Are You Wearing a Dirty Secret?
One of the biggest causes of pollution on our planet…
“Fast Fashion.”
A decade ago I had never heard the term. A student introduced me to a video he had watched in an environmental impact course. Stunned is an understandment.
Webster defines the term:
an approach to the design, creation, and marketing of clothing fashions that emphasizes making fashion trends quickly and cheaply available to consumers
That definition seems harmless enough. Who doesn’t want access to more affordable clothing, especially since those of us who grew up sewing our own clothes find fabrics too expensive for home sewing?
When we in good conscience donate old clothing to thrift stores and recycling centers, thinking we are helping to keep clothing out of landfills and on people’s backs, we are creating yet again the “unintended consequences” of a new trend — making cheap clothing for mass consumer use. What seems like a good idea creates unexpected consequences
“Fast fashion” is destroying textile industries, simply by bringing used, discarded clothing from the United States (primarily) to countries in Africa. It is then sold piecemeal to individual entrepreneurs, who in turn take the clothing into small villages and sell it cheaply. It is cheaper for people to…
