UnchainedTV: Cruelty - Get The Hell Out Of Fashion Now!

0:00 Now, here's your host, Jane Velez Mitchell. You are looking at a woman performing an incredible burlesque show. However, those are not real feathers, although they look just like real feathers. This is a cruelty-free fashion show. And this entire hour is going to be cruelty-free, where we show you there is no place for animal cruelty in fashion. Those are not real feathers. There is absolutely no need whatsoever to torture any animal for fashion. Monica Kaye is the woman holding those feathers. She's gonna be joining us today. And there she is, Monica.

0:42 We've got other fantastic guests, but take it away. Tell us about your campaign to end feathers in fashion. Hi, Jane, thanks for having me on. I started the feather phase-out campaign in January of last year, so it's been 13 months now. And I was primarily motivated to begin this campaign because as a dancer and as a vegan, I'm very aware of how feathers are used in all forms of dance. And it was always upsetting to me to be in dressing rooms or even be an audience member at a show and see feathers.

1:26 And I've met a lot of performers that are either vegan or close to vegan, and they also would prefer to use a non -feather item, but we've just been kind of just doing what everyone before us does. Typically, when you dance, you have a mentor. When you're learning dance, and if the mentor uses feathers, then the student ends up using it. And that just keeps passing on and on and on, generation to generation, practising using feathers. And I never had to use feathers in any of my acts. And I came up with this faux feather burlesque fan, and people are interested.

2:12 And I think that there's a need for faux feathers in burlesque because the demand is there. People want to use them. And I wanna say, and I'm gonna put it right here in the comment section, you have a show coming up, and it is going to be a very, may I say, sexy, glamorous event in Pomona, and it's cruelty -free. You said you would participate only if it was cruelty-free. Tell me about that. Yeah, so when I started the campaign, unbeknownst to me, and I'm finding this out now, studios all over the world are using a tutorial that I made to make these fans.

2:53 And there was a studio in Pomona where a few of the students kept making these faux feather fans using the feather phase-out tutorial. And the owner of the studio decided to reach out to me and invite me to be a part of their Valentine's-themed show. And I have been trying to retire for a while now to move on to other things. And when she asked me to do it, I thought, well, this would be a good opportunity for me to get, just like with the vegan fashion show in Canada, this would be a good opportunity for me to prove that these are faux feathers, they're beautiful, burlesque artists can use these.

3:33 The audience, they don't even know that, they can't even tell that they're fake. Like, they think they're real feathers. So I was pretty much motivated to do the show because I could be on stage, get proof, photographic video proof that these are usable props. And, but the caveat would be that I wouldn't want to participate in the show if somebody else were using real feathers. Because that's just always been a real downer for me as a performer. And I think- And you, this is great activism by saying, look, I'll participate if it's cruelty-free.

4:15 You made the entire performance cruelty-free. Where'd it go? I want to very quickly play your, just a tiny snippet of your how to make faux feathers tutorial that's all over YouTube. Let's just take a quick look at it. And this video is going to show you how to make collapsable burlesque fans, just like these, out of faux pompous. So this stuff, not the real stuff. Got disassembled faux pompous. They come wrapped like this. So you just take that paper off, throw it in the trash, disassembled pompous. I also have some where I've trimmed the stems off.

4:59 Wow. So that's what people are using all around the world. The tutorial you created so that those who want to have that feathery look, I saw it at the Superbowl. I mean, I pray that those weren't real feathers, but I just saw it this past weekend at the Superbowl. You're nodding your head, Nina Jekyll. You are a fierce campaigner against cruelty, the leader of, and indeed Lady Freethinker in the house. And you have unmasked the most extraordinarily horrific cruelty involving fur. And we're only gonna show a couple of photos because honestly it is just too disturbing.

5:41 But your investigation has shown that fur unfortunately is still continuing and still causing torture to animals. It is. In fact, we found thousands of foxes and raccoon dogs just languishing in tiny filthy cages on two Chinese fur farms. This was an investigation in cooperation with Paws of China, a local organisation. And as you can see there, this is actually in transport. So after they're removed from their breeding housing cages using metal tongs or poles, they're crammed into these tiny, tiny cages and shipped off to slaughter.

6:27 Some of them were actually slaughtered on site and very often they were seen moving, thrashing around, blinking, still visibly conscious even as they were being skinned. So the animals are very much being skinned alive in this industry. I know it's horrifying to talk about it, but unfortunately fur is still to some people fashionable. And to think that these animals undergo such suffering, so much pain and agony just so somebody can wear a coat or a trinket, it is hard to wrap your head around.

