Paper short abstract:

This paper addresses the characterisation of moral failings in the exploitation in Tierra del Fuego of fur seals for garments against a background of historical change in which the population of local human groups was extinguished and that of sea mammals severely threatened.

Paper long abstract:

Moral choices are often made in the light of experience gained from historical precedent. As the hunting of seals changed from the self-sufficient localism practised by the Yamana and Selknam of Tierra del Fuego to the full-scale exploitation by whalers and sealers from northern countries, different moral equations pitted local humans, outsiders and non-human animals against each other. This paper addresses some of the moral implications involved in changing attitudes toward the clothing of human bodies with the fur of non-human animals in a process in which the population of local human groups was extinguished and that of sea mammals severely threatened.