Is wearing fur simply a fashion choice?

BEFORE Sarah Vine champions the fur industry (Mail), she should picture a dog being strung up, squealing in terror, as it is skinned alive. The pelt is sent for curing to trim fashion garments. Dogs and cats are routinely treated in this way in the Far East. ROSIE BURSTON, Par, cornwall. I RESPECT people’s views against wearing fur, particularly if they are vegan or vegetarian, but it can seem to be an emotional, not a reasoned, crusade. If foxes need to be culled, is it wrong to use their fur? Is it wrong to use leather or wool from animals bred for meat? Who is causing more suffering: a person who wears one piece of fur for life or someone who eats lamb three or four times a month for years? name and address supplied. ANIMAL rights campaigners have worked for decades to stop the slaughtering of animals for their fur, yet Sarah Vine supports ‘fillies in fur’. How offensive. SYLVIA ACKROYD, address supplied. I WAs saddened and disappointed by sarah Vine’s article on fur being worn at the cheltenham Festival. Fur is not a by-product of the food industry. Who eats mink, silver foxes or snow leopards? Animals on the endangered list are poached for their fur, while rabbits, foxes, seals and even dogs are treated extremely cruelly by those breeding or capturing them for fur. the pelts are exported to other countries, sometimes labelled as faux fur. Fur only looks beautiful on its original owners. e. J. EARLEY, Woking, Surrey. FUR has never been less fashionable. It was reported in December that the Duchess of Cornwall had switched to wearing faux-fur hats. Looks can be deceiving: most fur is fake because of objections to the fur industry. Fur farming was banned in Britain more than a decade ago, and more than 100,000 people have signed a petition to the Government to ban the importation of fur. In the week that Donatella Versace and Furla declared themselves furfree, joining Gucci, Armani, Michael Kors and Jimmy Choo, Sarah Vine’s article harked back to a less enlightened era from which most of us have moved on. OLIVIA JORDAN, Peta, london n1.