wear" is one of PETA's mantras. I agree with it. Therefore, I'd have to suggest that PETA would probably still be against the sale of pelts for vanity. However, if they were made for the homeless or for animal shelters, that might be different (PETA often donates used furs given to them to homeless shelters). PETA's underlying objection would be how the animals became roadkill. Sprawl, deforestation, killing off natural predators, paving through migration areas, etc are all issues that can cause an animal to find his/her way onto a roadway, and into the path of a moving vehicle. Maybe the animal was hit by a deviant, swerving AT the animal, at which point the animal may have suffered at the hands of human intention.

BTW, it wouldn't just be PETA. Most AR/advocacy groups would be against this. Just my 2 cents...

[benburch]

7. But what rights do dead animals still have?

And from an ecological point of view, the alternatives are landfill or rendering.

Yes, many places sell their roadkill to renderers, and they are made into fats that are used in commercial products.

If animals are not ours to wear, are they ours to wash our cars with? Commercial soaps are one of the many products made with rendered animals.

Also, roadkill includes deer, moose, bear, and the occasional large wild cat. All of which can be attractive materials for garments. Around here I see MANY raccoon and skunk, both were heavily used by furriers in the days of trapping.

[China_cat]

8. PA at one point tried to pass a bill

allowing road kill deer to be fed to state prisoners. (I don't know whether it ever passed or not) The deer population has increased exponentially and with the loss of more and more habitat, what you see on PA's roads are about 3 dead deer per mile.

Here in SC we're beginning to see a lot of roadkill alligator.

[benburch]

9. Alligator would also be a useful material.

And I'm betting it gets landfilled now. Why waste what Nature produced?

[flvegan]

10. To speak to your statements/questions:

Those are the alternatives if the animal is picked up and disposed of, yes.

Roadkill is oftentimes put in dog food, as well (also from the renderers you speak of).

No, they aren't ours to wash our cars with. One can avoid soaps made from animal products, as well as avoid soaps tested on them.

I agree, almost any animal could be roadkill. Turtle shells could be made into ashtrays, too. I'm not denying any of that. However, the many skunk you see might make one coat.

It's not the rights of the dead animal, it's the "rights" of the animal that is now dead, and why that animal is dead to begin with.

[jilln]

13. roadkill is food for other animals

or will naturally rot and go back to the environment. No need to collect it for anything.

[benburch]

14. Actually, it seems to get other animals killed a lot.

I've seen roadkills where there were scavengers dead alongside the original kill.

[jilln]

15. true, but then we could move it off the road...

because making soap and other crap out of it is disgusting.

[radwriter0555]

11. The tire tracks and blood spatters could indeed make a statement

if you're into nasty, stinking, rotting pelts as fashion...

:)

[benburch]

12. I've seen some salvaged material, and it was not objectionable.

Once treated, it had no odor other than a leather/pelt odor, and you cut out any bits you cannot clean up.

Some friends from a commune in the Missouri hills have been salvaging road kill for their own use since the 60s. They make all manner of useful things from it. And they always do a native american (several are Choctaw) prayer for the animals they collect.

[YankeyMCC]

16. It wouldn't stop at random kills

As soon as a corporation is created to make money off of selling these things they'll lobby for things like taking down the signs indicating with large animals cross roads. (You know those moose crossing signs) And any other law or regulation that will lead to increased incidents of cars killing animals.

And I'm sure some will go out and accidentally/deliberately kill animals with cars.

"Hello AAA? Yes I need a tow I just hit a large Buck."

"Ok sir where are you?"

"About 2 miles off the main highway. You can't miss me I'm in the Hummer2 next to two big oaks."

;)

edit: fixed some spelling.

[bertha katzenengel]

17. Of course they'd have a problem with it, but I don't know why.

Why do I think this? Because they're PETA. God bless 'em, I agree with many of their premises but they are, as a group, among the most easily offended folks on the planet.

[jilln]

18. to paraphrase...

If you're not offended, you're not paying attention!!!

I understand what you're saying, but realize that people who are sensitive to animal abuse are surrounded by it all day every day in many forms. We're supposed to sit there quietly while people eat chickens who were very possibly boiled alive, be polite to people wearing fur trapped in leghold traps, and listen to our coworkers talk about breeding purebred dogs all the time while in my city alone, we kill 40,000 shelter animals a year.

If we were protesting child abuse no one would EVER say we went too far in anything, yet the issues and the suffering caused are the same if not worse, and the punishment for breaking animal cruelty laws is NOTHING compared to what people who abuse children get... so that's why we're sensitive.

[bertha katzenengel]

21. You know, I could have gone all my life without having those images

in my head. I won't begin to tell you how they will affect me -- how they have always affected me. You don't want to know.

Suffice to say you make an excellent point. But dear, some of us can't fucking handle such imagery. That's why we don't read "my dog was hit by a car" threads.

Tell me, Jilln: What was the point of PETA standing outside the Embassy of Spain in DC last week in their underwear? Not only do I not know exactly what they were protesting, but I don't get the point of being outdoors unclothed.

I promise you I'm not being combative and I'm trying not to be an asshole. I'm truly curious.

BTW I eat meat and I wear leather, and not a day goes by that I don't think about making a change. It merely is Not. That. Simple.

[jilln]

22. Hmmm

I didn't hear about that thing in Spain, but maybe it was a protest of the running of the bulls? I know they do a naked run. I've heard PeTA speakers say that the reason they do stuff like that is that when they TELL people for example that fowl are not covered under humane slaughter laws and what happens to them on farms, people ... well... just like you ... say how awful it is and keep eating fowl. When they pull some weird stunt, everyone says how stupid it is but then visits the Web site - their traffic will go through the roof and everyone will be exposed to images of the cruelty, if just for a second, which is much more effective.

Anyway, if there's anything I can do to encourage you to go vegetarian I'd be happy to help. For me it WAS that simple ... I just decided I didn't want to be the cause of that kind of suffering. Yeah sometimes it means it's hard to find a restaurant to eat at, but that's pretty minor in comparison. And the abuse I described before is just the tip of the iceberg, which I guess you already know.

[bertha katzenengel]

23. Thank you for not taking my comments as insults.

I was harsh.

That's probably what it was - to protest the running of the bulls. Maybe there's something about that particular protest on the Washington Post's web site. It tied up traffic in Foggy Bottom for a few hours, from what I hear.

Thank you for your thoughts.

[arissa]

20. Don't be silly

http://www.peta.org/feat/roadkill/