To interrupted the immigrant and teacher debates and some we can get behind. A decent article that is worth reading (if you have the attention span) and sharing. If you do share, click in the link and use the links share button. By doing this it shows media outlets what is popular and give more attention to.


Here you go:

https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/peta-protest-faux-fur-synthetic-garments/

Animal-rights group PETA recently reiterated its criticism of the harvesting of natural furs from animals for use in coats. ‘Tis the season, after all, to lambast people for wearing leather, wool, hide, and fur garments.

On December 13, PETA added “#CanadaGooseKillsDay” to their Twitter account. Currently, PETA has a page on their website dedicated to detailing what coyotes undergo for the sake of the creation of Canada Goose coats. It describes how wild coyotes are trapped and the physical and psychological effects they can suffer, including dehydration, shock, frostbite, and gangrene. PETA says that “Canada Goose jackets are products of cruelty.”


Of course, PETA is not advocating for an end to coats. The same page declares that there is “no need for any of this to occur when so many fashionable, functional fur and down alternatives exist,” linking to a series of faux fur brands.

While at first glance, faux fur and synthetic garments might seem like a reasonable and compassionate alternative to natural fur coats, synthetic coats have a surprisingly large effect on the environment.

The list of materials in the making of one of the winter coats of Donna Salyers’ Fabulous Furs — one of the faux fur brands on PETA’s list of recommended alternatives — includes acrylic, modacrylic and polyester fur trim. Other faux coats boast a similar make-up of synthetic fibers, principally acrylic and polyester.


Polyester, invented in the early decades of the twentieth century as a cheap and more insulating alternative to cotton and wool, shortly overtook the competition and became one of the most popular fabrics. In the fashion world, polyester, like other plastics in other domains, became a quick and easy alternative to organic materials.


However, there is nothing quick nor easy about the production or destruction of polyester, which is one of the least environmentally friendly fabrics. Unlike organic fibers, polyester and other synthetic fibers do not easily biodegrade; a synthetic garment can take from 20 to 200 years to break down, whereas leather takes 50 years at the longest. Wool can take only six months, and a cotton garment can take as little as five months, to biodegrade.


A PETA activist protests outside a clothing store in Berlin in 2007. (Tobias Schwarz/Reuters)
Animal-rights group PETA recently reiterated its criticism of the harvesting of natural furs from animals for use in coats. ‘Tis the season, after all, to lambast people for wearing leather, wool, hide, and fur garments.

On December 13, PETA added “#CanadaGooseKillsDay” to their Twitter account. Currently, PETA has a page on their website dedicated to detailing what coyotes undergo for the sake of the creation of Canada Goose coats. It describes how wild coyotes are trapped and the physical and psychological effects they can suffer, including dehydration, shock, frostbite, and gangrene. PETA says that “Canada Goose jackets are products of cruelty.”


Of course, PETA is not advocating for an end to coats. The same page declares that there is “no need for any of this to occur when so many fashionable, functional fur and down alternatives exist,” linking to a series of faux fur brands.

While at first glance, faux fur and synthetic garments might seem like a reasonable and compassionate alternative to natural fur coats, synthetic coats have a surprisingly large effect on the environment.

The list of materials in the making of one of the winter coats of Donna Salyers’ Fabulous Furs — one of the faux fur brands on PETA’s list of recommended alternatives — includes acrylic, modacrylic and polyester fur trim. Other faux coats boast a similar make-up of synthetic fibers, principally acrylic and polyester.

Polyester, invented in the early decades of the twentieth century as a cheap and more insulating alternative to cotton and wool, shortly overtook the competition and became one of the most popular fabrics. In the fashion world, polyester, like other plastics in other domains, became a quick and easy alternative to organic materials.


However, there is nothing quick nor easy about the production or destruction of polyester, which is one of the least environmentally friendly fabrics. Unlike organic fibers, polyester and other synthetic fibers do not easily biodegrade; a synthetic garment can take from 20 to 200 years to break down, whereas leather takes 50 years at the longest. Wool can take only six months, and a cotton garment can take as little as five months, to biodegrade.

