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What do you think most clothes were made out of before polyester? Most people wore cotton, linen, or wool clothes. The first two are from plants, the last one doesn’t kill the animal. Hemp was also a major source of textile. Seriously, what the hell are you talking about?
Nevermind how downright bad leather is for most clothing applications. It’s high maintenance, stiff, non-breathing, non-padding and cannot be repaired easily. There’s a reason it was only used for specific parts of clothing in specific situations once we had figured out stuff like cotton or wool.
Wool is more of a byproduct of the lamb meat industry these days, so wool and meat are inextricably entangled. I’m a sheep farmer, last couple years we threw the wool away due to lack of demand. Nobody is raising sheep just for wool.
However this is a problem with our distorted markets and not with the sheep industry, this valuable fiber is being dumped or burned while we pump out synthetic crap. It costs us more to remove it from the sheep to keep them from overheating, than we can sell it for.
This is true and also not true. We’ve thrown away cow hides and sheep skins/wool for lack of demand, but I also know the wool industry and they’re not exactly chomping at the bit to get their hands on the garbage wool slaughterhouses (or in our case small/medium farms) produce. There are producers who raised sheep just for high quality wool whose meat you wouldn’t really want to eat…
Damn throwing away cow hide sounds so sad… That stuff is awesome I can’t believe there was no takers.
Yes valid point, our wool is not ideal being farm flock wool, medium fibers. But for years we still sheared/skirted/bagged and tried to deliver at least a saleable product, it was disappointing to see it go to zero value. I would love to see it at least made into insulation batts or something.
Most of that high end Merino wool comes from places like NZ where they can graze year round, here the hay and chaff always mess the wool up a little and most have said running a true fiber flock is not economical. In Canada at least fiber has always just been an adjunct to a productive meat flock.
I ran some Columbias for a couple years but let them go quick. Gorgeous wool but terribly behaved critters and the lambing percentage and flavour were very poor compared to our Dorset cross main flock.
I can’t wear wool. It physically hurts and causes a rash. I want to like wool. I want to wear wool. I can appreciate that wool is good. But even cashmere I’d like sandpaper.
I think we all know what the solution is. We need to genetically engineer a sheep that is 15 times as big with wool 200 times softer the reproduces by laying eggs, and make it so that it produces mostly drone sheep that are able to care for it without human intervention, grooming it attentively and instinctually building large hives out of the coarse wool we currently call wool, so that all we have to do is harvest the total wool to have cuddly soft garments in cute colors.
Is it a lanolin allergy, and if so have you tried alpaca? Its as soft as cashmere (in superfine grade and above), but shouldn’t make people with wool allergies itchy. It doesn’t have the hive mind qualities you seem to be looking for, but it might help with the itchiness.
It’s legit when it comes to shoes. Also clothes in colder regions of the world.
I mean we can also make long lasting clothes out of natural fibers without hurting animals.
You can indeed. But growing cotton has already resulted in environmental changes beyond my comprehension.
I guess the first step should be to adapt a habit of clothes repair
Growing cattle has also had a massive impact on the environment. And you often need more land for animal based materials because you both need land for the animals and the land to grow food for the animals. With cotton at least you just need land for the cotton.
I dare you to travel to Uzbekistan and see for yourself what’s needed to grow cotton for the whole region.
Then maybe not cotton and instead hemp
Hemp and also linen are even harder to grow than cotton, though much of it is due to not as advanced machinery for harvesting and processing. Hemp also sucks as a material for clothing, to make it wearable you have to treat it quite heavily or it’s scratchy AF.
Taking production out of the equation linen is the best material of the three: Much better moisture regulation than cotton, only real downside is that it crinkles easily but it also crinkles elegantly so wear it with pride and you’ll be fine.
Production-wise the best alternative right now is modal, that is, basically, synthesised cotton, raw material is anything that contains cellulose. Nasty chemicals are involved but in modern processes it’s all closed-loop, the nasty stuff all stays within the factory.
