West Hollywood Fur Ban Passed by Council: WeHo to Become Nation's First Fur-Free

[TruthBrigade]

West Hollywood Fur Ban Passed by Council: WeHo to Become Nation's First Fur-Free City

By Simone Wilson Tue., Sep. 20 2011 at 9:00 AM
http://blogs.laweekly.com/informer/2011/09/west_hollywood_fur_ban.php

?Fancy L.A. ladies looking to add some baby seal to their fall collections, or hipsters sniffing out their own clip-on foxtail in the Burning Man/Wiz Khalifa tradition, won't be welcome in West Hollywood anymore.
The city tentatively approved an ordinance last night that will halt all sales of fur beginning June 30, 2012.

Mayor John Duran made it clear that some wording in the ordinance would have to be cleared up during the next couple City Council meetings:

Councilmembers still need to decide whether selling vintage fur at consignment shops or yard sales should be banned as well (though the overwhelming sentiment among them last night was that no, it should not), and Councilwoman Abbe Land thought it very important to consult the West Hollywood business community on how, and when, this can realistically be implemented.

"Would it be acceptable for us to approve this in concept?" asked Councilman John Heilman. And that's just what they did, 5-0, to a bleary-eyed yet overjoyed crowd at 1:30 a.m.

By 4 a.m., fur-ban advocates were still celebrating. The campaign's PR guy, Gary Smith, sent us this victorious email:

"After a seven-hour meeting, and lots of public comment, the council voted unanimously (5-0) to move forward. There are a few details they want to settle in advance of the next meeting, such as the date of implementation and civil penalties, but it's just what the Fur Free West Hollywood campaign wanted."
The fur ban's most ardent supporter was Councilman John D'Amico, the newest face at City Hall. It was his most highly publicized campaign promise -- one that likely gave him the edge in a competitive pool of candidates last March.

"This item is not about what to wear," he said last night. "It's about how we live now."

?Strangely, though, before unanimously approving the ban, D'Amico's colleagues spent their time on the mic making (quite logical) arguments against it:
Heilman said the ordinance seemed to be drawing lines in the sand. He wondered aloud: Why is killing animals for food any better than killing them for fur, when one can easily survive without meat? Duran, who has HIV, piled on, asking himself why should he should oppose fur as fashion, when he supports animal testing in the name of advancing medicine and "eats a lot of meat on a daily basis."

But there was no swimming against the tide of popular opinion in council chambers last night. Almost 50 speakers, most from outside city limits, stood up to push for an all-out ban on fur sales, comparing West Hollywood's moral duty to stand up for animals to slavery, child abuse, the Civil Rights movement, etc.

Activists declared triumph from the outset:

"I cant tell you how excited and proud I am to be here tonight," said Ed Buck, WeHo resident and driving force behind the ban (pictured with dog, above). "West Hollywood is more than just this city. We are a beacon; we are the city on the hill. When we do something here, it reverberates around the city and the world."

Damn. Even more rampant were the adorable-animals-in-trouble emotional appeals: "It takes 10 baby seals to make one fur coat," said one woman. "As they're being clubbed, they scream and howl in pain and terror." And another guy: "I saw 500 foxes anally electrocuted right in front of my eyes."

What kind of death-wishing politician wants to argue against that?

Likewise, only a handful of stakeholders in the West Hollywood fashion industry spoke up in defense of their business practices, citing fear amongst their peers.

Genevieve Morrill of the WeHo Chamber of Commerce argued that activists' efforts would be much more effective if channeled toward "raising the consciousness of the consumer" instead of aggressively forcing local shops to shoulder the burden. A couple boutique owners said they were positive they'd lose customers and designer lines to nearby Los Angeles if barred from buying up the couple fur items in most collections.

Charles Hamilton, who proudly identified himself as producer of "The Cove," countered the economic argument with: "If you take the moral high ground, the money follows."

