A very disturbing "instructable"
Can someone please talk to someone in charge and take down an Instructable by "velacreations" named "Make a rabbit fur hat from scratch"?? This crazy person is encouraging people to breed bunnies and slaughter them for fur to make hats, need I say more?? Well I will, it's revolting, and extremely disturbing. I was in shock when this even came promoted to my email. I don't want to unsub from this site but will with no hesitation if this doesn't get removed. Rabbits are supposed to be wild or loved as pets. Not raised to be killed, butchered, and skinned (with kids at the house too boot it seems!) and spread across the internet with info on how to do it to tons of other defenseless bunnies. Come on now guys, don't stoop this low and think this acceptable.
Thank you and I truly hope action is taken ASAP.
Joanne
Thank you and I truly hope action is taken ASAP.
Joanne
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I used a ton of it, all over, and it worked at first but then got moldy. Perhaps it just got damp from ambient humidity when I started taking the salt off? That's my theory, anyway.
Some advice from a friend: What you need is non-iodized salt. It is available in your grocery store. Do not use ice cream salt. the grains are too large and will spot your hide and cure it unevenly. Use the non-iodized table salt. Then go to the drug store and get some alum. It is also avaliable whereever food canning suplies are sold. Mix the salt and alum together and thoroughly coat the flesh side of the hide with a heavy layer of the salt/alum mixture. Allow this to set for a couple of days and then scrape it off and throw it away. Replace it with another layer of salt/aluim mixture and let it set for several days. This will cure your hide and keep the hair from slipping. At the end of this time, your hide should be dry and hard. Now get some Neats Foot Oil (mink oil works also) and work a good coat into the hide. Now the work begins. Get an old baseball bat and make sure that the end is smooth. Fix it so it will stand up with the bat end sticking up. Start working the hide over the end of the bat to break up the collagin in the hide. The collagin is what makes it hard. Keep adding oil and working it until it is soft enough to do what ever it is you want to do with it. Be patient, this last part takes some time and work.
And I see NO cure for punitis
You say you're worried that they're going extinct?
There are probably 200 million rabbits in Australia alone, and anything up to 3 billion world-wide. That doesn't make them endangered by any stretch of the imagination. In fact, rabbits are a greater danger to humans, as a species, than the other way round, breeding, well, like rabbits, and consuming all green matter in their path, including tree saplings.
In the 1950s, myxomatosis killed off 95% of British wild rabbits - the population, though, has increased roughly 3-fold every year, and is now 45 million and still climbing.
It takes on average, in the great state of Texas, 10 YEARS for a single hunter to make a successful kill. Imagine all that money that he/she spent hunting that went to help protect wildlife and conserve wildlife for that 1 deer to be harvested.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Isinglass
As for "wild", networks of rabbit-tunnels are known as warrens after the medieval practice of granting permission to hunt specific small game in defined areas without fear of prosecution as a poacher.
The unnatural aspect of raising rabbits is the relatively modern practise of anthropomorphism that prevents otherwise-sane individuals from dealing with prey animals in the manner for which they were originally domesticated.
(You probably think Guinea pigs are supposed to be cute little pets as well...)
...
But I do I think I've lost my harmonica, Albert.
This is how your great grand parents survived, was by growing their own food and eating them if not you would die. Also kids would raise these animals for extra spending money. Their parents didnt just give them cash to blow.
The instructable is a little unrealistic, there is no blood, no viscera being removed and the hide looks a little too photogenic but they have their kids involved so that they can grow up and share the traditions of raising and skinning your own food.
This is no different than raising cattle to slaughter. except most people do not have the facilities to slaughter beef.
It's possible that comments you replied to were removed, and that the tail end of the thread was excised as well. Does that seem feasible, since you know what comments have gone?
i don't remove comments that when i still mean them
(Jesuitical? Me? LOL)
We do not evaluate anyone's politics, and will not be removing the Instructable. It is well-documented and does not violate our be nice policy.
However, we have removed your comment on the Instructable as it did violate the be nice policy and was not constructive. I believe it is possible to express your feeling that rabbits are better as pets in a constructive comment -- or perhaps more powerfully as an Instructable on the best care for rabbits or similar. If you decide Instructables is not the place for you, we will respect that decision, but will be sad to see you go.
Eric J. Wilhelm
Instructables.com Founder
How this is a "political" issue or how me posting an Instructable myself would help in this matter is BEYOND me. I'm choosing to unsub and opt out. I liked this site until the recent promotions like this came to my email. This is certainly NOT what I signed up for much less wanting to support a site/owner that censors my comments. This will be the last I write as I don't like to waste my time typing risking that it will be deleted. Who would right? I believe that many others that speak up on this site are censored too because there is a very peculiar LACK of oppositional remarks about this on his page and there isn't really a "nice, constructive" way to word something when one is literally appalled. We live in a day and age where animals go extinct for their fur and synthetics are EASY to come by. I'm not saying rabbits are any where in the predicament of extinction but encouraging people to make their own fur products is just f'ing insane. Perhaps I'll check in once in blue moon but no way do I want more promos coming in since they clearly have the ANYTHING GOES policy. As long as they see profit who cares, right?
Joanne
Don't let the internet catch you on the way out...
Tsk, tsk!
-Why did you bother with all of that then?
You don't understand the site's philosophy but disagree with your perception of it's ethics. Not coming back is probably the best thing to do.
L
(CAPS is not good, it makes you look like a child or very angry)
(I have a non-pro account for testing purposes).
L
I also can't speak for this website, but its generally been the practice to disallow Instructables that are illegal or dangerous, and sadly the Instructables in question don't violate any laws (that I'm aware of).
The other point (that many have made) is that similar practices are followed all the time and aren't censored. For someone to eat turkey at Thanksgiving required an animal to be slaughtered; and if someone posted an Instructable on making something with the turkey feathers then you'd have to consider censoring that as well because its really not much different. Whether you approve or not, the legal killing of animals does take place everyday for the sole purpose of becoming a meal, for leather or for some other use. I still couldn't hurt a rabbit for a stupid hat, but I don't think that censorship is the answer...
. The TV has people killing each other on the news everyday. Ban the TV!
. Books have been written on this and other disterbing subjects! Burn all the books boycott the library!
. Every religion refers to eating plants and animals! Boycott life!
. We should all just crawl back into a hole and never interact with our surroundings because someone doesn't like something or is offended!
Someone else should take care of us from cradle to grave and not hurt or offend anyone else, unless you approve.
Big Brother is Watching You
Not in my world
That bothers me, too, but what can I do? Many people eat meat and wear fur, and they're not likely to stop soon.
I don't see rabbits as more deserving of protection than other animals. Sorry.
No worse than keeping chickens...
Not to inflame but it isn't really awful, no worse than any farming etc. For the record, wild rabbits, yes, pet rabbits no - having kept them I can say they make poor pets, plenty cuddly but they eat and eat or escape, keeping them in a hutch seems the mean bit to me.