7:09 And I do hope that with these findings, we can expose the reality of this industry to more people and help them make more compassionate decisions because nobody needs to wear fur. Those faux feathers were absolutely gorgeous. I love them. Similarly, we have all kinds of faux fur. You can wear any type of colour and texture imaginable and not have to kill an animal to do it. It's beyond comprehension evil. And I am proud to say that I am, and so are you Nina in California, which just became the first state in the nation in January of 2023 to officially ban the sale and manufacture of any new animal fur products.

7:56 Of course, it's a question of enforcement. Already some activists have gone and tried to determine whether it's being enforced. And there are stores that one activist found pretty easily that still were selling new fur. And when she confronted them about the law, they said, so it seems, but they acted like they didn't know. So we have to make sure our government enforces the law in California. And this incredible activist said, everybody needs to become the fur police and go into stores in California and ask them, even with a hidden camera, are you selling fur? And if they start showing new fur, that is in violation of the law.

8:38 They need to be prosecuted. And that is something that I certainly hope happens because a law is only as good as its enforcement. Now we've got the fashion show, the vegan fashion show founder here from Canada. Vicky, we are so proud to have you. And I wanted to show a little bit of, you sent me some clips. I could have been watching them all day and all night because they were so glamorous and exciting. But tell us about your, the vegan fashion show in Canada and how it is really changing the game.

9:20 And by the way, this is still technically New York Fashion Week going on. And we certainly hope that there's no fur, no feathers, no silk, no wool. Unfortunately there probably is, but take it away, Vicky. Hi, thanks for having me. So yeah, I think a lot of the people in the Toronto area and I'm sure everywhere else, they don't really know what's going on and how these animals become materials. And I say that in quotes for the fur industry, leather and everything like that. And so what we do is even for our model casting, we'll have a presentation about it.

10:01 We preview trailers for different documentaries such as Slave. Yeah, so I mean, I really started doing this because of activism that I was doing and doing friendly outreach. And then I realised people were like, well, aren't you wearing leather shoes? And it's so easy to think, oh, what a ridiculous question. But people really don't know. They don't know that the cheap old school vegan leather exists, let alone next gen materials. And you still placed so many cutting edge fashion materials in your show.

10:42 And I wanna get to that in a minute, but I have to tell you, the lines are lighting up. I think you're all familiar with Paige Parsons Roach. Your question or thought, Paige? Thank you, hopefully you can hear me. Is it true that there are millions of animals that are actually bred to become costumes, become fashion and so forth around the world? Can somebody else read me that, thank you. Yeah, I mean, who wants to take that one, Nina? I mean, yes, animals are bred in those tiny cages that we uncovered in our investigation, a variety of species.

11:23 We saw foxes, red foxes, Arctic foxes and raccoon dogs. Obviously there are minks and other animals as well. And most of the fur right now is distributed from China. There are still some other countries who also distribute, although thankfully it has been banned, I believe in about 20 countries raising animals for fur, which is phenomenal. But as long as people continue to purchase it and there's a market, it's going to be very hard to stamp it out completely. So we really have that power of choice as consumers to stop this cruelty from happening. You know, just yesterday I was walking my dog.

12:07 Zuh, you may hear them in the background every so often. And they remind us that these are sentient beings who are just like children and who need to be protected. And my dogs and your dogs are no different than the dogs that they are torturing in China and in other parts of the world, okay? But there was a woman wearing a fur coat and I've seen her several times. She had a dog and I walked right up to her and I said, I certainly hope that's, oh, I had a feeling it wasn't, but it made me disgusted that even today walking around, you still see people, it wasn't a full length fur coat, but it was, you could see the fur trim. And it's like, wake up people.

12:48 I mean, it's just beyond comprehension to be walking a dog and essentially wearing dogs at the same time. So, you know, it's really upsetting. And we, look, I was polite. I didn't scream in her face, but I said, I certainly hope that's faux. And I think as I was walking away, she said it wasn't and tried to offer an excuse. But really to wear that is to essentially applaud animal torture. That's what it is. I can comment too on Paige's enquiry. There's very little visibility in the feather supply industry.

13:30 But what I did find was that there are birds that are protected across the world in various countries for different reasons. And so there is a lot of black market trading, illegal trading, smuggling, illegal slaughter of birds, some of which are protected, some are not. And so wearing feathers and treating it as if it is a fashionable, desirable product encourages that kind of black market trading. Thank you so much for that. We're gonna go out to the phone lines. We've got another caller, Nilo Farr in Dallas, Texas. Your question or thought for our panel, fighting cruelty in fashion.

