#Responsible consumption and production practices

[greenthestral]

Unlocking a Sustainable Future: Embracing Responsible Consumption and Production

In a world marked by growing environmental concerns and resource depletion, the need for responsible consumption and production practices has become more critical than ever. Goal 12 of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) aims to promote sustainable lifestyles, ensure sustainable consumption patterns, and foster efficient use of resources. By adopting responsible consumption and production practices, we can pave the way for a brighter, more sustainable future. In this article, we will explore the significance of Goal 12 and delve into actionable steps individuals and businesses can take to contribute to responsible consumption and production.

The Urgency of Responsible Consumption and Production

The urgent need to address unsustainable patterns of consumption and production cannot be overstated. Goal 12 of the United Nations Sustainable Development Goals recognizes the detrimental impact of these patterns on our planet and its finite resources. The current levels of consumption, driven by excessive production and wasteful practices, are placing immense strain on our ecosystems and threatening the delicate balance of our natural world.

One of the primary consequences of unsustainable consumption and production is rampant deforestation. Forests, which are crucial for carbon sequestration, biodiversity conservation, and climate regulation, are being cleared at alarming rates to make way for agriculture, logging, and urbanization. This loss of forest cover not only disrupts ecosystems but also contributes to climate change, as trees act as natural carbon sinks.

In addition to deforestation, unsustainable consumption and production practices result in widespread pollution. From industrial emissions to improper waste management, pollution takes various forms and poses significant risks to human health and the environment. Air pollution, for example, caused by the burning of fossil fuels and industrial processes, contributes to respiratory diseases and climate change. Water pollution, caused by improper disposal of industrial and domestic waste, not only affects aquatic ecosystems but also jeopardizes the availability of clean drinking water.

Perhaps the most pressing consequence of unsustainable consumption and production is climate change. The excessive burning of fossil fuels for energy, transportation, and industrial processes releases greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, trapping heat and leading to global warming. This rise in temperatures has far-reaching effects, including extreme weather events, sea-level rise, and the disruption of ecosystems. The impacts of climate change are felt worldwide, exacerbating poverty, inequality, and food and water insecurity.

To address these formidable challenges, responsible consumption and production practices are crucial. It requires a fundamental shift in our mindset and behaviors, as well as the implementation of sustainable policies and practices at all levels of society.

Rethinking our consumption patterns is an essential first step. This involves questioning our needs versus wants and making conscious choices that prioritize sustainability. It means opting for products that are produced ethically and sustainably, considering their environmental and social impact. It also means embracing minimalism and reducing our overall consumption levels, avoiding unnecessary waste and excess.

Another key aspect of responsible consumption and production is waste reduction. The concept of the three Rs—reduce, reuse, and recycle—lies at the heart of waste management. By reducing the amount of waste we generate, reusing items instead of discarding them, and promoting recycling of materials, we can significantly minimize our environmental footprint. Composting organic waste is another effective way to reduce landfill waste while enriching the soil with valuable nutrients.

Promoting sustainable production processes is equally crucial. Businesses and industries play a pivotal role in adopting sustainable practices that minimize resource consumption, reduce emissions, and prioritize the well-being of workers and communities. This involves embracing technologies and practices that enhance energy efficiency, use renewable energy sources, and optimize resource use. It also requires the implementation of circular economy principles, where products are designed to be durable, repairable, and recyclable, ensuring a closed-loop system that reduces waste generation.

Furthermore, responsible consumption and production practices require education and awareness. Empowering individuals with knowledge about the environmental and social consequences of their choices can inspire behavioral change. By integrating sustainability education into school curricula, raising public awareness through campaigns, and fostering dialogue and knowledge-sharing platforms, we can create a culture of sustainability that permeates all aspects of society.

Responsible consumption and production are imperative for addressing the unsustainable patterns that endanger our planet and its resources. By reevaluating our consumption habits, reducing waste, and promoting sustainable production processes, we can mitigate the adverse effects of deforestation, pollution, and climate change. It is through collective action, involving individuals, businesses, and governments, that we can pave the way for a more sustainable and resilient future. The urgency of the situation demands that we embrace responsible consumption and production practices today to secure a thriving planet for future generations.

The Principles of Responsible Consumption and Production

Responsible consumption and production is guided by several key principles. These principles serve as a roadmap for individuals, businesses, and governments to adopt sustainable practices:

Reduce, Reuse, Recycle: The mantra of the three Rs is a cornerstone of responsible consumption. By reducing our consumption, reusing items, and recycling materials, we can minimize waste and conserve resources.

Sustainable Supply Chains: Embracing sustainable supply chains ensures that products are sourced, produced, and distributed in an environmentally and socially responsible manner. This involves reducing carbon emissions, using renewable energy sources, and promoting fair labor practices.

Life Cycle Thinking: Adopting a life cycle approach involves considering the environmental impact of a product or service throughout its entire life cycle, from raw material extraction to disposal. By making informed choices based on life cycle assessments, we can make more sustainable decisions.

Education and Awareness: Promoting education and awareness about responsible consumption and production is crucial. By empowering individuals with knowledge about the impact of their choices, we can foster a culture of sustainability and inspire positive change.

Actions for Individuals

Responsible consumption and production is not solely the responsibility of governments and businesses. Individuals also play a pivotal role in driving positive change. Here are some actions individuals can take to contribute to Goal 12:

Mindful Consumption: Think critically about your purchases. Consider the environmental and social impact of products before making a buying decision. Choose sustainably sourced, ethically produced goods whenever possible.