Oh, one often overlooked factor: Seams. Modal is better than cotton at being yarn because the cellulose fibres are much longer but nothing compares to the likes of polyester when it comes to not coming apart. I don’t think there’s an alternative yet, either you use polyester and make the whole garment non-biodegradable or you use modal and live with the reduced durability. Though one idea would be to aggressively get rid of seams, you can knit yarn into any shape whatsoever. Wait: Silica thread is a thing. Usually only used for extreme applications (think firefighter gear), also uses some chemicals to make it usable in sewing machines and it just won’t ever hold a knot so when it comes apart it comes apart completely, but it’s essentially fancy stone, just like computer chips: Doesn’t really biodegrade but it doesn’t matter that it doesn’t, either.
Another overlooked factor is stretch. There’s no natural alternative to elasthan, so no yoga pants or stretch jeans. Tons of stuff nowadays contains elasthan, often just a bit for a tiny bit of stretch simply because it’s more comfortable.
I know nothing about growing hemp, but it sounds like what a stoner would say
It is more resource and space efficient than cotton, and can grow in a wide variety of climates. It grows kind of like, idk, a weed. It can be made into comfortable textiles and used in the same application are cotton. Robust plant. The difference between hemp and cannabis is the THC content.
I mean you can make leather from all kinds of skins. And there’s one… animal… that we have a particularly large amount of on earth and we regularly have to get rid of a significnat number of deceased of without currently re-using their skin. Hrm… cool idea for an industrialist horror movie…
Why is this always brought up, stop spreading this. Animals usually are not fed grain unless it’s harvesting time. We also do not grow food just to feed them. The grain we feed animals is shit you cannot eat. It’s roots/stalks/stems/bad/rotted plant matter. It’s the leftovers from the greens we can consume. Most animals also are raised on land that is not suitable for crops, rocky/hilly/weak topsoil land.
What you say is true for 5% of animal feed globaly.
That 46% is land whose biodiversity and ecosystems have been intentionally crushed for the meat industry.
100 % or this chart is made up of food we got by intentionally crushing land for the meat Industry. It shows how the food we feed livestock is spread across different feeding sources, not the land uses by said food source.
I poated it because the person I replied to insisted that most of the food animals are fed is just the uneatable byproduct of agricultural products made for humans. This chats shows its defnetily not the main source used to feed animals, as it only makes up about 5 %
Beef is fed (extra) soy. A lot of porc as well
Food is grown specifically to feed livestock though, it would be a pretty weird trophic pyramid for them to survive on our waste unless you went back to a time where people killed their one pig for the year and salted it away. In our country, the land degradation from clearing hill country for grazing has led to enormous biodiversity loss and a self-fufilling prophecy of eroded weak topsoil that people claim isn’t good for anything else (though it could still be rewilded and in other cultures and times would be terraced and swaled to support plant crops).
??? But it’s not, we do not grow crops for livestock in any meaningful amounts. It’s miniscule what is grown to feed livestock only.
Stop making stuff up, please. Idk what you do on your farm but globally we absolutely grow a lot of food for animals.
Please provide a source that shows that we grow crops directly for livestock consumption in a meaningful amount. So far no one has shown anything that states otherwise.
Animals products are less efficient for a simple energy reason. Animals produce heat which radiates away as lost energy, and they rely on consuming autotrophs. All life gets its energy from the sun, we as animals get it one or two down the food chain from plants or other animals (which are also eating plants). Animal-based products are simply less efficient.
You can think this all you want, but you cannot consume what they do, you also cannot grow crops usually where livestock are raised. Crops need a pretty flat chunk of land, livestock don’t.
Except for the deforestation needed to increase pasture area and for growing more feed. Destroying habitats and pushing indigenous people further from their homes. Meat on a large scale doesn’t work because it is energetically less efficient. Farmed animals produce waste products like methane which are large contributors to global warming. Even if the land used by livestock was completely unusable for other purposes, they would still be polluting the environment through eutrophication and destroying locally endangered species.
Everything you just said…is the same shit that happens for plants as well. Deforestation isn’t something that happens only with livestock. It also only really exists now in poor countries for people who are trying to survive by any means. You also are assuming that plants don’t use nutrients from the soil or that the ground has to be fertilized or sprayed with pesticides or that large machinery has to be used to harvest it.
Why it is true that you’ll graze non-butcher animals on the leftover stalks and such, we absolutely finish beef and pork on grain and a big portion of the grain harvest is for animal feed.
