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Vegan musician Morrissey has called on controversial company Canada Goose to ‘stop killing animals for coats’.
The singer, who is about to embark on a Canadian tour, has written to the company’s CEO Dani Reiss urging him to ‘make the old ethical choice to remove coyote fur and down feathers’ from the parkas.
Campaigners from vegan charity PETA will accompany Morrissey on his tour, collecting signatures from fans, on a petition calling on the coat company to ‘ditch fur and feathers’.
Vegan letter
“Canada Goose has almost singlehandedly revived the cruel trapping industry, in which animals can suffer for days and try to gnaw off their ensnared limbs before the trapper eventually returns to bludgeon them to death,” Morrissey wrote in the letter.
“No hood adornment is worth that. And geese are confined to cramped cages and trucked hundreds of miles to slaughter in all weather conditions before they’re hung upside down and their throats are slit – often while they’re still conscious – so that their feathers can be stuffed into (and poke out of) jackets.
“That strip of coyote fur isn’t keeping anyone warm, and there are plenty of superior insulators composed of everything from biodegradable fleece to coconut husks. That’s why other outerwear makers, including For All Kind, Save the Duck, and HoodLamb, have already dispensed with fur and down for their products.”
Morrissey and controversy
Morrissey has faced controversy for some of his views in recent years for some of his views and statements, including calling the Chinese a ‘subspecies’ and branding halal meat ‘evil’. In one 2018 interview, the singer mocked London Mayor Sadiq Khan for his accent, saying he ‘cannot talk properly’.
These views have led some vegans to denounce the singer, including prominent vegan blogger and events planner Fat Gay Vegan, who wrote a post about the singer following the 2018 interview saying: “Morrissey’s dedication to saving animals does not give him a free pass when it comes to the promotion of [far right political party] For Britain…I still occasionally listen to old Smiths and Morrissey songs but unless he has a radical shift in the language he uses and the bigoted views he promotes, I will never buy another musical release or concert ticket until the day I die.
“I do not know that Morrissey is personally racist and I am not declaring him to be racist. I am stating that I will not support an artist who uses language associated with far-right politicians that, in my mind, is dripping with racially-charged and bigoted overtones. I will also continue to speak up against people who use such language.”