Reduce Waste: Embrace the principles of the three Rs: reduce, reuse, and recycle. Minimize single-use items, opt for reusable alternatives, and separate recyclable materials. Composting organic waste is another effective way to reduce landfill waste.

Energy Conservation: Conserve energy in your daily life by turning off lights when not in use, using energy-efficient appliances, and reducing unnecessary energy consumption. Switching to renewable energy sources at home can also make a significant difference.

Spread Awareness: Share your knowledge about responsible consumption and production with family, friends, and your community. Engage in discussions, organize workshops, or participate in local sustainability initiatives to raise awareness and inspire others.

Actions for Businesses

Businesses have a significant role to play in achieving Goal 12. By integrating responsible consumption and production practices into their operations, they can drive positive change on a larger scale. Here are some actions businesses can take:

Sustainable Sourcing: Evaluate and monitor supply chains to ensure responsible sourcing of raw materials. Give preference to suppliers that follow sustainable practices and adhere to ethical labor standards.

Circular Economy: Embrace the principles of a circular economy by designing products that can be easily repaired, refurbished, or recycled. Encourage product stewardship and take responsibility for the entire lifecycle of your products.

Energy Efficiency: Implement energy-efficient measures within your operations, such as optimizing manufacturing processes, using energy-efficient machinery, and investing in renewable energy sources. Reduce waste generation and promote recycling within your facilities.

Stakeholder Engagement: Engage with stakeholders, including customers, employees, and local communities, to foster a shared commitment to responsible consumption and production. Collaborate with industry peers, NGOs, and governments to drive collective action.

Government and Policy Initiatives

Governments have a crucial role in creating an enabling environment for responsible consumption and production. They can facilitate change through the implementation of policies, regulations, and incentives. Here are some key government actions:

Policy Frameworks: Develop comprehensive policy frameworks that encourage responsible consumption and production practices. Establish regulations that promote sustainable resource management, waste reduction, and circular economy principles.

Economic Incentives: Provide financial incentives and support to businesses that adopt sustainable practices. This can include tax breaks, grants, and subsidies to promote green innovation and investments in sustainable technologies.

Education and Awareness: Incorporate sustainability education into school curricula and develop public awareness campaigns to educate citizens about responsible consumption and production. Foster partnerships with educational institutions, NGOs, and industry experts to promote knowledge-sharing.

Collaboration: Foster international collaboration and partnerships to address global sustainability challenges. Engage in multilateral initiatives, such as the UN's Sustainable Development Goals, to exchange best practices and promote collective action.

Conclusion

Achieving Goal 12 of responsible consumption and production is crucial for building a sustainable future for generations to come. By adopting the principles of reduce, reuse, and recycle, promoting sustainable supply chains, embracing life cycle thinking, and raising awareness, individuals, businesses, and governments can contribute to a more sustainable and equitable world. Together, we have the power to unlock a future where responsible consumption and production are the norm, ensuring a thriving planet for future generations. Let us embark on this transformative journey today.

[reasonsforhope]

It’s an open secret in fashion. Unsold inventory goes to the incinerator; excess handbags are slashed so they can’t be resold; perfectly usable products are sent to the landfill to avoid discounts and flash sales. The European Union wants to put an end to these unsustainable practices. On Monday, [December 4, 2023], it banned the destruction of unsold textiles and footwear.

“It is time to end the model of ‘take, make, dispose’ that is so harmful to our planet, our health and our economy,” MEP Alessandra Moretti said in a statement. “Banning the destruction of unsold textiles and footwear will contribute to a shift in the way fast fashion manufacturers produce their goods.”

This comes as part of a broader push to tighten sustainable fashion legislation, with new policies around ecodesign, greenwashing and textile waste phasing in over the next few years. The ban on destroying unsold goods will be among the longer lead times: large businesses have two years to comply, and SMEs have been granted up to six years. It’s not yet clear on whether the ban applies to companies headquartered in the EU, or any that operate there, as well as how this ban might impact regions outside of Europe.

For many, this is a welcome decision that indirectly tackles the controversial topics of overproduction and degrowth. Policymakers may not be directly telling brands to produce less, or placing limits on how many units they can make each year, but they are penalising those overproducing, which is a step in the right direction, says Eco-Age sustainability consultant Philippa Grogan. “This has been a dirty secret of the fashion industry for so long. The ban won’t end overproduction on its own, but hopefully it will compel brands to be better organised, more responsible and less greedy.”

Clarifications to come

There are some kinks to iron out, says Scott Lipinski, CEO of Fashion Council Germany and the European Fashion Alliance (EFA). The EFA is calling on the EU to clarify what it means by both “unsold goods” and “destruction”. Unsold goods, to the EFA, mean they are fit for consumption or sale (excluding counterfeits, samples or prototypes)...

The question of what happens to these unsold goods if they are not destroyed is yet to be answered. “Will they be shipped around the world? Will they be reused as deadstock or shredded and downcycled? Will outlet stores have an abundance of stock to sell?” asks Grogan.

Large companies will also have to disclose how many unsold consumer products they discard each year and why, a rule the EU is hoping will curb overproduction and destruction...

Could this shift supply chains?

For Dio Kurazawa, founder of sustainable fashion consultancy The Bear Scouts, this is an opportunity for brands to increase supply chain agility and wean themselves off the wholesale model so many rely on. “This is the time to get behind innovations like pre-order and on-demand manufacturing,” he says. “It’s a chance for brands to play with AI to understand the future of forecasting. Technology can help brands be more intentional with what they make, so they have less unsold goods in the first place.”