Almost all of the grain we feed is what I just explained. All of that is ground up and a binding agent (usually molasses) is applied. We do not grow crops just to feed to animals, it’s a complete waste of land. We grow crops for our consumption and use first and whats left over is turned into grain to feed to animals we then butcher and eat.
I can only speak to the USA, but in my area the number one crop in this area is dent corn and soya. Of the corn grown here 40% goes into ethanol production, and 36% is used for animal feed.
Commercial poultry production heavily relies on grain – typically corn. It’s the primary ingredient in the processed feed overwhelmingly used for commercial poultry, as seen in this typical mix.
We absolutely grow crops specifically to feed livestock. And this is ignoring the 52 million acres used for alfalfa and hay-grass.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2211912416300013
86% of the global livestock feed intake in dry matter consists of feed materials that are not currently edible for humans
But it also makes an important contribution to food security through the provision of high-quality protein and a variety of micronutrients – e.g. vitamin A, vitamin B-12, riboflavin, calcium, iron and zinc – that can be locally difficult to obtain in adequate quantities from plant-source foods alone
Just because they feed corn doesn’t mean it’s edible to humans, a lot of the corn grown is left to dry on the plant and then harvested. We do this so we don’t end up with another famine. Not saying corn is what we should be growing for that, but it’s a very easy and hardy plant.
It’s brought up because it’s true.
edit: link doesn’t appear to be working, but it’s the paper by Emily Cassidy called ‘redefining agricultural yields’
But it’s not, these papers and studies all assume the land that cattle graze on is suitable for crops. You cannot grow crops on a massive hill properly. It’s why the all the states that are flat usually have crops grown and all the hilly/dryer states raise livestock. No one is saying livestock can fully replace plants, but to many think we can replace everything with plants only. This is complete junk science.
This has nothing to do with grazing land. This is crop suitable land being used to grow crops that is then fed to livestock. There are no assumptions being made and it is not junk science, you’re just not very good at reading.
Except it’s not, we are not growing crops just to feed to animals, as I’ve explained multiple times now, grain is created from the shit we cannot consume. Why is this so difficult to understand?
Mate, I have three chickens at home and I feed them a scratch mix that is mostly grain. I think you’re talking out of your arse, and I strongly doubt you have any actual animal husbandry experience.
Your chickens are definitely on a different diet than factory farmed ones, haha
Sure, it’s different to cage hens. But it’s the exact kind of feed that’s used for free range farm chooks.
Edit: I literally get it at a farm supply store because it’s way cheaper than a pet shop.
Chickens were classically considered food for the rich because they eat grain. They are an exception among livestock in that regard. Talk about animal husbandry.
And it’s almost like in the modern era, we do this with other animals. For the rich still. https://www.grainfedbeef.com.au/
Not everywhere. Many places its much more sustainable to make clothes from the animals you are eating and it makes sure that you aren’t wasting any of the life you’ve taken that you need to survive.
You also don’t need to eat the animals to survive.
True…and you don’t need to live in a house, or use the Internet, or have a bank account, or have a computer/mobile…all things that have caused catastrophic damage to the environment and killed countless animals.
One has to draw a line somewhere- perhaps you shouldn’t be holier than though just because you draw the line at “I don’t want to see the evidence of the death”
I mean I just said a fact, sorry if I upset you.
Just a very common case of leftists being anti-exploitation until it involves reconsidering what goes on their plates.
Vegans in western cultures have access to dietary supplements derived from non-animal sources. That’s basically impossible without access to modern industrial food processes.
If we’re talking about cultures without ready access to plant fibers for clothes, then they’re not going to have vegan supplements, either.
Let me guess, you’re a westerner with access to plant-based dietary supplements? I suppose you’re vegan then? If not, you must be part of some indigenous people.
Let me guess […] I suppose […] if not you must be
Do you really think that is how logic is supposed to work?
Logic? No. Sarcasm? Yes.
Maybe YOU don’t have to eat animals to survive. What a privilege u you have that you live in a place where vegetation can be grown in your area or more likely shipped there cheaply(not free of harm to the environment or people\animals). But your experience is not universal there are places on earth that people live where that is not an option. And some of those people have been living there sustainably for 10s of thousands of years. Not to speak of people who’s body needs meat to live because of some other reason. You can not eat animals and that’s fine but it doesn’t replace the science of how to stop environmental damage.
