Anti-Wool Activists Brandish A ‘Bloody Shorn Lamb’ at London Fashion Week

For Immediate Release:

15 February 2019

Contact:

Jennifer White +44 (0) 20 7837 6327, ext 222; [email protected]

ANTI-WOOL ACTIVISTS BRANDISH A ‘BLOODY SHORN LAMB’ AT LONDON FASHION WEEK

PETA Urges People to Open Their Eyes to Abuse of Sheep – Who Are Punched, Kicked, and Slammed to the Floor – for Wool Clothing

London – With fur almost dead and gone from London Fashion Week, PETA has set its sights on a new target: the wool industry. Today, to highlight the suffering of sheep exploited for wool, three blindfolded activists, sporting vegan wool jumpers and cradling a “bloody shorn lamb”, descended on London Fashion Week holding signs proclaiming, “Don’t Pull the Wool Over Our Eyes” and “Wool Is as Cruel as Fur.”

Images are available here, here, and here.

The protest follows the first-ever video exposés of the British wool industry, which revealed that on 49 farms visited by a PETA Asia eyewitness, shearers punched sheep in the face, stamped and stood on their heads and necks, and beat and jabbed them with electric clippers. One farmer was recorded dragging two ailing sheep into a shed, where he left them to suffer and die.

“Sheep’s wool, just like foxes’ fur, is not a ‘fabric’, and it doesn’t belong to us – it belongs to the animals who were born with it,” says PETA Director Elisa Allen. “Whenever animals are viewed as nothing more than commodities to be turned into wool scarves or fur coats, abuse will always be a part of the production process. The only way to be sure we’re not buying into cruelty is to leave wool garments – and all other clothing made from animals – out of our wardrobes.”

PETA (whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear”) and its affiliates have released 11 exposés of 99 facilities on four continents, revealing that sheep are mutilated, abused, and even skinned alive for wool – including wool labelled “responsibly sourced” from deceptively named “sustainable” farms.

The 2017 “Pulse of the Fashion Industry” report ranked wool in fourth place on its list of materials that had the highest cradle-to-gate environmental impact per kilogram. Fortunately, many animal- and Earth-friendly vegan alternatives to wool are available today – from hemp and coconut fibres treated with enzymes extracted from the oyster mushroom to organic cotton, bamboo, and even banana bark.

For more information, please visit PETA.org.uk.

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