Guess we'll see about that (if the ban even manages to stand up in court). But in the meantime, a ban like this deepens the ironic divide in free-thinking West Hollywood -- L.A. County's balls-to-the-wall Boystown -- between radical moralists and advocates of personal freedom at all costs. See also: West Hollywood's puppy-selling ban, cat declawing ban, plastic-bag ban and strict nonsmoking ordinance.

[@simone_electra/swilson@laweekly.com]

[mtex]

WeHo has become an OCD sanatorium? 

Well, now that my psychopathic ex has gotten rid of all his leathers, gloves, felt hats, long woolens etc, so that he wouldn't have to have "any dead things on me", and wasted all his savings buying vegan clothes, now he can finally move to West Hollywood!  

He actually took me to Real Food Daily WeHo when I visited him:
http://www.yelp.com/biz/real-food-daily-west-hollywood
They had a real nice "Savannah salad", but their Acai drink was very boring.
I was so jetlagged that night, I don't even remember what I had for dinner.

... it's difficult to think of him the way he was back then versus the monster he has turned into now.
But then again, Thomas Scheridan says that's typical of psychopaths. The person who was sitting across from me at Real Food Daily WeHo about a year ago is dead.

[TruthBrigade]

LOL  I thought you would like this article...my goodness.  What will they ban next?

I mean yes, I might agree that it's a bummer animals have to die for their fur, but does that mean they will ban meat next...?
What about using the fur of the animals they kill for meat?  Wouldn't that be like killing 2 birds with one stone...?  No pun intended...LOL I mean really, they kill animals anyway...how about using all of it...?
Or what if you have some fur's your grandparents left you in your closet and you want to sell them at a garage sale or resale shop?  Are you going to go to jail???

I personally am tired of all this control for our own good.

When the govt starts to practice what it preaches I will have some respect for their laws, but what do they expect when they are the biggest murderers, rapists and thieves there are?!?!?

Do as I say, not as I do!!!

[mtex]

What will they ban next?

I can think of a few things: leather, felt, wool, bone, honey, they will tick off every item on a vegan's no-no list. They will also ban me ;-)

When the govt starts to practice what it preaches I will have some respect for their laws, but what do they expect when they are the biggest murderers, rapists and thieves there are?!?!?

Christie, you know who the biggest crooks really are:

http://warisacrime.org/content/welcome-boston-mr-rumsfeld-you-are-under-arrest

Animal rights zealotry is just a political schimera for the politically disenfrancised to pretend they still exert some kind of residual influence on the political process, because they don't want to face the fact that they are completely powerless against their government's warmongering around the world and at home with the roll-out of the police state grid. Animal rights zealotry is inherently myopic. It's the non-activism of tiny little people (petit bourgeois) whose world and perception of the people in it has shrunk into a tiny little dot. To quote a Twitter comment that perfectly summarized the attitude these people: "Boo hoo hoo, three years and no pony! I WANT MY PONY AND I WANT IT NOW *pouts*"
 
If these animal rights zealots are such righteous activists, pray, why are they trying to use the American police state to silence an online critic? The fact is that they are control-freak psychopaths who completely identify with the fascist elites who have disenfranchised them in the first place. They love the global police state, they love American Imperialist fascism, they like the idea that as Modern-day Romans they can impose their country's laws on another country across the globe (or so they wish.). They go to the LA Zoo and stare all day at the elephants and the tigers in a cage, and get righteously offended about that, so that they don't have to look at toture-pictures from Abu Ghraib and Gitmo, and realize how meaningless their righteousLESS offense is in the light of what their government is doing all the time every day around the world.

[TruthBrigade]

How about banning sex?!?!?

http://truthbrigade.org/smf/index.php/topic,3375.new.html#new

[mtex]

Naaah, I don't think so. Fascist societies are always oversexed at the same time as they are sexually repressed, it's a fascist dialectic.

[TruthBrigade]

What do you think of what these fake "scientists" say about how child birth CAUSES "global warming???"