DUBLIN: Protesters in Ireland's capital city covered themselves with red paint on October 12, in an anti-fur protest. The move sparked controversy in the city after animal rights activists forcibly freed thousands of mink from a local farm last month. Organizers of the demonstration argued that legislation is the best way to improve animal rights in the country. Protesters held signs depicting a dog raccoon, which campaigners said had been skinned alive on a fur farm in China. Fur, much like the depiction on the sign, is then sold worldwide, including in Ireland, where shoppers “don't know the horrors associated with their purchases,” one activist told Bikya Masr. “Most people who wear fur today are people who just don't know what goes on behind the scenes,” Animal Rights Action Network campaign coordinator John Carmody told reporters. “They're almost always skinned alive because there's no way of killing them with anesthetic individually – it would take too much time so it's literally like a production line,” Carmody added. He argued that the protest has two aims. “We want people to know that their fur actually had a face and that every year animals are trapped, their drowned, their beaten to death in the wild or they're gassed.” “Our second message is that we're asking and we're urging the Government that the proposed legislation in the agreed program for government is brought in by the end of the year. We want this legislation to be passed in the Dáil by 2012, a historic piece of legislation for the animal welfare movement here in Ireland will mean that fur farms will banned in Ireland.” According to Irish animal rights organizations statistics some five farms in Ireland house up to 140,000 mink at any time and they are used primarily for clothing. Statistics show that some 28 million animals are used worldwide for fur annually, with the vast majority being mink. In one mink coat, between 30 and 70 animals are slaughtered and killed. “It is horrific that this sort of behavior continues,” said Keilan Wallace, a Scottish animal rights activist living in Dublin. “I think that getting the word out and informing people is the best way to go and this sort of paint on the streets will definitely get people at least thinking of what they are doing. Maybe it will change minds.” The Dublin protest, Carmody said, will be repeated in all major Irish cities in the coming weeks in an effort to bolster the campaign against fur. BM
