‘Sponsored with blood money’: Olympic partner LVMH slammed for animal abuse
Ahead of the Paris Olympic Games, anti-cruelty messages have been projected onto the city’s famous landmarks to protest LVMH’s use of exotic skins and fur.
Credit: PETA France
In the lead-up to the 2024 Olympic Games in Paris, animal rights activists have displayed anti-cruelty messages across the city to protest against LVMH, one of the event's partners.
Known for its numerous high-end brands, LVMH has faced criticism for its use of animal-derived materials such as fur and exotic skins.
People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals (PETA) France projected a video across some of the city’s iconic landmarks - including the Eiffel Tower, Place Vendôme, and the Futur Hôtel Louis Vuitton on the Champs-Élysées.
The demonstration happened during the Vogue World fashion event on Sunday attended by celebrities and fashion designers, including Pharrell Williams, men’s creative director for LVMH-owned brand Louis Vuitton.
The projection features the message “Louis Vuitton: Drop Exotic Skins”, a parody of the official Olympic mascot, and the organization’s graphic undercover investigation footage of humans slaughtering crocodiles for their skin.
“If extreme cruelty to animals were an Olympic sport, Paris 2024’s premium partner LVMH - the parent company of Louis Vuitton, Dior, and Fendi - might just take home a gold medal for selling the skins of violently slaughtered crocodiles, snakes, ostriches and other wild animals,” stated PETA vice president for the UK and Europe Mimi Bekhechi.
“The world is watching, and consumers should know that the Olympics are being sponsored with blood money. Every time you buy anything made of someone’s skin, you’re funding immense animal suffering,” added Bekhechi.
Credit: PETA France
When LVMH was being considered as an official sponsor of the Paris 2024 Olympic Games, PETA called on the International Olympic Committee to reject the deal unless the fashion company agreed to stop selling fur and exotic skins.
In a letter to IOC President Thomas Bach, PETA highlighted how LVMH continues to risk the public’s health with its mink coats and python bags. “We all know the enormous toll COVID-19 took on lives around the globe, so it would be unconscionable for the next Olympic Games to be sponsored by a company that supports these dangerous industries.”
Experts have warned that the unsanitary and crowded conditions on farms and at slaughterhouses in the exotic-skins supply chain are an ideal environment for viruses to thrive, similar to the one that caused the COVID-19 pandemic, which significantly affected the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Game
Fur farms in several countries, including Denmark, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain, Sweden, and the US, experienced COVID-19 outbreaks among animals and workers, with a dangerous mutation of the virus in minks also spreading to humans.
A PETA Asia investigation into slaughterhouses in Indonesia that supply LVMH has documented instances of snakes being inflated with water, struck with hammers, and cut with razors while potentially still conscious.
PETA entities have also reported that workers in the fashion industry have been observed hacking at crocodiles’ necks, inserting metal rods down their spines, chopping off conscious lizards’ heads with machetes, and electrically stunning ostriches before slitting their throats in front of other ostriches.
Reports also indicate that animals raised for fur are often kept in small, unsanitary cages and are subjected to electrocution, bludgeoning, gassing, or, in some cases, being skinned alive.
The animal advocacy group argues that LVMH is lagging in efforts to make the fashion industry more humane, pointing out that many other major designers, such as Mulberry, Victoria Beckham, Chanel, Burberry, Diane von Furstenberg, and Vivienne Westwood, have already banned the use of reptile skins and other wildlife products, whilst nearly all top luxury fashion houses have banned fur.
What Can You Do?
Please join PETA in calling on LVMH to drop exotic skins and fur from Louis Vuitton and all of its other brands now. Send a letter here.
Species Unite is calling on Louis Vuitton, owned by LVMN, to join the modern age of compassionate fashion by committing to stop supporting the torture of crocodiles and the use of exotic skins. Please add your name here.
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