@WinglessOne Well, I think you and I reached the "agree to disagree" stage regarding clean beauty once before. LOL. However, I'm always interested in updating my knowledge, since I know I don't have all the answers. Do you have any materials you can point me to?
Also, I suppose I differentiate between 'better for individual humans' and 'better for the planet' when it comes to clean beauty. I'll start looking up some of the ingredients and see if I can remain confident that it's better for my health to choose clean products.
And yes, I acknowledge that as a consumer of beauty products, I'm part of the problem. I'm also a consumer of harsh cleaning products at times, and I use a ton of paper tissues instead of handkerchiefs because I have allergies and I'd need a stack of hankies three feet high to get through the week. I use clean water to flush my toilet instead of composting my "humanure". I drive my car instead of attempting to use our terrible transit system. I usually buy new clothes and shoes instead of thrifted ones because it's so hard to find my size. I try to buy organic veggies and free-range eggs, but I can't afford pastured meat.
I guess I often feel like everything I try to do is basically a spit in the ocean. First world countries do almost nothing to help eliminate pollution and climate change, not compared to what needs to be done. Capitalism and convenience win, over and over. Maybe me buying clean beauty and recycling and composting won't make a lick of difference, but I do the small things that I can that I believe to be helpful. What else is there to do?
@Westcoasty Iโve been using my tablet (a new one actually; I finally upgraded from my first iPad) lately because my laptopโs having issues. All my clinical study bookmarks and cites are on the laptop, so I canโt post โem here. But thereโs plenty of info out there from scientists, doctors, and cosmetic chemists about what โclean beautyโ gets wrong, including the questionable studies some โcleanโ claims are based onโif theyโre based on scientific data at all.
For now, Iโll kinda summarize what I meant when I said โclean beautyโ harms instead of helps human health (I focus on the human health aspect because thatโs supposedly the point of โclean beautyโ; itโs not about helping the planet):
1. Misinformation scares people away from supposedly โdirtyโ ingredients and the actually helpful product that contain them. A prime example of this is chemical (organic) sunscreen. Thereโs been so much misinformation and fear mongering about how chemical UV filters are dangerous to human health, some folks refuse to use them. Instead they try to use zinc oxide (mineral) sunscreens since those are supposedly โcleanโ and safer. But thereโs no scientific data that shows chemical UV filters are as dangerous as the โclean beautyโ crowd claims. Chemical sunscreens tend to look and feel better on skin for many people, especially those of us with brown skin. Many zinc oxide sunscreens leave a white, grey, or lavender cast on skin (even on lighter skin tones), and they often feel heavy and greasy. Those are some of the reasons people hate to use sunscreen. If theyโre convinced invisible chemical sunscreens are poison and zinc oxideโs their only safe option, they may give up on sunscreen altogether. And I donโt need to explain why thatโs dangerous to human health.
Petrolatum used to be heavily demonized by the โclean beautyโ crowd, and some folks and brands still call it dangerous. Iโve seen false claims that petrolatum is the exact same stuff as the petrol that goes into gas tanks, as if thereโs no refinement process involved. At some point, weโll probably have to wean ourselves off petrolatum for environmental reasons. This is an instance of a very beneficial skincare ingredient (best moisturizing ingredient out there) that will likely disappear when humanity depends less on petroleum; its fate is tied to environmental reform. (Petrolatum is a byproduct thatโs refined to heck until it meets the FDAโs safety standards.) Meanwhile, petrolatumโs often used by doctors, nurses, and estheticians to protect skin from clinical-grade chemical peels, help wounds heal, etc.
2. Fear mongering of โdirtyโ ingredients can lead to safe helpful ingredients disappearing from products, because beauty brands always follow the money. Iโll use parabens as an example here. Iโve posted more than once about how parabens were demonized so much by โclean beauty,โ brands stopped using them in productsโnot out of genuine safety concerns, but simply to ensure folks would buy their products. People forget that cosmetics companies follow market trends and will happily jump on marketing bandwagons to sell more stuff. Thatโs the main reason thereโs so much โclean beautyโ messaging in the industry right now: not genuine health concern, just โwe gotta follow the clean trend if we wanna sell products.โ Quickly back to parabens: all the negativity was based on one very flawed clinical study. Thanks to that study and the โcleanโ reaction, parabens have been replaced in many products by preservatives that can irritate skin. Iโd rather have safe effective parabens back.