Grogan is equally optimistic about what this could mean for sustainable fashion in general. “It’s great to see that this is more ambitious than the EU’s original proposal and that it specifically calls out textiles. It demonstrates a willingness from policymakers to create a more robust system,” she says. “Banning the destruction of unsold goods might make brands rethink their production models and possibly better forecast their collections.”

One of the outstanding questions is over enforcement. Time and again, brands have used the lack of supply chain transparency in fashion as an excuse for bad behaviour. Part of the challenge with the EU’s new ban will be proving that brands are destroying unsold goods, not to mention how they’re doing it and to what extent, says Kurazawa. “Someone obviously knows what is happening and where, but will the EU?”"

-via British Vogue, December 7, 2023

[mountainsandmayhem]

BDSMaid - Chapter 3

Pairing: Millionaire!Joel Miller x Female!Reader

Rating: E, 18+, Minors dni

Series Summary: After recently graduating from university, your best friend offers you a job cleaning luxury homes for clients you’ll never know. It’s only temporary and a good way to save money for when you go back to get your law degree. That’s what you’re promised at least. Easy. Simple. Mundane. That is, until one of your clients is home and everything that you felt was missing in your life starts to fall into place. This goes against the NDA you signed and you could get fired. Or worse, you could fall in love.

Chapter Summary: You decide it's time to put yourself on Joel's radar.

CW: Age gap (Joel 45, Reader 22), dual POV. Specific warnings in small red below the cut, do not read to avoid spoilers.

WC: 10k. Sorry, grab a snack!

AN: I'm continuously surprised by the love, excitement and joy that this story brings anyone but me. That probably doesn't even make sense, I'm just lost for words, tbh. Forehead kisses to @mermaidgirl30, @littlevenicebitch69, @joelmillerisapunk, and @milla-frenchy for screaming with me or pre reading this for me. @lotusbxtch gets a forehead kiss and a tip of the nose kiss for deep dive beta reading this, she's solely responsible for every semi colon.

Series Masterlist || My Masterist

I no longer have a tag list, please follow @mountainsandmayhem-updates to be alerted for future chapters.

Content Warnings: Flirty, alcohol consumption, mentions of sexual acts, kissing, mutual pining, reader being pinned against a wall, sexual tension, touching. Reader does have some description so may be considered more of an OFC.

The week after Joel removed you from his club goes by in a well-scheduled blur. You work your usual three days, cleaning mansions of people who don’t tip as well as Mister Miller. You pour yourself over LSAT study guides, practicing insane logic questions. You enjoy a coffee date with Jamie who asks you what happened the night at the poker game. You tell her a practiced lie that feels like acid on your tongue as it leaves your lips. You hate lying to your friends, especially her. You can feel that lie sitting heavily on the top of your stomach the entire time you’re with her, but you simply cannot afford to get fired with three years of law school on the horizon. You spend an evening with your roommate, Odette, watching Netflix and eating dumplings from her favourite spot, the only spot in Austin that has those little white paper boxes with the red writing. 

If you decide not to lie to yourself, on top of everyone else, you also spend at least an hour a day watching videos of women tied up and dominated, thinking of Joel goddamn Miller the entire time. Since learning his full name, and the name of his club, the Google searches you swore you’d stop doing have been much more productive. You’ve found multiple blogs and Reddit posts, not just about kink, but also about Joel. It turns out that he’s well-known in the kink and BDSM communities around the world, but is essentially changing the face of kink in Austin. 

One night, you get lost in a Reddit wormhole of women in Texas, and one in Paris, who have been a submissive for a man that sounds a lot like Joel. They don’t actually mention him by name but there’s advice on what he likes and doesn’t like, and how he never actually has sex with any of his submissives. It also sounds like some of these women pay him to be their dom, and, based on the conversations in the comments of one thread, it seems like he has a few submissives at the moment, and majority of their interactions happen at the club. 

 The club. Fuck, Jamie wasn’t kidding when she said JMK was exclusive. Anyone can join, assuming you can pay the yearly membership fees that, according to Reddit, are around $80,000 per year. From the minimal, cryptic information you find, Joel Miller is the main owner and he has two business partners. One you assume is his brother that you served the other night, but the third you are unable to find any information about. 

Since everything you find online is up to interpretation, it’s hard to say what is and isn’t true. According to one disgruntled poster, once you become a member at JMKink, there are a lot of rules to follow. Everyone has to get tested monthly; it’s highly recommended that women are on birth control; and even if you’re married to the guest you bring, men must wear condoms. You can’t just bring anyone in with you: every member and their guest has an app, and the only way to get that app is from a QR code and an assigned activation code. According to another poster, the app is full of waivers and consent forms. You can’t stop the shy smile that crosses your face when you remember how concerned Joel was with your consent the first time you met. 

The Monday before your usual every-other-Tuesday shift at Joel’s, you find a blog post about becoming a submissive, and it’s like it was written just for you. The writer explains how she had a hard time shutting off her brain and how, by the end of the day, she was so exhausted from making decisions that all she wanted was someone to tell her what to do for once. This led to her and her husband exploring a sub/dom partnership. Now, she feels lighter and freer; they’ve both discovered new ways to get pleasure outside of the idea of sex that society feeds us. Being a submissive isn’t always about orgasms or pleasure; it’s helped her build confidence, and she’s found that as they progress, that little voice that tells her she isn't good enough has stopped being so loud. 

After reading through the post a few times, you shut your rose gold laptop and stare at the wall behind your desk. You feel seen, heard even though you didn’t speak. At first, you found yourself feeling ashamed of getting off to these videos, like there was something wrong with you for being turned on by it, but it’s really that ability to let go of control that you crave, the feeling of someone else making the decisions for once. You want that, but more so, you think you need that, and badly.

