Dear Vanessa,
. PETA is seizing the international spotlight of the Summer Olympics to help animals by exposing the nightmarish conditions for dogs, cats, and other animals who are unlucky enough to be on Chinese fur farms.
.
China is one of the world's largest suppliers of animal fur. More than 95 percent of China's finished fur garments are exported for sale overseas, and much of it is sold in North America.
.
The video footage from PETA's undercover investigations on Chinese fur farms have revealed that dogs—including German shepherds and golden retrievers—and defenseless tabby and Siamese cats were strung up by their legs or tails and skinned alive. Their fur is often labeled as "Asian jackal," "rabbit," or "raccoon" fur and sold to unwitting consumers around the world.
.
If someone feels uncomfortable wearing the skin of a kitten or a puppy, they should certainly be uncomfortable wearing the skins of rabbits, raccoons, and other animals.
.
As our undercover video footage reveals, the suffering of dogs, cats, and other animals in China's fur industry is extreme. After spending their lives crammed together in filthy, homemade wire-mesh cages, they are thrown onto trucks and bludgeoned, poisoned, electrocuted, or even boiled alive before their skin is ripped off their bodies. Some animals in the video footage are still conscious and look up at the camera while they are skinned.
.
I hope that you will make a donation to PETA to help our work for animals who are caught up in China's wretched fur industry. Please help us push harder with our global campaign to stop the torture of animals for their fur. The support of caring individuals like you is the best hope for ending this horrific industry.
.
As you know, there is absolutely no acceptable use of animal fur in our society: not for jackets, hats, boots, purses, glove linings, trinkets, cat toys, consumer vanity, or corporate greed. Killing animals for their skin is repugnant, intolerable, and cruel.
Yet the slaughter of innocent animals continues.
But working together, we can save millions of individual animals in China and around the world from suffering. Please make your special gift to help animals today.
Because of supporters like you, PETA has been able to reduce the suffering of so many animals already. We've convinced some of the world's leading designers and retailers—including Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, Polo Ralph Lauren, and Ann Taylor—to adopt permanent no-fur policies, and countless people have agreed to stop wearing and buying fur. But we have much, much more to do before all animal suffering for the sake of fashion ends.
.
Please help us devastate this industry, which thrives on animal misery. Your donation to PETA today will turn up the heat on the Chinese government to close these cruel fur farms and auctions, and it will help convince more people all over the world to say "No" to fur forever.
.
Thank you for standing up for animals' rights.
.
Kind regards,
.
Ingrid E. Newkirk
President
.
P.S. PETA's anti-fur campaign is truly global: We target companies everywhere that supply and sell fur, from Chinese fur farms to North American retailers, like the Burlington Coat Factory, that continue to sell fur. But we need your support to get our investigators inside these operations, mobilize our grassroots activists, and conduct our hard-hitting media campaigns. Your online donation to PETA today can help us save animals who are in danger of being tortured and killed for their skin.
.
__________________________________________________________
. Dear Friend,
.
There's a lot to celebrate about the Summer Olympics in China: The many nations of the world put politics aside and come together in peace so that the greatest human athletes on Earth can compete.
.
But there's an ugly side for animals living in the Olympic host country, a side that you won't see in this week's nonstop coverage: the Chinese fur industry's horrific abuse of animals.
.
By making an urgent donation today to support our work, you can help us draw the world's attention to the cruelty of the Chinese fur industry and keep people from unwittingly supporting it.
.
An estimated 2 million cats and hundreds of thousands of dogs are tortured and slaughtered for their fur in China every year. PETA's undercover video footage shows terrified animals crouched in tiny cages that are crammed so full of animals—both dead and alive—that the animals are unable to move. Some of the dogs and cats shown in the footage were still wearing the collars that their former families put on them. Animals are often hung upside-down by their legs or tails, and their skin is ripped off their bodies as they writhe and struggle.
.
China's fur industry unrepentantly continues to torture and kill animals for their skins.
.
China is one of the world's largest suppliers of animal fur. More than 95 percent of China's finished fur garments are exported for sale overseas, and many of them go to North America. Dog and cat fur is often intentionally mislabeled as "Asian jackal" or "rabbit" fur.
.
With so much attention focused on China right now, this is the time to demand an end to the Chinese fur industry's terrible torture of animals. Please help us stand in the way of the fur industry by taking the following two simple steps:
.
Sign our pledge to go fur-free. Thousands of people—including gold-medal-winning Olympic swimmer Amanda Beard—have already pledged never to buy or wear fur. Please also forward this pledge to all your friends, colleagues, and family members. This simple act is one of PETA's most successful weapons in the fight against fur because it gets new people to take the pledge and think about the cruelty that goes into making fur garments.
.
Make a generous donation online to support
PETA's worldwide anti-fur campaign. Your gift will allow us to keep working hard to end the horrors of the fur industry in China and around the world. Please help us stop the slaughter of animals for fashion!
-
We know that the fight against the fur trade is one that we can win for animals if we push hard enough, long enough, and vigorously enough.
PETA's efforts to expose the true cost of every piece of fur has already helped convince some of the world's leading designers and retailers—including Calvin Klein, Tommy Hilfiger, Polo Ralph Lauren, and Ann Taylor—to adopt permanent fur-free policies. With your help, we can work to ensure that animals, including dogs and cats who are treated like trash by the Chinese fur industry, don't suffer for their fur.
.
Don't let this important moment pass without doing all that you can to help cats and dogs and other tortured animals in China.
Sign the petition, and make your gift now.
Thank you for supporting our work to end senseless cruelty.
.
Kind regards,
.
Ingrid E. Newkirk
President
.
P.S. By making a generous gift today, you can send a powerful message to those in China and around the world who profit from the unimaginable suffering of animals. Please act against the cruel fur industry today.