3. โCleanโ ingredients are not automatically safer than โdirtyโ ingredients. I already mentioned parabens vs. more irritating preservatives, soโฆ letโs briefly talk about essential oils: bergamot, lavender, grapefruit, eucalyptus, lemongrass, lime, lemon, geraniol, peppermint, clove, etc. These seem to be considered โcleanโ despite their potential to irritate the heck outta skin. Iโm not the only person on Earth whose facial skin will not tolerate lavender oil (or lavender extract, or even lavender water). I chuckle and roll my eyes whenever I see it in the INCI list of any โcleanโ skincare product.
Anyone can become skin-sensitive or truly allergic to nearly any ingredient. Doesnโt matter if the ingredientโs โcleanโ or not. In this sense, โcleanโ is 100% meaningless. It doesnโt signify safety. By claiming it does, the โclean beautyโ crowd may end up steering folks away from ingredients and products that are truly safe and effective.
I totally get the struggle of trying to reduce your own environmental impact. There are so many things we doโand things we could do but, admittedly, those things arenโt always easy or possibleโthat seem small and insignificant. But itโs good to keep doing what we can. ๐
@WinglessOne First of all, thank you for taking the time to write me out that detailed response. I appreciate it.
I take your point about flawed scientific studies. There are a lot of them out there in the field of nutrition, for instance. I think the thing I need to do to really be sure I can assess what I'm reading is to educate myself on statistical analysis. I read that hormone replacement therapy became demonized due to the way the statistics were expressed, whereas what it boiled down to was that instead of four women in 1000 having an increased risk of breast cancer (or developing it? Can't recall) it became five women in 1000, and that the level of risk didn't compare to the many health issues caused by lack of estrogen, such as bone density loss. Likewise, when you put it into real-world terms, statins perform just barely better than placebos, and statins come with a number of other side effects. So I definitely get that.
Anyhow, you mentioned parabens. I'd heard of them, but didn't know much, so I Googled "what are parabens." The first thing that came up was a summary by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) called What Are Parabens, and Why Don't They Belong in Cosmetics? They cited a number of studies that indicate that parabens harm human health and may harm the environment, due to persistence. The article itself is very convincing, but I'll need to look at the multiple citations appended to the article, as well as find out if EWG has skin in the game, so to speak. I know that scientific rigour and ethics can become a little slippery at times when funding is involved, sad to say.
Thank you again for discussing this with me. I really appreciate it. ๐
@Westcoasty Oh boy, the EWGโฆ thatโs an American lobbyist org (eh, โactivist groupโ as they call themselves) funded in part by the organic food industry. EWG is not a government agency or scientific research org. Itโs been a while since I tried to figure out how the heck their safety rating system works: they seem very biased, to the point where even if a brand they favor has a product that contains an allegedly dangerous ingredient, that product will still get a safe ratingโor a safer rating than another brandโs product that also contains said ingredient. Maybe theyโve tweaked their system in the last year or 2, I dunno, I havenโt picked through it that recently. Last time I checked in on EWGโs site, they had at least stopped calling petrolatum dangerous.
I also havenโt looked at their latest take on parabens, though I expect it to be very negative coming from EWG. Iโll have to check all their cites. Hopefully I can access most of them so I can see details like the method used for each study. On the persistence front, itโs important to remember cosmetic chemists take prolonged use into account when formulating skincare products. For the heck of it, hereโs what the FDA says about parabens as of Feb. 25, 2022:
Are parabens safe as theyโre used in cosmetics? Are they linked to breast cancer or other health problems?
FDA scientists continue to review published studies on the safety of parabens. At this time, we do not have information showing that parabens as they are used in cosmetics have an effect on human health. Here are some of the questions we are considering:
What do published studies show about the possible hazards of parabens, and on the effects of parabens on human health? For example, do experimental findings with various parabens also happen in real life?
What are the hazards and risks of not using parabens? If we stop using parabens to protect cosmetics and consumers from harmful bacteria, are there safer alternatives for preservatives?
If there are paraben-related health effects that are scientifically supported and documented, how do these effects relate to the use of parabens in cosmetics?
Do the different kinds of parabens act the same or differently in our bodies?
FDA will continue to evaluate new data in this area. If we determine that a health hazard exists, we will advise the industry and the public, and will consider the agencyโs legal options under the authority of the FD&C Act to protect the health and welfare of consumers.
