Breaking: PETA Interrupts Burberry’s Annual Meeting Over Cashmere Industry Cruelty
16.07.2024
London – Moments ago, PETA supporters stormed Burberry’s annual meeting, to call attention to the rampant cruelty inherent in the cashmere industry. The activists held signs that read, “Burberry: Cashmere Is Bloody Cruel,” and chanted “Shame on Burberry! Cashmere is cruel!” until security escorted them off the premises. A video from the action is available here.
“Each fibre of a cashmere scarf was torn from a terrified goat who screamed as their hair was ripped out, just for a fashion statement,” says PETA Vice President of Corporate Projects Yvonne Taylor. “PETA is calling on Burberry’s new CEO, Joshua Schulman, to stop turning a blind eye to goats’ suffering and ditch cashmere immediately.”
A PETA Asia investigation into cashmere operations in Mongolia – including one with ties to Burberry – revealed goats screaming in pain and fear as workers pinned them down by their legs and horns and tore out their hair, often tearing off pieces of their skin along with it; a worker using an unsterilised knife to cut open kids’ scrotums and pulling out their testicles with his bare hands, all without pain relief; goats left to suffer from bleeding wounds; and the bodies of dead animals on site, including kids who likely died from cold and hunger. When the goats’ hair production slows, they’re sold off to be slaughtered at abattoirs, where workers bash them on the head with a hammer and cut their throat. A year on, and despite Burberry’s claim to “never knowingly source raw materials if there have been any concerns over animal welfare”, the company continues to offer more than 200 cashmere items on its website.
In 2021, the company reported that a biodiversity baseline assessment revealed that its use of “leather, cashmere and wool have the most significant impact on biodiversity as well as accounting for a high proportion of Burberry’s carbon footprint”. PETA supporters have disrupted Burberry fashion shows twice since last autumn to call on the industry titan to switch to plant wools and vegan leather.
PETA – whose motto reads, in part, that “animals are not ours to wear” – opposes speciesism, a human-supremacist worldview. For more information about PETA’s investigative newsgathering and reporting, please visit PETA.org.uk or follow the group on Facebook, X, TikTok, or Instagram.
Contact:
Sascha Camilli +44 (0) 20 7923 6244; [email protected]
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