Animal Co-Products

1646: 

Edited by CJ Tointon

"Vanity, vanity, all is vanity (that's any fun at all for humanity)"….Ogden Nash.

Young or old, we all live for pleasure - and acceptance. Appearance and fashion is important to us. Young women's shoes have to 'look right'. But for young vegan women, there's often not much to choose from; which puts them in a difficult position. When I look around, I don't see many people without leather on their feet, whether it's hardy walking boots or formal footwear. Does it not cross peoples' minds to think about this material as a co-product of the abattoir? Animal hides are often more valuable to the shoe industry than the carcass is to the meat industry; hence leather becomes a co-product rather than an animal by-product. 

We're more likely to go for attractive or hard-wearing shoes than consider the unethical nature of using leather. For health reasons, we may eat non-animal foods; but we don't rule out wearing the skins of animals as clothing, fur or shoes. After all, a shoe or a coat will not adversely affect our health!

When health isn't an issue, we may consider that eating junk food is okay  - until we put on body weight. Even then, we just eat what we want, which is much closer to vanity and much farther from good health practice.

To acquire whatever commodity we consider essential to our lifestyle, we squeeze what we can from what's available. We spend big, risk debt, ignore warnings and mainly consider our own interests. We live for the moment. We just want to have fun - Now!

Young people will usually paint their lives from the brightest colours of the palette. To keep it exciting, they need to question what they buy as little as possible to avoid undermining their self confidence. At a certain age, young people are suddenly free to experience any stimulating experience they desire. "And why not? You only live once. Live life while you can!" This is the governing approach - until the shutters come down and one is forced to change (usually in later years). By this time we've probably lost the joy of living and become Vanity's faded victims. We've watched the years slip away, the fun drain from our lives, the youth slip from our bodies. But have we ever considered the ANIMALS whose lives have been sacrificed to make our own lives as 'colourful' as possible?