As a firm believer of ‘everything happens for a reason,’ it all comes together for you. You aren’t even nervous as the thought consumes you. If Joel shows up at his house, tomorrow I’m going to ask him to teach me. 

On Tuesday, you do as you always do, following Joel’s instructions to a tee while listening to a podcast. However, today you only wear one AirPod in hopes of hearing that familiar and comforting engine rev that signals him either coming or going. Every creak or pop of the house causes your heart to flutter, but it’s never him. Much to your chagrin, Joel doesn’t come home. 

Inside the envelope is that expensive matte black paper again, ‘Thanks -JM’ neatly written along it. 

Great, you think to yourself sarcastically, we are on initial terms again. 

Twelve hundred dollars is tucked into the envelope this time, you roll your eyes after thumbing the crisp green bills. The first tip you ever got from him felt sincere, but after walking in on him, and everything since then, it’s feeling more and more like apology money. You shouldn’t complain; people would kill to make this kind of money, but everything would be so much easier if he’d just fucking talk to you.

Your fingers run along the thick, rich paper that he uses as company letterhead. You can’t explain it, but the paper feels like Joel. It’s rough and thick, yet has a vulnerability to it, like you could easily destroy it with just a pinch of your fingers and a flick of your wrist. Your mind flashes back to his club the other night. He was literally begging you to leave, you can still hear it, the pleading in his voice as he said, “I’m sorry. I just can’t have you here, this is on me”. Your fingers trail across the golden ink of his neat handwriting and then open the paper the rest of the way. At the very bottom of the page, in shiny black print similar to the JMK logo at the top, is a phone number. Your heart slams against your ribcage as your eyes scan across the numbers.

  When you get home, you unfold the note on your kitchen counter and pace the three or four steps it takes to walk the length of your small kitchen, never taking your eyes off the paper, looking at it like it’s a live bomb or like it’s going to disappear if you let it out of your sight. This is it: you could call the office, make an appointment or something. You’d probably have to lie, but you just need to see him; you need to make a case for yourself. Your stomach lurches, throat tightening at the thought of being in the club with him again. You open the freezer and grab the bottle of tequila, taking a big swig right from the bottle. It’s a cold burn and you clench your eyes as you swallow it down. Your body shivers involuntarily.  

You dial before you can talk yourself out of it and before you know it you have an appointment under a fake name to speak to Joel tomorrow afternoon before your study group meets. You take two more large gulps of tequila after hanging up the phone. 

Fuck, this is really happening. You take another large sip of the frozen tequila for good measure, your nose scrunching up at the taste. 

Joel’s office isn’t attached to the club, it’s in a smaller building across the street and that has seemed to tamp some of the nerves that are vibrating your very core. Still, you can stop from nervously smoothing the wrinkles that have formed on the short, flowing skirt of your white sundress as you sit on the red velvet couch across from Joel’s receptionist. She is a small woman with a chin length bob, she’s probably in her late fifties and you wonder if her kids or grandkids know that she works for the owner of a kink club, or maybe she’s part of the community too. You’ve done copious amounts of research; kink isn’t just for young people, and you suppose Joel isn’t exactly young either. For all you know, she very well could be a dominatrix in her spare time. 

She says your fake name in a soothing tone as she stands and walks towards the tall black door, pulling it open effortlessly. “Go on in, sweetheart. Joel’s ready for you.”

You smile at her sweetly, tucking your hair behind your ear nervously as you walk over the threshold to try to convince the millionaire whose home you clean to dominate you. The air in his large, bright office feels heavy and thick. Blood rushes through your ears as he looks up at you from his seat. He slips off his 1950’s style black horn rimmed glasses and places them on his desk. A muscle in his jaw ticks as he assesses you. Your heart lurches, knees trembling as you take a few nervous steps towards his desk. As his eyes meet yours you feel it again, that exposed and naked feeling that only his gaze seems to be able to cast. Maybe you shouldn’t have worn such a short dress, but it’s an unseasonably warm March day and even before leaving your apartment you were sweating in a mix of nervousness and excitement. 

You see his lips move, but you can’t hear him over the pounding of your heart. You stop just past the door, then hear it click shut behind you. Joel’s silky lips move again and this time you hear your name followed by a calm, “What’re you doin’ here?”

The words come out before you even think about them, you practically yell them at him, “I want you to teach me.”

His hand waves to the chairs across his desk. When you don’t move he harshly says, “Sit.”

You rush across his expansive office, the plush carpet feels luxurious under your shoes. When you reach the black leather chair you sit on the very edge of the seat, your knee nervously bouncing up and down in time with your heart.

“You want me to do what?” He asks hesitantly, leaning forward in his chair. He looks absolutely beautiful in the late afternoon sun - orange hues reflecting off his tanned skin, the few greys along his temples glistening like the moon on the ocean. He’s in a black dress shirt again, his sleeves rolled to his elbows. You noticed today that he’s wearing a black watch and a gold ring on his right ring finger. Between his accessories and the veins that line his toned forearms your mouth goes dry.

“I - umm, I want you to teach me.”

The last word has barely passed your lips when he scoffs out, “No.”

Your face falls, “Joel, please. I’ve been doing research and I’ve decided that, well, that I want to be…that.”

He places his large palms on the desk, the square black diamond in his ring glittering in the sun, and pushes himself up. You crane your neck to look at him as he slips his hands into his pockets, his eyes already locked on yours. His intense eye contact wraps you up in a weighted blanket of safety and comfort, which is a dangerous and vulnerable place, a place that has the ability to rip you in half, much like you could do with that company letterhead he left you. He walks slowly to the other side of his desk. Once in front of you, he leans back onto it, keeping his hands in the pockets of his perfectly tailored black dress pants. 