Obviously if someone needs to eat meat to live I’m not going to object. And people living sustainably and not just supporting the animal ag industry are also off the hook in my books.
But in regards to your weird vegetation stuff, I hope you’re aware that the livestock are raised on vegetation and will typically consume more calories of feed than they provide with meat? This is a large part of why the Amazon is being deforested, it’s to feed livestock, not vegans. The science on how to stop environmental damage is pretty clear on that one.
It’s more sustainable to eat the animals you make clothes from.
I do.
No evangelizing
Is that a rule here??
Go vegan.
Wool is one of those natural fibers that can be harvested without harming the animal. Even if you end up eating the goat/sheep, it can provide a few coats of wool before hand.
Yes this is true but a lot of places can’t mantain a sheep herd, because it is too cold or to dry for grasses and food for the sheep
In Ireland where there are a lot of sheep theyre an ecological disaster (if you think having biologically diverse forests is a good thing)
Note to self: Introduce more dragons to Ireland.
I’m privileged enough to have a choice in that regard, haven’t eaten any animals in months. Sometimes I’m a naughty boi and eat some chicken tho.
Organic and recycled cotton is a lot better, and hemp and linen are also pretty good. And if you’re worried about hazardous pesticides the majority is used while growing feed for animals.
And cow feed is also grown with tons of pesticides and you need much more of it for less tissue at the end.
I have hard time seeing clothing with a bigger environmental than leather.
Of course, but there are more options than leather, like bamboo, linen, and lyocell.
Very few materials compare to the durability of animal leather. When you need leather, you need leather.
Leather doesn’t breathe and you don’t kill sheep for their wool. What are you talking about?
And most people wore clothes that came from plants, like cotton and linen. Leather and fur were not for commoners, and are not sustainable compared to plants.
Depends on the region. In cold climates leather was always essencial for commoners.
and are not sustainable compared to plants.
I don’t follow
Takes far more resources to grow an entire animal just for their surface area resources
Last time I checked we didnt have to kill sheep to get their wool to make clothes. Does wool not last as long or did I miss something?
And we are missing cotton
allergies
itchy :(
of course it isnt vegan; veganism is about ethical treatment, not just not killing. mass production of wool doubtless involves tons of cruelty
isnt there this mushroom based fakeleather stuffthingie?
this for example:
https://mylo-unleather.com/material/
ok the animation is kinda gross… if you find fungi gross, but i think these are just fun little guys also, i guess its more of a thing in the future when there is more competition in the market of mycelium based textiles or whatever and prices arent that crazy…
What the fuck… devilstrand from Rimworld is real??
Processed leather generally isn’t biodegradable.
Yes it is. It doesn’t take 1000s of years for leather to breakdown
I think they meant the stuff applied to animal skins to make it leather. Can be done cheap and extremely dirty…
It is though? Sure, you can’t just throw it on a compost pile and wait a few weeks for it to rot away. That’s why leather is processed (tanned) in the first place, otherwise it would be a pretty useless material.
But it will biodegrade. In a few years instead of thousands of years like plastics.
It depends on the process. Some processes literally make leather non-biodegradable. I’m not saying that faux leather is any better I’m just saying it’s more complicated than people realise. The leather industry could certainly use some improvement.
JUST BE NAKED
So…make clothes the old way?
Will nobody think of the profits?? The sweet sweet short-term profits of somebody else?
/s
You don’t have to kill animals, though. You can make leather out of plants.
That’s 85 percent plastic
Actually most leather seems to be coated in plastic as well.
I actually just watched a nice video on vegan leather vs animal leather and comparing the ecological impact (as well as other factors)
I don’t think this post is talking about leather - it does a lot of things well, but “breathing” is not one of them.
Eewooo eewooo, false dichotomy alarm!!!
Never understood the leather/fur hate. But I’m also not vegetarian.
Because it’s rational to hate when people kill other living beings just to wear their skin. That’s fucking bizarre and grotesque.
It’s extremely not bizarre. Their skin is very useful, when prepared right. We’ve been doing it for about as long as we’ve been humans.
Can I wear your mum when she dies?
If my mum donated her body, sure.
