Ok I'll bite.
 
It must not be forgotten that ferrets HAVE historically been raised, bred
and used for fur production!  Fitch fur is not uncommon, especially in
vintage items, and to me objecting to the sale of such a vintage item (as
the collar on ebay appears to be) is like suggesting the owner should, if
they don't want the thing, just burn it because it might offend our
sensibilities.
 
For myself, I can't stomach it very well.  But the fact is, we love
an animal who was BRED for multiple purposes, only ONE of which was
companionship.  To use the pig analogy, it'd be like saying that you've
decided pigs ARE companion animals now, and should not be used for meat,
and so you expect everyone to throw away the pork cutlets in their
freezers lest you accidentally see them being eaten.
 
Fitch fur IS a legitimate (as legitimate as any other, anyway) type of
fur, used in fur garments for a long while now, and there are a lot of
them available for sale.  It break my heart to see them, but my rational
brain tells me that not everyone loves the ferret the way I do, and not
everyone sees a pair of sad, twinkling eyes peeking out from the pelts
of their coat, alone at Rainbow Bridge, waiting for a human they never
had.  But I also don't think finding all the existing fitch fur pieces
and outlawing them is a great idea.
 
That said, I don't think fitch fur production has stopped.  A search on
google revealed at least one website selling NEW fitch fur trimmed hats,
and stating the fur was produced in North America, and the hat was
manufactured here too.  I didn't know fitch was still being produced in
North America, but I believe it is going strong in Europe.  Because the
ferret CAN (however we may not like it) fall into the livestock category,
the laws which govern their care in that aspect are different than those
for companion animals, just as the laws differ slightly when talking
about lab animals.  And also, lets not forget that the domestic ferret's
species partner, the European Polecat, is also used for fur, and would
we be able to tell the difference?
 
In all, unless someone is buying ferrets from PetCo and skinning them,
or to put it in a more broad perspective; unless someone is purposefully
buying ferrets sold as companion animals and killing them for their
pelts, they haven't done anything wrong for a legal sense.  Like it
or not, ferrets have been and still are bred for fur, and a far more
useful way of combating it, is to mount a legislation battle, rather
than harassing (not everyone is as polite as others, and I've seen Ebay
sellers over the years get far worse than anything Eleanor said,) random
strangers, one at a time.
[Posted in FML issue 4641]