“You can’t even say it.” He challenges. 

You furrow your brows, ready to confront him like you always seem to do. In the few interactions you’ve had with Joel, more often than not, it’s been him trying to tell you what to do, you fighting him over it, and then him ultimately winning. It’s infuriating, but not this time. No, this time you’re going to win. You have valid reasons to want this, and they’re all backed up by your research. You are leaving this office as his submissive. 

“I can too!” 

He shrugs his broad shoulders nonchalantly, “Say it then. You wanna learn how to do what, sweetheart?” 

You sit up tall on the edge of the chair, crossing your arms under your breasts, praying your cheeks don’t flush as you finally admit it out loud. “I want to learn how to be a submissive.”

“No.” One of his meaty hands comes out of his pocket, waving you off as he says it again.

“Please!” You plead, “I want to learn how to be a sub.” 

Joel actually squirms at the sound of you being so needy. He lets out a harsh ‘fuck’ under his breath and then whispers your name, “I can’t do this with you.”

Got him, you think to yourself, failing to fight the smirk as you lower your voice and sweetly beg, “Please, Mister Miller?” 

Joel ‘Your-Consent-is-Most-Important’ Miller is not a small man: his broad shoulders take up almost an entire door frame and he’s easily nearing six foot four, but at the sound of you calling him the one name he’s asked you not to, he moves faster than your brain can comprehend. You gasp as he lunges towards you, his hands landing on the arms of the chair, his wide shoulders pushing you back as he cages you in. Your exposed back hits the back of the chair, your short skirt riding up your thighs slightly. He is practically on top of you and for a second you can imagine that this is what having sex with him would look like. His knuckles blanch from gripping the arms of the chair so tightly, his eyes are practically black, and that familiar flush he gets when you challenge him paints his neck and cheeks.

His voice is deeper, thick with arousal, rattling your bones as he speaks slowly, “I said not to call me that. You can’t even…You can’t.” He shuts his eyes and takes a slow breath in through his nose. His tone softens as he opens his eyes, “No, I ain’t doin’ this with you, sweet girl.” 

You practically writhe in your chair. Sweet girl. He’s terrifying and commanding and so fucking beautiful like this. He obviously has a soft spot for when you beg, so you soften your eyes and stick out your velvety smooth bottom lip enticingly before whispering, “Please, Joel.” 

He lets out a groan as he pushes himself off the chair and walks towards the large wall of windows behind his desk, his hands resting on his tapered waist. He avoids your gaze as you sit up, squeezing your thighs together tightly to calm the need at your core. “Lemme set ya up with someone else. My brother Tommy. You were gettin’ him a drink at that poker game.”

“I remember,” you mumble, looking down at your hands like you always do when your lack of confidence gets the best of you. You can’t let that self-doubt creep in now, not when you’re this close. You look back towards his broad back. “But I really don’t want anyone else.”

“Why?” He spins towards you, the lighting behind him gives him an almost ethereal glow. There’s absolutely no denying it, Joel Miller is the most gorgeous man you’ve ever seen.

You tuck your hands under your legs, simply stating, “I trust you.”

“You don’t even know me. I could be a horrible guy.”

You let out a sad laugh, shaking your head at him. He’s right, you don’t know him, but you have a feeling about him and you consider yourself pretty good at reading people. “You’ve never given me reason to think I couldn’t trust you. Even that first day. You were so calm and apologetic.”

Joel presses his lips in a thin line, eyes raking over you. You subconsciously slip your bottom lip between your teeth, and a muscle in his jaw flexes. “How old are you?”

“Twenty two,” you immediately regret lying; the avenue of trust is of utmost importance between a submissive and their dominant, so you quickly add, “Almost, I turn twenty two on Friday.”

 “I can’t do this.” He croaks and you can’t help but feel a little bad. You’ve put him in an uncomfortable position and his voice sounds defeated. 

“Please. I always felt I needed more but,” you stand up and take a few slow steps in his direction. “But…I didn’t know what more was and I - I think it’s this.” You audibly swallow pleading, “Please. I need you to help me. I want you to help me. Teach me.” 

He holds his hands up and steps back as you inch closer. A silent call that signals you to stop or that he doesn’t trust himself, not here, not with you. “Jus’ let me set ya up with Tommy. You’re his type.” 

Your heart sinks and an acidic taste lines your tongue. Of course. You aren’t that tall, slender icy blonde girl he had strapped to his desk. No, you have curves, and stretch marks along your hips, your boobs are a B cup on a good day. He can get whatever woman he wants, why would it be you? You look down at your hands, pushing back the nonexistent cuticle on your right thumb. This nervous habit of yours used to drive your mom crazy, ‘you’re going to have no skin left soon’ she’d lecture, but you can’t help it. The immediate result of the nail bed looking clean and perfect is like a dopamine hit. It leaves you with a feeling of accomplishment. The problem is, the initial confidence you had about this decision on Monday night has dwindled and you’ve been so anxious about this meeting that every single finger has a nicely pushed back cuticle. 

It’s silent in the room for a while, you shut your eyes as you sheepishly ask,  “Am I not attractive enough for you?”

“No!” He says insistently and without hesitation. His hand runs through his beard, a faint scratching sound fills the room drawing your eyes open and away from the skin of your thumb. As they land back on him you wonder what his patchy facial hair would feel like between your legs or along the soft skin of your stomach as he kissed you. His voice softens, “That’s not it. I just - I’m sorry. I jus’ can’t do this, sweetheart.”

