Source: Bigstock

My point: You do need fur when you live in a cold place, and San Francisco can be a pretty cold place.

I didn’t ask the Siberians what they thought of synthetic fur, but my guess is that they wouldn’t like it. I think if you gave them a choice, and the synthetic fur was 50 percent cheaper, they would still wear fur. They trust the way it breathes and shapes itself to the body in the same way that Europeans 40,000 years ago did.

So the real issue is not fur. The real issue is, do humans have the right to use animals to improve our lives? And the answer, not just in San Francisco, is increasingly not just no, but hell no.

Alcee L. Hastings, a congressman from Florida, is crusading against dogmeat. He wants to eliminate the production and sale of dogmeat by passing laws and resolutions that target some city in China that enjoys canine cuisine.

Why dogmeat? Why not go after the meat from ducks, geese, turkeys, cows, pigs? Why not go after types of animal meat consumed in the United States? Why not go after leather? Why not go after every steakhouse on K Street?

Why not go after fish? They live in the wild too.

And the reason is that the San Francisco ban on fur is not about fur, it’s about people who can afford fur. It’s a veiled attack on the rich. It’s mostly class-based and, even when directed at the cheaper furs, it’s treating high school girls with rabbit collars like gateway-drug degenerates. Like many of the laws in California, it’s all about telling people how to live. It’s the kind of law that the Soviets, who loved to interfere in people’s private lives and judge their economic decisions, never even thought of.

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