14:16 Hi, I am an animal activist in Dallas Fort Worth. It's a privilege courtesy of Unchained TV. Ending cruelty in fashion should be a winnable campaign and we've come a long way. Yet circa about a decade ago, it seemed that satin fur was in sight. But fur came back mostly in trims and liners. What remains as the fundamental challenge today to eliminate cruelty as vegan fashion becomes more trendy?

14:57 Well, I'm gonna hit that with Nina and then we'll go back to Vicky. Yeah, that's a great question because we really have come such a long way. And for a while it seemed like fur was just going to disappear very quickly. Unfortunately, it's rarely quite that simple and there's a pendulum. It tends to swing right now. We are seeing that mop wife fur trend happening, unfortunately, which has made things more difficult. That said, I do believe that the momentum is still there. And as long as we keep talking about it, as long as we keep showing people the reality behind it and offering those amazing vegan fashions that you mentioned, I do believe that not only is it winnable but we will win this soon.

15:45 Patience is a must in activism, even when it's an issue that just seems so obvious. Fur is not relevant. It does not need to exist. And I think we're in those last stages and that we will see a final nail in the coffin fairly soon. Yeah, and I mean, to me, it's a contrarian indicator. If you feel the need to wear fur, to me it says you have a low self-esteem because if maybe in the 19th century, it was something that the upper classes wore to distinguish themselves from the peasants or whatever, but we're not in that stage anymore.

16:27 The most famous and the richest people in the world walk around in t-shirts. They hold investor meetings in t-shirts. So a fur is really a contrarian indicator and I do wanna get to some more video on the vegan fashion show out of Canada, but we've got more callers. Annie in Sherman Oaks, your question or thought for our fabulous panel. Oh, hi, thank you, Jane. Thank you fabulous panel, incredible work you do. Yes, it's so disgusting that people do not realise the cruelty behind the scenes. Aside from doing the fashion show, Monica and Lady Freethinker, all of you are amazing.

17:16 What methods are there companies to take over the companies that actually sell real fur from the animals, fur feathers and all that? I'm an activist, I'd love to do that, you know? Yes, thank you. Part of it is convincing companies that sell fur to not sell fur. And generally that takes some pretty intense protest. And I've seen it, I've worked in these campaigns. You ask nicely, you send letters, you send videotape, you do petitions, nothing, nothing, nothing. And then when you start protesting inside their stores, outside their homes, at events, like there was a famous furrier who was being feted at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

18:04 And it was disrupted by activists who played sounds of animals being skinned alive. It was after that, that he came out and said, I am no longer selling fur. But it takes that kind of really intense confrontation, appeals to conscience almost never work when it comes to corporations. And that is something that is very, very sad, but it's very true. Nina, just address that, and then we're gonna go to Vicky. Yeah, I mean, when there's profit involved, it makes ending cruelty that much more insurmountable. But when you add that public pressure, especially when press gets involved, and when public opinion starts to turn against that company for the cruelty, that's where you can make inroads.

18:52 And we have seen it happen. You know, now most major designers have stopped selling fur, you know, really because of that public pressure. And there are a couple left, you know, right now there's a really big push to get Max Mara to stop selling fur. And you just have to keep clamouring away, be persistent, keep that message out there, get it seen by as many people as possible. And that tide does turn against that company with enough pressure that things change. All right, one more caller. We've got Tom in Chicago. Your question or thought for our panel. Hi Jane, thanks for taking my call. My question was that about celebrities that will wear fur.

19:34 The other day, Reba McEntire is wearing a fur coat. Okay, a couple of years ago, we saw a big boy at the Superbowl wearing a fur coat. Lady Gaga's wearing fur. Why don't we reach out to the celebrities and say, please not endorse these products because they influence thousands, if not millions of people. Someone needs to reach out to them and say, do not wear fur, advocate, do not cause the suffering and torturing of animals to wear fake fur, things like this, if they can influence these people. It's really frustrating to see them do these things. It's so unconscionable they would wear fur products and influence their audience, if you will. Anyway, you could reach out to them and tell them, please do not wear fur and be an advocate for going fur free. Thank you for taking my call. Yeah, and I want to point out, I do not have the ability to live television confirm or deny any of the claims that was made by that caller.

20:22 I don't know if those particular examples are correct, but there were people, and it's hard to tell when you're watching on TV, who are watching major events that almost always you see somebody that looks like they're wearing fur. So let me move toward Vicky. Vicky, how do we combat this? You're doing it proactively with your fashion line and it's very effective because your fashions are gorgeous. And so people would want to look like that, look like you, look like the women on the runway and the men on the runway. Yeah, I think people are very impressionable.