You feel your chance to become the woman you want to be slipping through your fingers. Your plan is failing and for once in your life you don’t have a Plan B, this is the only plan that makes sense to you. Sadness creeps into your throat, “Why?” 

“‘S not a good idea, sweet girl,” he answers, his soft brown sugar flecked eyes reaching out to yours. 

His face and voice seem to be at war with his words. He’s saying no, but there’s a sadness in his eyes and a caring undertone to his voice. You’re not sure how you know it, but him calling you sweet girl means something to him. “Because I’m not your type?”

He shakes his head, that same curl falling into his eyes as it did in his foyer the other day. “That’s the problem, you’re exactly my type.”

Hearing that you’re this beautiful man's type should feel like you’ve won the lottery, but the way his shoulders slump as he says it only builds that lump in your throat. As you swallow the sadness down, his eyes travel to your neck, watching as the muscles flex and relax with the motion. “I - then why?”

He lets out a long breath and as he walks to the door he says, “I ain’t havin’ this conversation. I said no. And someone who is cut out to be a submissive would just take that answer for what it is.” 

“You’ve made it clear that I’m not a submissive,” you counter and walk towards the door. He cracks the door open and you step in close to him, unconsciously taking in his leather and ash scent before adding, “Have a nice night, Mister Miller.” 

Joel

The door feels like a feather behind his hand as he slams it shut - your body, warm and already vibrating, trapped between him and the solid piece of wood that separates the two of you from his receptionist. He made himself a promise in his rear view mirror the other week; he had to cut this off, create distance. He needed you to be just his house cleaner. Because everytime he looks into your eyes he feels the same way he felt at seventeen when he met Tiffany in that garage. Everything about you oozes sweetness and innocence, his sweetheart, his sweet girl. He didn’t think he was capable of feeling that way again. And he definitely should not feel this way for someone who is younger than his own daughter.

His large frame looms behind you, forcing your chest and forehead to rest against the door. He uses his foot to spread your legs wide. A breathy gasp passes your lips as your hands scramble for purchase against the wood grain of the door. He keeps pushing your legs apart, wide enough for your short white skirt to ride up your creamy thighs. Thighs he’s imagined wrapped tightly around his head as he makes you scream. 

Joel takes a small step forward, caging you completely, making it so you’re completely at his mercy. He can smell the sweet scent of your arousal growing between your thighs; he knows if he reaches a calloused finger to the gusset of your panties they’d be soaked through. His cock is hard as steel, pressing against the zipper of his pants and the small of your back. You’re practically panting and he fights to keep his breathing steady when really he wants to mirror the quick, uneven pace of your breath. This is much more serious and intimate than when he had you trapped in the chair. This is dangerous. This could lead to more.   

His strong fingers wrap around your dainty wrists. He loves the way you don’t fight him as he pulls them above your head, gathering both your wrists in one of his hands, pinning them to the door roughly. His free hand draws a slow line down your arm, then along the sensitive skin of your neck, and down your spine. Goosebumps break out over your skin and you instinctively arch your back into him, a desperate whine passes from your lips between laboured breaths, and that sound nearly buckles his knees.  

His lips come to the shell of your ear, his beard tickling you as he speaks in a slow and commanding tone. “Do you feel what you do to me when you call me that. I’ve asked you not to. Multiple times.”

Your mint and lavender scented shampoo fills his nose as he nudges at you to tilt open your throat to him. He revels in how easily you oblige, cocking your head to the side like the good little girl he knows you are. He continues, lips just a hair away from your pulse point; he’s sure if he pressed his lips to it he’d feel how hard your heart is racing. “But I don’t want you to stop. In fact, I fucking love that you haven’t stopped.” 

Your soft skin is warm against his rough fingers as they continue their trail down your body, running over the firm globe of one of your ass cheeks. He sucks his bottom lip between his teeth and bites down hard, distracting himself from the urge to spank you for calling him Mister Miller yet again. Finally, his fingers find a home on one of your thighs. He brushes lightly against your soft inner thighs, small little touches jumping from one leg to the other. The little involuntary twitches of your body and the needy little gasps of air you suck through your teeth has his cock straining painfully against his zipper. He’s aching for you in a way he hasn’t felt for years. 

“You infuriate me with your insubordination and it makes me weak,” he mutters. “Makes me absolutely insane. I can’t stop fucking thinking about what’s underneath those clothes, and after seeing your perfect breasts and your little pink nipples… fuuuuck, baby. All I can think about is how good they’d look with my handprints tattooed on them after I slap them while you orgasm. Can’t stop thinking about how wet your little pussy must get. How tight she would be around my fingers as I claim her as mine. How fucking delicious she must taste. How goddamn sexy your cries of pain and pleasure would sound.”

Your whole body shudders against his. He knows exactly what he’s doing to you and he knows he needs to stop before he crosses a line, but the way your body responds to him is precisely how he likes it: pliant and ready. His mind reels with all the naughty things he’d like to do to you. If he reaches just a little bit higher he could finally know how you sound when you come, how silky your cunt is, how you taste. He runs the tip of his hooked nose down your neck, the light citrus of your perfume replacing the scent of your shampoo. 

“That what you wanna hear?” Joel continues. “How fucking weak you make me? How desperate? I can’t do this because once I start…I ain’t gonna be able to let you go. Ain’t gonna be able to stop. Never gonna be able to have any other little play thing. It’s just you, sweet girl, only you. If I start this, this is it for me.”

