Green Lipstick?Making sense of natural bath-and-beauty products.
Posted Tuesday, Feb. 24, 2009, at 10:38 AM ET
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StumbleUponYou also have to realize that most of these labeling efforts stem from consumers' anxieties about the perceived health risks of artificial ingredients—not necessarily their concerns about big-picture eco-issues, such as sustainability or water safety. If cutting down on tongue-twisting chemicals makes you feel healthier, more power to you. (You can begin your research with the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, though the Green Lantern suspects this activist organization overstates the danger of certain commonly used chemicals.) But when it comes to the health of the planet, plant-based products aren't necessarily the better choice. To give just one example, Unilever, the maker of Dove soap, was recently lambasted by Greenpeace for its reliance on unsustainably farmed (though certifiably natural) palm oil.
As a rule of thumb, though, products that bear the above-mentioned labels will generally be greener than conventional drugstore choices. These programs are, at the very least, making gestures—if often frustratingly vague ones—toward sustainability. The USDA, NFS, and OASIS logos all promote organic agriculture, which is generally more sustainable than conventional farming. The Natural Products Association, in turn, stresses that ingredients should come from "a renewable resource" and that "companies should strive to maximize their use of recyclable and post-consumer recycled content in packaging." Whole Foods claims its Premium Body Care products are "sourced and manufactured with respect for the environment" and designed to have "minimal eco-impact after use." You have to trust that the programs are actually following up on these recommendations, but at least they're stressing their importance.
Ultimately, making green beauty choices involves doing a little research before you head to the drugstore. But there are a few things you can do in those final minutes. Reduce your impact immediately by choosing products that come with minimal packaging, made from recyclable and post-consumer recycled content. (The average American woman uses a dozen beauty products a day—just think about all the shrink wrappers and plastic casings swaddling those soaps, lotions, creams, and powders.) Learn to love the refillable compact. Swap out your bottle of liquid body cleanser—particularly if it's made of plastic that's not the easily recyclable types No. 1 or No. 2—in favor of simply packaged bar soap. Try to steer clear, too, of products with triclosan and trichlorocarbon, two antibacterial agents found in soaps and deodorants. Scientists are only beginning to study the effects of pharmaceuticals and personal-care products in our water, and though the environmental and health consequences of these trace chemicals are largely unknown, triclosan and trichlorocarbon have been singled out for special attention.
Of course, you can always follow the green golden rule, by cutting down on your cosmetic consumption in the first place. Think carefully about whether you really need separate creams for your eyelids, cheeks, and neck or six different pots of brown eye shadow, half of which you'll throw away before finishing. You'll not only save the planet, but you'll also have the added benefit of less goop at the bottom of your purse.
Is there an environmental quandary that's been keeping you up at night? Send it to , and check this space every Tuesday.
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Nina Rastogi levels a serious, and uninformed, charge in her column that the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics is "overstating the science." It seems that Nina might have fallen prey to the same deliberate disinformation from the chemical industry that has us all wondering how much we can trust products on the market, and the regulatory agencies that are supposed to protect us. The strategy, first developed by the tobacco industry and now employing some of the same people who worked on that, is to exploit the doubt that accompanies all scientific inquiry. The billion-dollar PR machine to mislead the public is so rampant that there is a Congressional investigation into one communications firm, the Weinberg Group, which was hired by the American Chemistry Council to possibly mislead the public about bisphenol A. Meanwhile, the Personal Care Products Council spends millions lobbying against regulations and trying to convince the public that it's OK for personal care products – even baby products – to contain known hazardous substances such as formaldehyde, 1,4 dioxane or lead. American companies can do better than this, and they need to do better. The science on these substances is solid, and consumers do not want to buy baby shampoo tainted with carcinogens, or lipstick laced with lead. The Campaign for Safe Cosmetics encourages consumers to check out our Web site, as well as all sources you can find, to learn more about the health risks of certain chemicals used in personal care products, and the availability of safer alternatives.--- Stacy Malkan, Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, Author of "Not Just a Pretty Face: The Ugly Side of the Beauty Industry" (New Society, 2007).
-- stacymalkan
I'm glad you brought up the "doubt that accompanies all scientific inquiry," and the fact that commercial interests often exploit that uncertainty to squelch efforts at sensible regulation. Anyone who wants to know more about that topic should indeed click through your link, and read the excellent book by David Michaels. (Warning: It ain't beach reading.)
But I do think it's important to point out that the manufacturers aren't the only ones who can exploit doubt and uncertainty. Activist organizations are just as adept at what has now become a standard rhetorical gesture in the public sphere. Take the folks at the Discovery Institute, for example, who are using "Intelligent Design" theory to cast doubt upon the theory of evolution. There's no discernible commerical interest lurking behind their Christian evangelical message. Nevertheless, they have methodically emphasized every piddling inconsistency in the fossil record, and all the necessary tweaks and recalibrations we've made to Darwin's original idea.
Similarly, those dedicated greens with an evangelical bent have begun to cast skepticism and doubt from the ramparts of consumer activism: Your campaign's database of cosmetic products is just as willing to play the uncertainty game as the billion-dollar PR machine you despise.
To take just one small example: Punch into your database the name of almost any conventional shampoo, and you'll turn up a frightening "hazard" rating, and the insinuation that anyone who uses this product may be subjecting themselves to "neurotoxins," "organ system toxicity," and cancer. But a closer look reveals that most horrifying ingredient in that shampoo—the one that earns a red-highlighted, super-deadly hazard score of 8—is "fragrance". What makes "fragrance" so dangerous? Its actual chemical constituents are unknown, and some users may be allergic to it.
It's fine to point out that our labeling laws are insufficient-- and that companies can include any number of chemicals under a generic term like "fragrance." But I'd call it grossly alarmist and irresponsible to let consumers believe that the fragrance in Head and Shoulders shampoo is likely to cause organ failure, brain death, or cancer. Have there been any documented cases of death by dandruff shampoo? If Head and Shoulders is making people sick, what kind of mortality rates are we talking about? If one in 10,000 users develops some kind of mild allergy, does that make the shampoo a "highly-hazardous" product? Or is Head and Shoulders no more a "toxin" than peanuts, milk, cochineal, or any other all-natural, organic product that produces adverse reactions in certain, unfortunate users?
I bring this up only to point out that doubt cuts both ways—and activist groups have proven extremely adept at manipulating doubt to promote their own broad, policy goals. I'm sure Procter & Gamble would like us to take the "data gap" on their ingredients as evidence that everything is perfectly safe. But your Website invites us to see the same uncertainty as evidence that everything is harmful and toxic. That's the message of the bright-red "hazard scores," I'm afraid. And the frightened, naval-gazing mentality that it creates—sociologist Andrew Szasz has called it "reverse quarantine"—strikes me as regressive and counterproductive when it comes to public health.
-- engber
Slate editor Daniel Engber
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