21:05 Things that we're seeing on social media, I think people see it glamorised and we need to let them know it's coming from violence. It's not glamour. We need to stop romanticising fur, for example. And I think we need to take a systems thinking approach. There's just so many different angles we need to attack this issue from. And I feel like everyone can find their own way to do their part. For myself, I felt like the vegan fashion show was something that I could do just based on my experiences, experience with brands, networking with influencers and brands over the years, and just being a model in the past myself. For me, this was the way that I felt I could best do something about it.

21:50 There's so many things I wanna do, of course, but I do like fashion and I know a lot of my friends and acquaintances, they like fashion and I want them to know where it comes from. I think everyone deserves to know how their fashion is made and what it's really made out of. Yeah, and I wanna jump to the actual fashion show as it happens. So you can take a 32nd sense of being there in Canada at the vegan fashion show. Let's listen to this and then we'll talk on the other side. And it's a fashion label based in Beijing, China. The designer brand was co-founded by Trans Boundary designer, Stephen Shen and director, Louis Yin.

22:30 The designs are simple, structuralist, easy to wear and dispels gender. QZ Shen has won the Love Design Award from PETA Asia. Now, it seems like that is the cutting edge in fashion. It was gender fluid. It was based out of China. It got a PETA award. Like you, vegan fashion is on the cutting edge of fashion. Yeah, we had a great mix of designers. We had an indigenous designer, which is great because a lot of people in Canada, at least I know think that indigenous and vegan, it's like conflicting, but it doesn't have to be that way.

23:20 We had a faith-based designer. And I think it's just good to intersect with different values and causes and show that everyone can be compassionate with their fashion choices. No matter what you're looking for, there's something out there for you. Excellent. And we've got more callers. Let's see who's up next. We've got Tiffany in Los Angeles. Your question or thought for our fantastic panel. Tiffany. Gorgeous. And it's really inspiring to see this. I felt so, I won't mention any names, but after watching the talent at the Superbowl and then seeing them in a long white fur jacket, I was just so disgusted.

24:04 So this is really inspiring. Are there any plans to bring the show to the States or Los Angeles in particular? Good question, Vicki. We could use it. Now, I wanna say, we do have a vegan fashion scene here. And I was just, in fact, we did a video about a vegan fashion show here in Los Angeles, downtown LA, Michelle and I were there and it was pretty fantastic. But the more, the merrier, right? There's a whole bunch of non-vegan fashion shows. We should have tonnes of vegan fashion shows. Go ahead, Vicki. So right now, yeah, as you said, that there already is a vegan fashion week there.

24:45 So we're actually just focused on Canada right now. So we already have covered Toronto. This year we're gonna be in Vancouver and Toronto partnering up with Tanted Expo. In the future, we'll go to Montreal as well. But yeah, and there's a lot of things we can do online to reach people. So yes, the more, the merrier. I hope that there is more vegan fashion events all over the world. I also, I was thinking, recently, I wish I called it Next Gen Fashion Week because now I'm just such, I'm a geek for all these new materials coming out. But when I had thought about this idea originally years ago, next gen fashion and materials were not really coming out.

25:28 So I wasn't even aware of the term next gen materials at that time. So, you know, every year there's changes, there's so much more innovation every year and I'm just really excited about it. Well, let me just show the purse runway show. This was part of your vegan fashion show in Canada and this was next gen materials. Maybe you can explain a little bit. Yes, so this is made out of Mirum. So Mirum is, you know, the most commercially available right now material that is plastic free, a vegan plastic free material. But not only is it zero plastic, it is low carbon. It takes no water to make.

26:09 It's non-toxic, it's all natural. It's circular and by circular, I mean, that is what Mirum wants us to say when we talk about it, but what it really means, it is biodegradable in the right conditions. I don't say that it's recyclable, you can endlessly recycle it because I don't think recycling is like, you know, the end all solution, but it's circular. You know, there's just really no downsides to it. So, I mean, of course, let's not kid ourselves, overconsumption is the biggest problem. So I'm not saying to like go buy, buy, buy, but there really is no more excuses. You know, we have the leather industry saying, oh, like vegan leather is plastic, blah, blah, blah.

26:50 And by the way, with people that say that, I'm glad that people are concerned about plastic pollution, but I hope they don't eat fish because the fishing industry is a really, you know, top polluter there. So anyways, back to vegan fashion, you know, there's just no excuses now to be wearing real leather. What I don't get is that fashion always tries to be on the cutting edge. Fashion really is about evolution, the evolution of style. And you'd think that everybody would want to embrace the very latest. Now we know with a lot of fancy electric luxury cars, there's vegan leather and vegan leather has taken over.