Info copied/pasted from fda[dot]gov/cosmetics/cosmetic-ingredients/parabens-cosmetics
Whenever I think of stats, I remember what one of my middle school math teachers said: โthe fun thing about stats is they can be skewed to represent whatever someone wants them to. So you need to look at stats very critically, and look at the whole picture, not just the numbers.โ I was already kinda skeptical about many things, but he really drilled critical thinking into my brain. ๐ I look at all clinical studies with a critical eye, regardless of whether or not I like their conclusions. Canโt let confirmation bias get in the way.
Iโm happy to have a good conversation about this stuff. ๐ Some folks get very rude about this and other topics, and that makes polite discussion impossibleโand goes against BIC conduct rules. Thank you for not being one of those people.
@WinglessOne Of course I'm polite, I'm Canadian! LOL. But seriously, yes, I understand what you mean about having a polite discussion. I've discovered that whenever I get up on my "I'm right and you're wrong" high horse, generally the horse bucks me off in swift fashion...so I try not to ride that horse any more. ๐
I was a bit skeptical about EWG once I saw their rating chart in the article. Granted, I didn't dig further into what it was based on, but I was definitely wondering what it was meant to accomplish. At the very least, correlation doesn't imply causation. I didn't see that they were connecting the dots, though as I say, I didn't dig further into it. All I got from it was "we rate this as a 7, and 7 is bad!".
And you're quite right about stats. That's why I mentioned HRT and statins, where (IMHO) stats were used in a way that ultimately has caused more harm than good, though I'm sure the pharmaceutical companies benefited mightily from selling statins based on misleadingly presented statistics.
Mostly, I guess, I'm disappointed that Clean Beauty may just be another form of greenwashing. It seemed like a great solution at a time when, as I say, I think we're beginning to see a wave of issues that aren't yet universally recognized. with regard to the prevalence of chemicals planet-wide. I'll admit it: I didn't want to do the work to figure it all out for myself, and was happy to find a convenient label that did the work for me. Sigh.
Anyhow, thank you as well for this polite discussion. I've always had tremendous respect for the depth of your knowledge. ๐
@eshoe I think there are a lot of questions, and sheet made foils are part of that! I mentioned that the 2x2 inches was rather small and it was weird because it mentioned mascara...but mascara tubes/wands are longer than 2 inches. And I still need to read the fine print...like the no frosted glass bottles.
Yes, the frosted bottles part is interesting, @greeneyedgirl107. I messaged them this morning and will update re: the sheet mask packaging. They could be folded into 2x2 rectangles ๐ค
@eshoe Heh, I thought the same thing about folding a sheet mask pouch small enough. ๐ 2x2โ is a weird size restriction that many cosmetics packaging wonโt meet, even if I exclude all skincare packaging. Heck, many eyeshadow quads are larger than that.
@WinglessOne it makes me wonder what wizardry they are compacting these empties with...must be quite an expensive process or machinery, I would love to see it in action!
@ather Several companies (in the US) do, either through Pact or TerraCycle. ๐ And Iโm glad to see more cosmetics brands moving to recyclable packaging. ๐
@WinglessOne I love that. I wish Canada would also start more recycling projects! I am always so envious of all the ones I can see across the boarder but I cannot participate in. I recycle all mine through the normal recycling here but I often worry that it ends in the trash. So all my hard work is wasted.
@ather Have you looked into the recycling program at Winners locations? I read it to be similar to this one... just easier for me to access for things that don't work with my cities curb side recycling program.
@ather I hear you on worrying local recycling stuff will end up in a landfill. Itโs so easy for recycling centers to reject items for the smallest issues. Iโve seen news articles about entire loads of recycling from apartment/condo buildings being rejected because a couple items of trash (like pizza boxes with stuck-on food) were found in the batch. And if one company owns both a trash business and recycling business, thereโs a good chance some recycling will be routed to landfill regardless of quality. Itโs all very frustrating.
@WinglessOne Itโs so sad. I was told the same about my local area too. And I really sort things out. And itโs frustrating to know all the work I do with sorting and making sure I separate or clean out. And it just ends up in the landfill. I will continue to do it tho because if they just throw it in the landfill I know I did the right thing. And I am content with how I did it. Itโs a lot of work and you have to really take time but we only have this one planet.
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