And unlike wool and cotton that is harvested exclusively from organic sources, polyester is in part derived from coal and petroleum, industries much maligned by PETA: Another page on its website bears the headline “Fight Climate Change by Going Vegan” and says: “Climate change has been called humankind’s greatest challenge and the world’s gravest environmental threat.” In another list on the ethics group’s website, “save the planet” is one of their top ten reasons to go vegan. But PETA’s concern for the environment only seems to crop up when it is convenient for itself.

PETA has criticized the environmental toll of the oil industry before. However, the group’s criticism took a strange tack. It declared that consumers should stop eating meat, which drives demand for oil. In one instance PETA flew a plane over Mobile, Alabama, with the banner “Meat on Your Grill = Oil Spill.”


It is absurd of PETA to put the brunt of responsibility on consumers with limited options, but this is becoming an increasingly common position for the animal-rights group. PETA has endorsed practices that have much more toxic results than the production of animal-derived goods at a time when warnings about the environment are growing louder.

The process of creating and maintaining synthetic coats takes a toll, the garments themselves remain pollutants for hundreds of years after they are discarded, and when they are washed for everyday use, they shed additional plastic fibers. According to the Guardian, “researchers at the University of California at Santa Barbara found that, on average, synthetic fleece jackets release 1.7 grams of microfibers each wash.”

And using the same coat from year to year will do little less damage. The amount of microfibers that synthetic coats and jackets release into water when washed only increases as the garment age. The same study found that “older jackets shed almost twice as many fibers as new jackets.”


Manifest pollution from polyester microfibers in synthetic garments have already been found by multiple studies to be a primary source of plastic pollutants in oceans, lakes and rivers. Plastic pollutants contribute to increased acidification of the ocean, which, UN scientists recently warned, “is projected to amplify the adverse effects of warming” and affect the “abundance of a broad range of species, for example, from algae to fish.”

If PETA truly cared about environmental health and the health of the animals whose very existence depend on that healthy ecosystem, they would not promote fake fur as adamantly as they do. PETA’s facile reasoning doesn’t take into account the long-term repercussions of using non-biodegradable alternatives to natural garments.

Natural fibers are ultimately more sustainable than synthetic, even though they demand a more immediate use of resources, including livestock. PETA ought to consider whether, in the long-term, it is promoting trends that will prolong the length and quality of the lives of the animals it claims to speak for.

Good common sense article that will fall on completely dead ears.

I knew a young woman who supported PETA once. I watched her lambast a man who was selling lamb skins at an event we were at. She went off on him about how selling lamb skins was cruel, because the lambs were skinned alive. The man was totally confused and asked her why in the world she thought anyone would skin a live lamb. He said they would not hold still for it. She then told him they do it because the skins grow back. She said she watched a video on it, that it hurts the lambs terribly and that the lamb is bloody with it's muscles hanging out until the new skin grows back. We both laughed at her stupidity. I asked her are you sure they weren't just shearing the lambs wool off. She went on to say that she was sure they skinned live lambs. We explained there was no way they skinned live lambs, that grew their skins back, because the lambs would die. She insisted that it must be some new breed we never heard of. PETA supporters are not all there mentally.

Keith

Holy crap

So...how do we shake this country up ? lol

When the fake economy hit's the wall a lot of people will be jolted into reallity.

These groups have neve had a basis other than emotion. If they ever figure out bacteria are tiny little animals, they will self destruct rather than kI'll them.

As for what Kieth said, I had posted a reply to another thread recently about common sense. I said that the things some people say or do can only cause you to have a blank stare. (Or something like that). How can an adult actually believe you could skin a lamb alive and the skin would grow back??????

While not as crazy as that woman’s belief, I once had a Brother-in-Law who was raiised in Atlanta. He moved to Zanesville, Oh, and drove about 50 miles one way to work in Columbus, OH. There are tons of deer in that area and in the winter on his late day drive home he would see them. One day he says to me, “I never see deer during the daylight. So they must go into holes underground and come out in the evening, right?”

Hal is right. Emotion!! Emotion! EMOTION!!!!

No common sense! Cannot they see how illogical that is??

I had a girlfriend years ago believing that the yellow curves ahead road signs were snake crossings......

So that's where they go during our gun deer season. Thanks for the info.

The same folks that think a dead pet is a happy pet, total nut jobs!