27:35 I love to look at people's feet when I'm walking in a crowded area and I'm seeing more and more people are not wearing leather. Maybe, you know, on Wall Street, there's a lot of leather shoes, but everywhere else, it seems that a lot of shoes are just non-leather. I was at a very hard show, showroom the other day where there were shoes everywhere and there was a tag, I'll leave the brand name out of it, said vegan leather. And I turned to the woman, I said, oh, I said, this is vegan leather, what about this? And she said to me, all of our shoes are vegan. Like I was an idiot, I was like, yay, yay. So, I mean, let's do a round robin on this.

28:15 Like why, Monica, you're in fashion, you're in burlesque, you're in, you know, basically it's about wanting to be attractive, wanting to be sexy, wanting to be cool, wanting to be the latest and the greatest. Why would people wanna be in this old fashioned materials? Yeah, I mean, I think that people just kind of do what the people around them do. And when it comes to fashion, I think that people are influenced. I think someone had mentioned that earlier. I think also there's two groups, there's two mentalities. One group just doesn't, maybe doesn't care about animals.

28:56 One group just doesn't care. The other group cares, they just don't know the truth, right? And then real quick about the community that I'm focused on, the burlesque community, they happen to be very confident. They have lots of self-esteem. It takes a lot of self-esteem and confidence to perform on stage. So this is the group of people that I think would easily transition over to faux feathers because they are not trying to, burlesque is all about challenging status quo. It's all about creativity and uniqueness and embracing things that are different.

29:37 So, you know, this notion of like, okay, well, people wear fur because they want to seem elite or upper class or whatever. That doesn't necessarily have to be the case in burlesque because these dancers actually do care about animals. It's just, they are not being told the complete truth. And what is the truth? We don't know because there's not a lot of undercover investigations regarding feathers. There's the down feathers, down feathers not too much used in burlesque. And then there was the expose on ostriches, but that's it. Like there's no other undercover stuff regarding feathers. I think what you're saying is people think, oh, they just fall off the animal and there's no cruelty.

30:19 And that's not true, correct? No, that's not true. There's no way that, well, first of all, ostriches don't moult. So ostrich feathers are probably one of the pop, the most popular feather used in burlesque. And ostriches do not moult. If you ask a company that profits off of ostrich feathers, they're gonna say, oh yeah, there's a moulting season. But they're probably referring to when they're plucking feathers off and they're just calling that a moulting season. And companies that do not profit off of feathers, bird experts, things like that, they'll say that ostriches do not have a moulting season. Yeah, there's an in demand for feathers.

31:00 There's just thousands and millions and millions of feathers. For example, the Big Bird. Yeah, I have to keep brand names out of this. But let's go to Michelle Celestino, our social media director and a fashionista who does OMGLA, which is one of our series looking at fashion in Los Angeles. What are your thoughts? Well, first of all, I wanna say all of you are so amazing and I'm so glad we're doing this segment. I love fashion. I always loved fashion. I think one of the biggest things for me to go from plant-based to vegan was changing out the fashion. And I have a lot of friends that are conscious, but they don't know what to do.

31:45 So I think what it is, and I'd love to get everyone's opinion, maybe it's changing the perception of luxury because that's why a lot of my friends who buy all the brands and all the clothing, it's the idea and perception of what that means and the luxury of it. And your feathers are amazing. I think they're even prettier in that, like you can dye them and do different things to them. What do you all think? I think we should have a variety of different price points for, I'll talk about vegan handbags because this is just in my life so much, but people will complain if it's too costly, but at the same time, yeah, we do need to address the luxury desire as well.

32:30 So I think it's great to have lower price points for more affordable vegan handbags and other types of materials, but then also have the luxury brands as well. So I think that's gonna be very helpful. And there is this unfair association with vegan products, particularly handbags and shoes as plastic, but you're pointing out that this product here is not plastic and it's very environmentally sound. Yes, and we're gonna see more and more of that. There is a lot in the works right now from different material manufacturers, but this is the most commercially available one right now. Yeah, and I have to say also that Vegan Women's Summit is coming up here in Los Angeles where there's a plethora of entrepreneurs, women entrepreneurs making incredible vegan products.

33:25 I attended the Vegan Women's Summit in Brooklyn last year. There were people making pineapple leather and all sorts of leathers from these great products. And honestly, I have a cork leather backpack that was made by a vegan fashion designer. I thought, how long is this gonna last? It has lasted beyond all of my other products. It is so durable. So Nina, what do we do to counteract this notion that somehow, and this is put out by industry, that if it's not leather, that A, that leather is natural, which it's not, that leather doesn't require a lot of chemicals.