Joel releases your wrists with a growl and walks away, carding his fingers through his curls and looking out at the cityscape as the sun begins to dip behind the tall buildings. He doesn’t look back, he can’t look back or he’ll fucking crack. He’ll haul you over his shoulder and take you into his club. He’ll show you everything right now and he won’t stop. His eyes flutter closed as he takes controlled breaths to slow his heart rate, the unmistakable sound of his office door opening and closing behind him. 

You 

You yank the door open and walk as fast as your legs will take you, your mind swirling, every emotion trying to win for first place. You’re painfully turned on, you can feel how soaked your panties are. It’s just you, sweet girl, only you. It’s like it’s been carved into your brain. Only you. You jam at the elevator close button as your lungs scream for fresh air, and as you step out into the warm spring night you suck in breath for what feels like the first time since you made this appointment last night. 

Your phone vibrates in the small purse you have across your body. He doesn’t have your number, you remind yourself as you reach for your phone. Jamie’s name across your slightly cracked screen. “Hey!” 

“Are you ok?” her voice is thick with concern.

Your chest feels tight, “Ya, why?”

“You sound like you're out of breath.” 

You laugh a little, “Oh. I was..” fuck, what was I doing. “I mean I am walking. Like on a walk.” 

Even a toddler wouldn’t be convinced by your lie, and Jamie isn’t either as she gasps loudly on the other end before whispering, “Were you having sex?”

“No! God no!” Your clit twitches at the thought of how close Joel was today. “I’m on the street, can’t you hear the cars.” 

“Ok. You do need some sex though,” she laughs. 

“Jamie,” you sigh, “I have to get to a study group. What’s up?” 

She giggles devilishly. “Wellll - It’s your birthday weekend. I want to throw you a party at this really amazing club on Friday.”

“Umm, ya. Sure. Nothing too crazy though, right?” 

“Promise you can keep your top on this time, prude.” She says teasingly and you laugh. “It’s called Mystique. The owner is an old family friend and she gave us a sweet VIP booth and bottle service, all completely free!”

You slide your key into the door of your SUV to unlock it, “Ok. Let’s do it.”

“Good, because I already invited the girls.” You sigh and your phone buzzes in your ear as Jamie’s computer dings on the other end. “Oh, weird. Your regular every other Tuesday clean just requested for you to go on Friday. Weren’t you just there yesterday?” 

Joel. You say dreamily in your mind. 

“That’s shitty,” Jamie continues, “That’s your birthday. The shift is only 4 hours, but I can offer it to someone else if you want.” 

“No!” It comes out too eager and you remind yourself to chill the fuck out as you put her on speaker phone and open the app. “I mean, no, that’s ok. I need the money and my calendar shows 11 to 3, lots of time to get ready!” 

“Text me when you’re done with your study group and we’ll hammer out the details for Friday night. We didn’t get to celebrate you turning twenty one with your insane schedule -”

“Hey!” You exclaim, pretending to be hurt.

“Ya ya, I know,” her voice an amused sarcasm as she continues, “The master plan to graduate early. Which you did. So can we please make this the best celebration yet?” Even without being able to see your best friend you know she’s dancing excitedly on the balls of her feet while giving big green doe eyes. 

Friday rolls around quickly, and you aren’t sure what you’re looking forward to more; a much needed night out with your girlfriends or the possibility of Joel being home today. You’ve tried not to think about how his body felt against yours, but every few hours you found yourself with your hand between your legs, rubbing tight little circles on your clit until you came to thoughts of him, whispering Mister Miller like a church prayer.  

Pulling up to his house today feels strange. He requested an extra clean this week just minutes after you asked him to teach you how to sub and after finding out that your birthday was today. You haul your stuff into his house, letting out a frustrated sigh when you find it quiet and empty. You click open your app and he’s asking you to dust and vacuum the basement, as well as wipe out the fridge. You look down at the app confused. He’s never asked you to clean the basement, and the fridge? He doesn’t cook. The eleven thousand dollar fridge is basically just a decoration to fill a gap in the countertops. 

You pop in your airpods and head downstairs. The cozy white carpet of the stairs feels like plush clouds under your Keds. As you round the corner of the stairs you see everything that makes someone's house a home. So this is where he keeps it all, you think to yourself. 

The short hallway from the stairs to the large open concept basement is covered in photos of Joel at all stages of his life. The first picture that catches your eye is a teenage baby faced Joel and a beautiful young woman sitting on a hospital bed, she’s smiling at the camera as Joel looks down at the tiny bundle of pink blankets in her arms. He looks so happy and soft, and it ignites a small flame of jealousy. Not at the woman, but at the happy little family.

As your eyes scan all the pictures you see that baby at all ages. There’s a picture of her holding a trophy as big as her with little cleats and shin guards on. In another, she and Joel are holding a big fish, her toothless smile bright and brilliant, while something in Joel’s eyes looks sad even though his plush lips are curved up in a sexy smile. 

Another picture is of the little girl sitting on her mom’s lap; the woman doesn’t seem as vibrant in this picture. The next one to catch your eye is her holding a cupcake with a candle in the shape of the number sixteen, then him in a pressed black suit and her in her high school cap and gown. The last picture is similar, except it’s a college graduation photo. 

As you peel yourself away from all the pictures you haven’t managed to look at yet, you face the main living area, a large open concept space. There’s a cozy grey sectional facing the big screen TV, shelves of DVDs surround it and you can only imagine all the movie nights the two of them had down here. There's a pool table along the far back right side of the room and to the left are a bunch of guitars, both acoustic and electric, hanging on the wall. You walk towards the guitars, there’s a stool and a small table beside the amp. An open notebook with lyrics lays on the table and as tempting as it is to read it, you look away. This space is who Joel is and he’s obviously trusting or testing you by sending you down here. He did tell you that you didn’t know him, and that he could be a bad guy, but everything here screams wholesome family man. 

