You know What I did Last Summer — Part I: Environmentalist Girl in a Consumerist World
The summer is fast approaching and depending on where you’re reading this from, there’s a probability that you’re already blanketed by heat and humidity. Before we find ourselves truly in the midst of the hot season, I’d like to go back in time and share with you all some fairly life-altering experiences that I had last summer. In case you’re wondering what took me so long to get my thoughts and act together, I have a few ‘legitimate’ reasons for the tardiness of this piece — (a) I was in the midst of a fairly demanding graduate program (b) I was desperately looking for jobs which could justify all the time and money spent on my two and a half decades of education (Thanks Mom and Dad!) © I was trying to learn my way around the aforementioned job. Having said that, it would be delusional on my part to attribute the delay solely to ‘legitimate’ reasons. So, in all honesty, the timing of this post is actually a function of the ever present and easy choice of procrastination. With that confession out of the way, here I begin.
Self-realizations
It all started when I interned at an apparel company last summer. I was a part of their ‘re-commerce’ program though which customers could sell their used gear, which would then be re-sold at a lower price. On one of my visits to their warehouse premises, I was overwhelmed by the number of garments that were available for re-sale. Most of these were in perfectly good condition, and had it not been for the buy-back program, they would have been lying in the darkest corners of the wardrobe from where nothing is ever retrieved, or eventually found their way to the darkest corners of human civilization aka, landfills. One hardly expects a trip to a warehouse to be that of self-realization, but that visit opened my eyes to the dire fate that millions of garments meet every year. In an alternate universe, or with an alternate psyche, homo sapiens would never get bored of things that they own and would continue to use them till they shred apart. But, we are all just human and the best that we can do is take the effort to drop bags full of rejected clothes at thrift stores.
While there are many local thrift stores that are ever grateful for our donations, there are also giants in the business who find themselves inundated with much more than they can re-sell. Self-realization number two occurred when I visited the warehouse of one of the biggest thrift store chains in the US. I was met with the sight of mountains of clothes that were about to begin their long journey to the beaches in Asia, Africa and South America where many meet the same fate of ending up in landfills. Like most environmental problems in the world, the reality of landfills is far removed for most of us. We don’t usually drive past them or smell them, but they have far reaching environmental, social and health repercussions. Most garments that are bought eventually end up in landfills as opposed to being recycled. More than 21 billion pounds of textile waste are sent to landfills every year. While garment disposal might seem like the single biggest issue, the fashion industry is in fact rife with dubious practices through its value chain.
Fast and Furious
The fast fashion industry has moved at breakneck speed to become one of the leading polluters of our planet, and by extension, our lifestyles. Right up there in the echelons of industries that have a pervasive impact on our daily being, this industry has made an indelible mark on what I’d like to group as ‘the troika’ of (a) our planet’s health (b) our physical and mental health, and © our financial health.
What intrigues me more than the mechanics of the fashion industry is its psyche, or rather, its customers’ psyche — our psyche. If you find yourself window shopping and ogling at things you don’t need, you’re not alone. We live in a world which thrives on activating the obsessive consumer within all of us. Our society is chock-a-block with material goods and this has conditioned us to believe that owning things equates to happiness. When we conform to these rules of consumerism, we end up possessing far more than we could possibly need and more importantly, far more than what we can afford to extract from the earth. ‘Efficient’ means of production under capitalism and industrialization have made access to these ‘bundles of joy’ highly accessible and pocket friendly — often disregarding the environmental and social costs that should ideally be inextricably linked to costs of production. Since profit is the most important parameter, we have undercut all checks and balances put in place to ensure that a healthy balance sheet does not sacrifice an environmentally just and socially egalitarian society. The result? Mass production, sale and eventual rejection of goods that consume resources at a rate much faster than what they can be replenished at. With new products attracting us every day, it is no wonder that we outgrow our purchases very soon. This is probably most pertinent in the fast fashion industry.
How can we do our bit?
I am no exception to the lures and seductions of the consumer industry. I’m as guilty as anyone else in propagating and participating in a culture that will eventually derail the tracks of our dangerously fast lifestyle. However, knowledge is power and with great power does come great responsibility. My learnings about the impact of the fast fashion industry last summer urged me to change my rampant buying habits, and to pause before I give in to temptation. After all, “We are what we do, not what we say”. While reducing consumption is the best way to reduce the environmental impact of our actions, it can be hard to go against our social conditioning and curtail the need to ‘treat’ ourselves. In which case, I try to be a ‘responsible’ consumer.
The past few years have seen an increase in the number of brands that practice responsible and sustainable processes. These practices range over the entire gamut of activities from sourcing and manufacturing, to packaging. Many brands have taken it up a few notches and ensure fair pay for their workers, healthy and safe working environments and energy efficiency within their premises. Needless to say, all this comes at a price. When a manufacturing plant has more than just economies of scale as its guiding light, there will be an increase in operating costs. When a brand takes the effort to source its raw materials ethically and dispose waste responsibly, their products will be more expensive than those made from questionable fabric with an opaque supply chain. Most importantly, when brands take care of their employees and pay workers fairly, their products will be priced higher than when workers are exploited. These costs cascade down to customers who buy these products. While there may not be much aesthetic difference between a $10 and $30 T-shirt, when you buy the latter from a responsible brand, you are also paying for responsible practices which ensure the health of our planet. These products tend to last longer than those of less responsible brands. By charging you a price that is higher, and hence a more accurate reflection of the environmental, human and economic costs involved, these brands do not propagate the same extent of consumerism as is prevalent in most fast fashion brands. The frequency of ‘retail therapy’ will go down when you shell out a minimum of $50 every time you want to buy something. Hence, buying responsibly is better for the planet, and in the long run, for your pocket.
In the hierarchy of solutions to try and improve our planet’s ailing health, reducing overall consumption takes the first place. Consuming responsibly and ethically manufactured products comes a distant second. While making responsible fashion choices does not seem as grand as driving an electric car or opting for solar panels, every act matters. While grand tasks are out of reach for many of us, the access to responsible consumer products is not. These products and brands are becoming increasingly popular by the day as more people are realizing the value of investing in more than aesthetics. There are many brands out there that manufacture high quality products and have their heart and ethics in the right place. A basic internet search will be a good starting point to learn about both mainstream and unconventional brands that are fast moving away from fast fashion’s practices. This is one fashion trend we must all try and keep pace with.
Here’s a pop quiz to sum it all up:
1. Water used to manufacture one basic cotton T shirt:
715 Gallons
2. Synthetic/plastic can end up in our oceans from one single wash of a garment:
1900 individual plastic fibres
TL; DR:
3. The industry that is second only to oil in terms of its environmental impact:
Textile industry
