People who practice a vegan lifestyle are averse not only to consuming animals or animal products, but they do not support the killing of animals in order to produce clothing either. By the broadest strokes of what vegan means, vegan shirts are made of materials that do not come from animals. This includes the fabric, the threads, the buttons, or any ornamental decorations. Some vegans feel clothing should be made only of organic materials, while others feel synthetic materials, such as polyester, meet the standards of veganism.
The strictest definition of a vegan is someone who does not condone the killing of animals or the use of animal products. Many practicing vegans, however, look at veganism as a philosophy rather than a simple principle. This philosophy centers around nonexploitative actions toward both animals and humans and causing the least amount of detrimental impact on the environment. Trying to define vegan shirts becomes even more complex when considering these factors.
Although a polyester shirt with cotton stitching and plastic buttons meets the encyclopedic definition of vegan, some practicing vegans try to avoid the use of these materials. Polyester is derived from petroleum, and the environmental impact of obtaining petroleum and processing it into polyester goes against their philosophy. The cotton used for the stitching may not be acceptable to some vegans because, although cotton is a plant product, pesticides were used on the cotton plants. The plastic buttons are offensive to some vegans because, like polyester fabric, they are produced from petroleum products.
The perfect vegan shirts would be those produced from organic materials with a minimum of mechanical processing, made using fair-trade practices and without exploiting cheap labor from vulnerable populations. A hand-woven shirt made from organically-grown hemp with buttons hand-carved from fallen wood meets almost every vegan’s definition of a vegan shirt. Vegans themselves debate on where to draw the line on what is acceptable when it comes to clothing. There is a wide variance between what is reasonable and what is acceptable, although all vegans agree that a polyester shirt, even with its inherent negatives, is still preferable to a leather shirt.
Truly vegan shirts are not widely available; most large chain stores do not carry any vegan clothing. This leads many vegans to settle for clothing that, while not strictly adhering to vegan philosophy, at least do not contain animal products. Shirts made of organic materials are becoming more popular, although even these are sometimes made in foreign countries using child labor.