Social media makes it easy to get distracted. The volume of posts being sent around our global online sources is beyond counting. We see people daily who sit (or even walk) while scrolling endlessly. Many of the stories are emotionally charged, but if you’ve seen one true crime video, you’ve seen the next week’s worth.
What I found while checking my video feed one day, however, blew my mind.
I saw a header about deodorants which warned that the video contained a list of deadly underarm products. In the past few years, I had been using what I figured was a safe product, because it was aluminum-free, so I was curious to see if it was on the list of products which were tested and proven. I took a few minutes of my time to watch.
My brand was on the naughty list. On the recommendation of the video, I switched brands and am happier with what I’m using now. It doesn’t slide onto my skin with slippery agents, but it also applies easily and lasts longer and better than before. It’s also composed of safer ingredients than the brand I had thought had a history of safety. Instead, my new/old school choice was reformulated to increase the possibility of cancer. Who knew?
It seems many of our products have become victimized by corporate cost-cutting, in a manner similar to how our healthcare needs are now settled in a boardroom instead of at a dying person’s bedside. The FDA apparently doesn’t regulate in the manner we would expect, so many products banned elsewhere in the world are liberally used in things we buy, and with little study or oversight. Often the result is neither, but those in charge simply look the other way.
We are a country of misguided consumers, and folks in suits and ludicrously expensive homes and vehicles are printing up the signage.
What becomes a piece of merchandise for health purposes may have been created in a laboratory rather than a kitchen. That oat-based moisturizer you slather on your skin, thinking it’s a healthy product, is actually a small (as in single) percent oats and the rest chemical compounds and scents to mask their odor. Imagine putting a derivative of crude oil on your skin to add moisture. It doesn’t do the job and, in fact, the product blocks your pores and does nothing to nourish skin. Some of the additives, the video revealed, are too large to be absorbed into pores, so your skin remains dry and needs more product. Which pays the manufacturers more money.
Since that day of revelation, I’ve watched a few more videos. The narrative can be uneven, and the soundtrack repetitive, but the information appears to be well-researched and is based on actual studies. It also mentions past court cases in which the companies responsible needed to pay huge settlements for deceptive practices. A big one is Johnson & Johnson’s talc lawsuit for the use of asbestos in their talcum powder. Their baby products also contain chemical derivatives. The companies destroy our trust while still making money from labels they are apparently under no obligation to alter. When you look at the labels of the products you use, what do they tell you? Look on the back instead. Read the ingredient list.
Videos of this nature–the creator of this series, which I feel safe to recommend, is called Dishclosure and appears on YouTube–show up right next to the Karen in the wild stories and cute cat clips, and seek to bring some reality to an otherwise sugar-coated fantasyland of society’s foibles being beamed on a small screen into our subconscious.
If we learn how we are being taken advantage of by big-name companies, we might be able to save our skins. Literally.
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