34:05 It does. That vegan products are somehow plastic. They're not. Of course, you can have plastic. There's plastic with leather. There's plastic without leather. But how do we counteract this misinformation? Right, I just wanna say that I also have a cork leather bag that I absolutely love. I don't know if it's the same brand, but it's super high quality, soft, pliable. So, I mean, there is definitely a perception that if it's not real leather, then it's some sort of synthetic plastic, terrible for the planet. And we do have to overcome that. And I think the more products that come out that are made from natural materials will help perpetuate that.

34:48 Not all vegan leather is just a cheap plastic pair of shoes from Amazon. There's really a high-end, well-designed fashion out there as well. I will say that I doubt that most people buy leather because of environmental concerns. I don't, I mean, some people, yes, that might be their impetus. For others, I just think they're not really thinking about it because leather is just so pervasive. It's considered normal among many fashion brands when you do look at their higher-end shoes, that they are made from animal skins. That's just the way it is. And we need more education, more variety.

35:31 There's still this perception that leather is just this sort of by-product and animals aren't really harmed for it. And it's okay to buy. I think there's a lot of consumer education involved. And there's also a lot of pressuring and encouraging brands to come up with more products because as much as we have out there, the majority of what we see is still made from animals. Yeah, but I try to be hopeful. And of course, our rural population is increasing. So even when we have positive trends, we're always fighting the numbers because even if more and more people are wearing non-leather shoes and going with vegan leather in their cars because there's so many people, it seems like we're always fighting just the sheer numbers of humanity making bad decisions.

36:26 But I'd like to think that getting to Michelle's point, that there's now an association of vegan leather with luxury. Teslas are obviously luxury cars. They're vegan leather. And some of the other electric cars are mimicking that with the vegan leather. When I first, I remember when I first asked for a non-leather seats in a car that I was buying, I was basically like accused of being cheap. And I was like, no, I do this for philosophical reasons. And that did not, now I think people really understand that there's a good reason to switch to vegan leather, a lot of people anyway, and that it is associated with luxury.

37:12 I mean, I think we have to, whoever frames the debate, wins the debate. Maybe a round robin on this, how do we better associate vegan products, and I'll start with Vicky, with luxury and point out that those other products are not just passe, okay? But they're really vulgar and they're something that you shouldn't wanna be associated with. That's why I was shocked to see the lady just yesterday with the fur. I was like, gross. I hope I don't run into her today if she's washing this. Go ahead. So yeah, that's one reason I felt that the Vegan Fashion Show is important to provide a platform for the brands that are passionate about the same things that we are as well.

38:02 And also just for the community to celebrate compassionate choices, because when we don't have, you know, we'll talk about the models a lot because I've been so close with them and I know where they're coming from. And when there's nowhere to be a model and celebrate compassionate choices, it's just kind of left out of the conversation. And so I wanna make it, I didn't wanna do a bad job. I didn't want this to be like some little put together last minute kind of fashion show because I wanted to show that this can be luxurious and desirable as well. So yeah, I think really just displaying how good it can look is very important.

38:43 And this can be on social media. This can be at fashion shows when we're having conversations with people, you know, the image of vegan fashion definitely needs some help. And I wanna say that the pandemic, I think put the nail in the coffin of fur because as we know, if you've been watching the news that during the pandemic mink in Europe became contaminated, they got the virus and they put hundreds of millions of them. I don't remember exactly how many millions, but it was like literally dozens of millions of them to death, horrible death.

39:24 And not only that, but there was a lot of video of all these minks being put in dumpsters, white minks with blood all over them. And any last vestige of an association with glamour, I think was destroyed, thankfully. I consider those mink martyrs, martyrs because they showed just the horror of it and also just strip the glamour from it. And I was wondering, Nina, since you're very involved given your undercover investigation showing the horror of it, if you could comment on that a little bit.

40:04 Yeah, so what COVID did was effectively end mink farming in some places of the world because the farmers all of a sudden had to cull their entire populations. And as horrible as that is, that all of those animals died needlessly, what came from that was that it didn't start up again. I believe Denmark is an example of that. Now, obviously the industry is still happening as we saw in China in our investigation as well as in other parts of the world. But that mass culling and sickness that happened on fur farms had a huge impact in the industry and the way that the governments perceived that industry as well.

40:58 So, at least there was some positive of all those minks dying and future minks were saved as a result of that. Yes, and I mean, it's a process. What I always try to point out to myself when I get frustrated is it's hard to see progress in real time. All of this is a blink of an eye in the span of geologic time, even from the agricultural era to the industrial era, it's all happening. But for us, it seems like forever. Ultimately, we're gonna have to switch because our planet cannot sustain what's happening. And all leather, yes, leather and fur from animals should be absolutely banned.

