Cosmetic Ingredients

If there is no other motivation to stop using conventional cosmetics, the health risks posed by their ingredients should be. Cosmetic ingredients are not required to be tested for safety and many if not most are not assessed at all for risks to our health. Cosmetic companies will tell you that even if there is some evidence of potentially harmful effects of ingredients used in their products, they are used in such low concentrations that they aren’t a problem. But the average woman uses between 9-17 beauty products on her face, body, hair, etc. each day! So you are getting several applications of these ingredients every single day. Our bodies absorb these chemicals and since our systems have trouble flushing these synthetics out, we store them in our bodies and they wreak havoc on us over time. Below I have listed just a few common ingredients that show up in many cosmetic items like foundations, powders, eyeshadows, liners, mascara, cheek color and lip color. But of course there are countless others that are equally scary. If you want to look up ingredients or specific products to see their safety ratings and details, go to http://www.cosmeticsdatabase.com/index.php . This website is amazing and so informative. It is the source for the info below and a crucial resource to public health and safety education at this point because the companies making the products aren’t going to tell you this stuff.

Talc- potential carcinogen and a known respiratory toxicant, not tested by industry panel for safety in cosmetic use, some lab tests resulted in skin irritation, possibility of contamination with asbestiform fibers (extremely carcinogenic)

Mineral oil- possible human immune toxicant and potentially cancerous, low to moderate doses in some lab tests resulted in sense organ effects and skin irritation, not assessed for safety in cosmetics by industry panel

Parabens (methylparaben is most common)- Human skin toxicant, one or more lab tests showed organ system effects, positive mutation in mammalian cells in vitro, weak endocrine disruption, brain and nervous system effects, skin irritation, and gene expression interference

Ferric ferrocyanide-Known human respiratory toxicant, one or more lab tests resulted in brain and nervous system effects at moderate doses

BHT-human immune system and skin toxicant, one or more lab studies using low doses show endocrine system disruption, brain and nervous system effects, and skin irritation, reproductive system effects at high doses, and one or more in vitro tests on mammalian cells show positive mutation results

Silica- (finely ground as in loose or pressed powdered products that could be inhaled)- Strong evidence of dust being an immune system toxicant, cancer risk, respiratory toxicant, musculoskeletal, cardiovascular and renal toxicant, and bioaccumulative in wildlife and humans

“Lake” colors (various pigments used for color)- Strong evidence of human neurotoxicity and nervous system toxicity, and one or more in vitro tests non-mammalian cells show positive mutation results.

It is possible to wear makeup (if you want to) without using dangerous ingredients. There are a few companies that are making truly safe cosmetics. That’s the next post.

Cosmetics

Feeling like we need to wear makeup, like we don't look good without it, is a horrible feeling. And it's a feeling that is instilled in us so that we will spend our money trying to feel better. I commend and envy all the women out there who feel great without wearing makeup and choose not to. I wish I could say I was one of these women, but I'm not...yet. It's definitely a goal of mine and I'm getting there. When I was in my teens I felt uncomfortable leaving the house without using what added up to be 8 or 9 cosmetic products. I have since learned to appreciate the way I look with a minimal amount (a little powder and bronzer and a sweep of mascara) and that's a big achievement for me! And it literally took just scaling it down over time and learning to accept what my face actually looks like, and disregarding the fact that I seemed out of place in some beauty companies that valued fully made up faces walking around the office. Both of those things were really unpleasant at first. I hope to get to the point where I feel great with a totally bare face, but I'm still self-conscious enough that it needs to be a gradual process. I know that a lot of women feel the same way and wish they felt better about what their faces look like without all the paints and powders and all the time and money these entail.

So the next several posts will be devoted to 1) why most cosmetics are actually bad for our health, 2) some companies that are trying to make healthier makeup (while we still wear it), and 3) things we can do to look and feel amazing without makeup.

The next post will be full of scary info about why cosmetics are physically bad for our health. But almost more important are the effects that they have on us mentally and emotionally. We should never feel inadequate or unattractive or embarrassed by our real faces, but many of us do. And this is not our fault. Our society has raised woman to believe that our job is to be beautiful and attractive to men at all costs starting from very young. This is ultimately so that a bit later on we can be sure to fulfill our true role in life: to get married and have children and keep husbands happy. And if our looks are lacking compared to made-up, airbrushed, photoshopped, surgically altered, perfectly lit models, actresses, and pornstars, then we could lose all that, and that is supposed to terrify us. On top of that, it forces us to constantly compare ourselves to the competition, other women. So we have been taught to obsess over our looks rather than focus on living the lives we really want for ourselves; and this all helps jeopardize our ability to have a totally healthy perspective of and relationships with other women-our true allies.

And if the psychological issues resulting from the motivations of the cosmetic industry aren’t bad enough, the dangers of the ingredients to our health are…