By Doug Draper
Why would anyone want to sit down on the cold pavement, locked up in a steel cage in downtown St. Catharines in the middle of February?
Tayler Staneff is caged while from left, behind her is Sarat Colling, Chris Shaperon and Kimberly Costello. On the cage is a fur coat that is the product of 15 foxes. Photo by Doug Draper
“We’re just trying to put out a message,” said Talyer Staneff as she talked to me through the mesh of that cage with animal make-up she had on.
“A lot of people who buy and wear fur coats probably don’t know how much suffering animals have to go through for them to get them.”
As I talked to her, an old fur coat hung over one corner of the cage, made from the pelts of 15 foxes. Staneff was one of more than 20 animal rights activists in Niagara who participated this February 13th in Canada’s 21st national anti-fur day, not that any federal and provincial government we’ve had in power over that time – Conservative, Liberal or NDP – has done much to recognized it.
What Kimberly Costello, a member of Niagara Action For Animals (NAFA) and one of the organizers of the demonstration had to say should leave Canadians wondering how our country could continue have such backward laws on protecting animals compared to the United States and European Union that at least bans the import of garments made from dog and cat fur, and has placed stronger restrictions on the sale of fur garments and the killing of animals for fur.
“We are just out here to educate people,” said Costello, adding that the location, which happened to be in front of a store called Henry’s Furs in St. Catharines, which just happened to be closed during the protest, “is just symbolic.” Continue reading
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