Alternately, if my mum was an animal, and you had raised that animal from birth, gave it plenty of food, made sure it was kept safe from predators, parasites etc., I’d say it would think that you taking its skin and meat when it no longer needed them was a small price to pay. If aliens abducted me and made me that deal, and those things weren’t already provided by the society I was surrounded by, I’d probably take it.
That’s just a no except you’d like to feel justified about it.
In fairness the suggested premise of you wearing human skin, not an animal skin, was funny but pretty stupid to start with. And not what they had suggested has been done for the while history of humanity.
I literally said yes.
Human skin is really only good for parchment and whatnot. It’s too thin to be used for protection and it’s lacking hair for warmth. Maybe you could turn her into some kind of drum? I’m not sure how much tension human leather can take.
Anyway, again we were talking about things that are or are not normal. Human artifacts have been created throughout history, but they’re generally pretty rare. They’re noteable. Shrunken heads, bone churches, skin books, a skin lamp shade. I think someone made some gloves once?
So, wearing my mum would not be normal. I’m gonna say you can’t because all of your friends would disown you.
Just because something is popular doesn’t make it normal or right. Maybe you should try visiting a slaughterhouse some time.
So, the fact that something is popular does, in fact, make it normal. “Right” is a completely different discussion from popularity, that’s correct.
Anyway, I generally agree we should minimize suffering as much as we can, but certain materials are irreplaceable for now. Leather has a combination of properties we haven’t been able to match with plant or synthetic materials. There are fake leathers, yes, but they don’t have the durability or flame resistance of real leather.
As for killing animals, I try to avoid it if it’s not necessary, and try to do it as quickly as possible otherwise.
And we are back at the maybe if you just did this one thing you’d agree with my weird ideas that I think everyone should embrace.
If not visiting a slaughterhouse, it is about watching cowspiracy or some weird youtube videos. Come on
Oh it’s you again, I didn’t even realize in either of those cases. Well stop having bad takes about animals, and start doing right by them. They need you.
Hi again :)
No bad takes here, I already mentioned before that I have three beautiful chickens that are well loved, fed and protected and give me eggs on a daily basis. We work pretty well together
Honestly it just feels weird, but its more rational definitely than killing the same animals and throwing away their skin when you have a use for it.
The rational thing is to just leave the animals alone and not kill them.
It’s supremely bad as a product, the origin doesn’t actually matter?
Smells, stiff, needs constant care, (comparatively) complex to repair, it just has virtually no upsides. It doesn’t even last long unless you’re comparing really high-quality leather to really low-quality cotton or something like that.
Ive been using a $10 leather belt every day for over 20 years now, zero maintenance or anything done to it.
I own a leather motorcycle jacket I’ve abused for 20+ years that is none of those things, and it wasn’t particularly expensive. I’ve repaired some loose stitches and rub some leather balm into it twice a year.
Yes: garbage quality leather is crap, and most of the “fast fashion” items on the market use trash leather. But decent quality leather will last for decades if you put a minimal amount of care into it. It’s relatively easy to maintain and repair too.
And that’s why it has had no use throughout human history whatsoever. /s
Do you also have an opinion on timber smelling bad and be completely useless with no upsides?
I don’t eat meat but do wear leather. I figure enough people will eat the beef anyways. I also try to buy my leather secondhand and take good care of it. If you treat it right it’ll outlast you.
Leather still can’t be beat for footwear, a good shoe/boot will break-in to your foot, it’s literally thick skin.
Leather jackets are basically windproof too.
Gore-tex is much better than animal skin for being both wind and water-proof, and better for breathability as well (and being much lighter weight). While the materials are bad environmentally, animal skin is not an environmentally friendly material either.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=CNQgcBUGD3g&pp=ygURdmVnYW4gbWljIGxlYXRoZXI%3D
Gore-tex is shit. You’re much better off with waxed fabric with strategic flaps for breathability (rain doesn’t tend to fall from below).
Nice example of a false equivalency…
False dichotomy? If so I agree
Leather is a by-product of dairy and beef production, there is vastly more leather than we use for garments. Most of it gets processed into pet food or makeup or automotive lubricants or who knows what
This is not true.
https://bitesizevegan.org/is-leather-a-byproduct-of-the-meat-industry/