41:42 And we'd like to remind everybody that here in California, happy to say that there is a fur ban in place. As of January 1st, 2023, it is illegal to sell or manufacture new fur in California. Unfortunately, there is an enforcement issue and there are activists who have gone out there and literally Googled fur stores and gone into those fur stores with a tape recorder rolling and they're selling new fur. So, we've got to crack down on that. And maybe you wanna take that one up as your next investigation, not to give you any assignments.

42:23 Everybody's an assignment editor and I hate when people do assignments to me all the time. But the point is that it's a giant leap in the right direction, but it's gotta be enforced. It absolutely does have to be enforced. And step one, pass the legislation. Step two, make sure that people follow it. And that's why enforcement is so crucial. And I'm happy that there are activists who have seemed to identify certain retailers who are still selling real fur. And hey, maybe a Lady Freethinker investigation is coming up, I don't know. But it's something that must be monitored.

43:05 And in the meantime, we'll continue to push for other bans. There are other areas that hopefully will ban fur soon as well. Progress has been slow, but we've seen that it's possible. And I do believe that it is in the future eventually. And I wanna point out something that one of our commenters is saying, which is a very apropos point. When we're talking about Canada, a bill has been introduced to the House of Commons to prohibit fur farming in Canada. In fact, Unchained TV has an entire documentary about this called Ending Real Fur, which I urge you to watch. Just go to watch.unchainedtv.com and you can see this documentary which premiered on Unchained TV and has gotten about 100,000 views so far.

43:51 So it's doing very well. But what is the situation, Vicky, in Canada? Because Canada, because it's cold, a lot of people use that as an excuse. Of course, it's no excuse. People aren't wearing fur coats to the top of Mount Everest or wherever they're climbing in cold weather. Synthetics are obviously far more sophisticated. But where does it stand in Canada? So we've had some, I would say, success in British Columbia, which is on the far east side of Canada, and, or sorry, west side. And yeah, so I think what we can do as activists or just concerned citizens and consumers is just follow the nonprofits that are really working on this and Ending Real Fur is one, Animal Justice is one.

44:43 And just, we have to think about the political aspect of it and the laws and just really support the nonprofits that are trying to make change. I would like to see more bans all across Canada. Because yeah, it's a public health risk. There's so many reasons not to be wearing fur. Oh, absolutely. And the pandemic risk is still there. I just don't understand how, despite the pandemic causing millions, many, many millions of minks to be killed. They would have been killed anyway, but just killed on mass. A mass, whatever you wanna call it, a genocide of these animals.

45:27 It's still something that is a hard sell for some politicians. It seems like what, do you ever wonder, Nina, what's it gonna take? We also, just looking at the pandemic, I mean, just speaking of the pandemic, it was a zoonotic illness, most likely started in the Wuhan wet market where they were killing many different species and co-mingling blood and stacking animals together. Or even if you think of the outlier theory of the Wuhan lab, they were torturing animals there. It stemmed from animals and nonetheless, it doesn't seem like, despite all that, our culture has really woken up to the self-destructive nature of animal exploitation.

46:19 Not quite. Thankfully, things have improved dramatically, but we do have a long way to go. I know before we mentioned the profit factor, and the truth is that there are lobbyists in the fur industry who do not want this trade to end because their livelihoods go away with it. And that makes the battle in politics, especially that, much more difficult. And we need politicians who care less about lobbyists and more about morality, the truth be told, to get that legislation passed. And in the meantime, we need to work on our end to get that public pressure out and encourage other consumers just to turn away from it, to turn away from it.

47:09 And many already have. It's gonna happen. I know that it's going to happen. And it just takes all of our voices to make it. I will say, I think it requires, and I'm not proud to say this, I wish I didn't have to say this, but I think it requires public shaming of corporations that allow any of these big, big events, whether it's the Super Bowl or the whatever, there's obviously producers, there's gatekeepers. And if somebody is hell-bent on wearing fur, there's got to be consequences for that in terms of public shaming.

47:49 We did that at one point. A little group of ours went down. I think it was one of the big shows. It was a couple of years ago, so I don't wanna say which one, but there was somebody who was wearing fur. It was advertised beforehand that this was the outfit, and we went down and protested right outside. And it did have an impact for the people coming in. And most of the people coming in said, that's horrible, that's horrible, that's horrible. But there's gotta be a concerted effort where when somebody goes out of their way to wear real fur, okay, at a very large event that is gonna have an impact on people all around the world, that there are consequences for that, that there is some kind of public accountability.

