Recycling Chemicals





 Baby cotton flannel pj topper, early 50s.

 I bought vintage for my son because i like the little prints, now i am grateful for exposing him to less toxins. Following the heart can have intersting rewards.

Lets play fool the public!

You are a business. You make chemicals. You are doing great; selling flame retardants to clothing and fabric manufacturers. You are raking in profits because back in the 50s you helped frame the stories about kids being burned because their pajamas caught on fire. You put this ad on TV and asked America to protect their kids.

It worked, America got up and voted to protect children from space heaters and cigarettes.  This problem was magnified to sell more chemicals to a public already hyped with ads like the one i found in a 1940s National Geographic "Living Better Through Chemistry." 

This emotional hype was needed because of the growth story. To grow you needed to sell more. How better to sell things than to make the public believe they needed them. You became a great storyteller.

To be fair, there is good chemistry but a lot of bad applications. Like synthetic vitamins are not a replacement for real food, household cleaners can harm your lungs, scents are full of endocrine disruptors..ai yi yi ...we have a mess on our hands.

So the we try to make amends and the we cleaned up this pj problem back in 1977 when Tris was banned from children's clothing. That was when it was found out to be an agent of cancer and perhaps not that great a fire retardant.

So now you start freaking out about lost sales and investors pulling out and your stock prices diving. This is bad ju ju, how will you live? How will your employees fare if you fail? CEO knows to get that bottom line straightened out or off with "the head." Loss of title, failure, spouse is alarmed, bills pile up- no this cannot happen.

So in survival mode the you pull together and find another way to sell Tris. You succeed by forming an alliance with cigarette companies who want to blame sofas and pillows for burns. You brilliantly change the story.

You succeed!!
& now :

85% of U.S. couches tested contained toxic or untested flame retardant chemicals.

• The newer the couch, the more likely it is to contain toxic chemicals.

• 41% of the couches contained cancer-causing chlorinated Tris, which was removed from children’s pajamas back in 1977!  (thank you Women's Voices for the Earth, WVE)

So when i say it is time to write the new stories...i mean it..enough of this nonsense.
(and i am working on it, please see the WaterRIP stories posted to FashionRIP blog)

The above story is not alone, our economic system enables, supports even protects this battle of the tall tales.

 I am embarassed by this lack of understanding, angry at this lack of foresight and insight, and amused that the enablers do not see that they too are being exposed to ever higher risk of disease. Are they suicidal?

Well anyway, now you know.

Safe Chemicals Act information is on the WVE site. Together we will change the stories.