48:35 What do people think about that? Monica? Yeah. I think that that's wonderful, that's great. Feather Phaseout actually has plans on possibly doing some demonstrations next year. The goal was to phase out feathers by 2025, so next year, doing some protests. I think that where I'm at right now in terms of trying to gain a following, the course that I'm taking is giving people the information, as much information as I can, so that they just don't even want to buy it.

49:16 I don't know what's going on with musicians and concerts, like if there's a wardrobe department that's encouraging the performer to wear a certain thing. So I can't really speak to that, but with the burlesque community, the dancers choosing their own outfit. And so if I can just make sure that everyone in the community understands, like this is where feathers are coming from, and then let them make the choice, because I think if they have the information, they're going to choose the non-feather alternative, the faux. And I want to just point out, for those who might be just joining us, those are not real feathers taken from animals.

50:03 Monica's entire campaign, Feather Phase Out, is to show people that, look, you can't tell the difference, continue on. Yeah, and the burlesque, and I'm just going to speak from burlesque, because that's what I know, but the dancers that I've met, deep down inside, they know that they don't want to use feathers. They're just doing it because that's the uniform of this art form. And that's what everyone, they go to a show and they're in the dressing room, everybody's got feathers. So they're just kind of doing whatever everybody else is doing. But I think that they know deep down inside that there's something secretive about this industry. If you email a company that sells feathers, hey, where are the birds?

50:46 What's the deal with the feathers? They always say the feathers come from industries where the feathers would otherwise be discarded. So that statement instantly makes the dancer feel like, oh, well, I'm actually helping because this would go in the trash. But it's a lie. Well, it's a lie, yeah. And it's also incomplete. It's a vague way to validate this purchase. Like, look, it's going to get thrown in the trash. You might as well just buy it. And so, and then the person that buys it, just that's the end of the discussion. Well, it was going to get thrown in the trash. It's not complete. And so that's what I'm hoping will happen with this campaign is eventually more and more information's going to come out.

51:29 Like, let's see these birds. Let's see how they're kept. Let's see how they're killed. Let's see how the feathers are plucked. Whether the bird is alive or whether the bird is dead, the feather is plucked. Absolutely. Okay, we only got a couple of minutes. First of all, I do want to point out one thing that somebody said to me who was in the fashion industry, and that is that the people who dress the celebrities are always looking for some new angle or something that's different. And so it's sort of a lack of imagination that they're often the ones pushing fur on, or feathers, or other animal products onto the celebrities because they've got to make them look different.

52:13 I mean, when you see these red carpets, it's all a big competition. Who's going to be in the paper the next day? Who's going to be on the viral? Who's going to go viral? So how do we reach those designers, Vicky, and those people who dress the celebrities? Well, as a publicist myself, I would say we need to connect with their publicists and show them the really neat options that are out there. There is actually plastic-free faux fur as well. And some of it looks really outrageous. It's really fun. It can be sparkly and colourful, and you can make really cool costumes with all of these materials.

52:55 And so that's the same with what Monica is doing. We have to just show that it's possible. And then, you know what? It gives a good story angle to say, not only is this a really unique outfit and all extra and everything, but it's also environmentally friendly, well, it has environmental benefits, I'll say. And we can talk about that. That's like a news story. You know, there's some good things to talk about. So I think our publicists and, you know, whoever else is, like stylists, for example, that are in charge of helping the celebrities get dressed, I think they should be thinking about this too. Like, let's get you in the news for a good reason. All right, final thoughts.

53:35 Nina Jackal, where do we go from here? I think there's a lot of hope in this area. This is, as someone said, a winnable campaign. I think we're on the right track. Everyone on this panel is doing amazing work. It's been a pleasure to be here with you all and just keep getting the word out, keep the pressure on, and keep shopping for those wonderful vegan alternatives. Absolutely. Monica, you've got the final word, my dear. Artists, creators, people that sew. If you make things, if you're an inventor, this is just me getting the ball rolling on faux feather fans.

54:16 Make a faux feather, improve on this design, because I can't do it alone. If we all work together, we can come up with something that's really beautiful, that's plastic -free, that's bird-free, compassionate, and beautiful. Absolutely, and as we wrap up, I always urge everyone, please download, download the Unchained TV streaming app. It's so easy to download. You can download it for free on your phone. Just go to your app store or on any Samsung TV or on any TV using Amazon Fire Stick, a Roku device, or an Apple TV device, or you can just go to unchainedtv.com and watch it online.

54:57 Thank you. Fantastic panel. You're all my heroes. We will see you next time here on Voice of America Radio. Bye.