You dust and vacuum, then fluff the couch cushions and fold the blankets nicely. There’s an empty glass on the side table, so you grab that and wash it at the small wet bar before placing it with the other glasses. You take one last longing look at the notebook, it’s tempting but decide you are right to not read it. It’s none of your business what he writes and sings about. You picture him there, dressed casually in sweat pants and t-shirt, his large fingers plucking with a practiced finesse at the strings, you wrapped in a blanket, sitting on the floor with a cup of coffee and a book. The two of you being independently together on a Sunday morning. 

Thoughts of the two of you like that are dangerous; being his submissive isn’t being his girlfriend. You’ve been very good at compartmentalizing, mostly as a coping mechanism to your past, so you find a metaphorical little box in the back of your mind to stuff all those feelings and thoughts into. As you gather your cleaning supplies, you take one last look around. maybe this was his way of showing you that you can’t have a future with him, that he’s done with the kids-and-marriage part of his life. None of that matters to you; you don’t want kids and marriage, you just want a partnership, and the support and comfort that comes with it. You want to become a lawyer, and eventually a judge, and one day sit on the supreme court and defend everyone's civil and human rights. That’s the goal, the only goal.  

From this point on, any feelings for Joel Miller go in that box. If he ever changes his mind, he is my dominant and nothing else. You push the lid on the feelings box and run through your life plan as you head up the stairs. Law school and lawyer, then a relationship before judge and supreme court. That’s the plan, it’s always been the plan.

Once you’re in the kitchen, you pop open the fridge to see a single red rose. You lose a fighting battle with your face, smiling huge from ear to ear. You grab it and close the now empty fridge, bringing the rose to your nose to breathe in the sweet and powdery scent. The black and red envelope sits on the shiny marble countertop. You place the rose down and pop open the envelope. You pull out fifteen hundred dollars and a black business card. Your brows knit together as you inspect the card, flipping it over. A QR code for the JMK app, an activation code, and a note that says “Happy Birthday, sweetheart.” 

You practically rip your phone from your back pocket and scan the QR code. You dance nervously on the balls of your feet as the app downloads. With shaky fingers you create a username and password, then type in the activation code. A bunch of permissions pop up, and while the baby lawyer inside of you screams that you need to read them, you’re too eager, so you hastily click accept on all of them. A profile with your newly appointed username splays across the screen. Right below your name it says “Beginner Submissive” and you roll your eyes. You upload the hottest selfie you can find of yourself to be your profile picture, smirking at what you imagine Joel’s reaction will be when he sees you in that tight fitting gold dress, a picture Jamie took of you on New Year’s Eve. 

On the top right of your screen are 3 little lines, you open the menu and have two options. ‘Assigned Dominant’ and ‘Limits and Waivers’. You are eager to fill out whatever Joel wants on this app, but none of this will feel real to you until you see his name as your Dom. You giggle as you click the first menu. Holy shit, you think as the new window loads, this is going to happen, he’s going to do it. 

Your heart freezes in your chest, and every ounce of excitement and happiness drains from you as you read ‘Assigned Dominant: Tommy Miller���.

When you get home, you open your JMK app again, looking at the assigned dominant screen in hopes you made a mistake. But there it is, clear as day, ‘Tommy Miller’. You lock your phone in frustration and toss it onto your unmade bed. Why would he do this? You’re sure that everything in the limits and waivers menu would have been a yes if Joel was your dom. But Tommy? Not that there’s anything physically wrong with Tommy. He’s definitely attractive, but he’s not Joel and you thought you made that perfectly clear. 

After you shower you've decided you’ve cooled off enough to continue in the app. Tommy is still not Joel, but you want this for yourself, right? And it’s not about pleasure or attraction, it’s about the escape, and more importantly, it’s about having someone to push you and help you grow.    

You click the ‘Limits and Waivers’ menu, a whole quiz comes up where you can rate your interest in different sexual and non sexual acts on a scale of one to five, and secondary checkmark if you’ve already done those things. You scroll through the list, this would be easy with Joel, all fives, all ‘highly interested’, or so you think. As you scroll through the list you get some real fetish level stuff - diapers, feet, scat play, being hung from hooks. You know enough not to kink shame anyone, but none of that interests you. As such, you rank them as a one, not at all interested.

You scroll back up to fill in all the stuff you’re more interested in. 

Spanking, five. 

Whips and Crops, five. 

Paddles, five. 

Nipple Clamps, five, fucking five hundred at this point. 

Bondage, another five hundred. Vibrators, five. 

Butt Plug, three - ya, that one surprised even yourself, but it’s Tommy, not Joel. 

The little box to click if you’ve done those things remains unchecked. You aren’t a virgin, but the small handful of college boys you’ve entertained had the same two or three moves, all of which left you unsatisfied. 

Odette bangs on your door, and you jump as your phone goes flying from your hand as she barges in. “Let’s get ready! Repeat twenty one, baby!”

You scramble off your bed to grab your phone before she does, one of your hands in a death grip on your towel, “Fuck, you scared the shit outta me.”

“Oh god, you were watching porn again weren’t you?” She laughs as your cheeks flush crimson. She wanders to your closet and opens the doors, “We gotta find you something real hot for tonight, you need to get laid.”

“Yeah yeah yeah,” you sing nonchalantly, wandering to your vanity to run a brush through your wet hair.

A few hours later and you’re all ready to go. Jamie and Laren came over to pre-drink and do their hair and make up. The four of you blasted nineties Shania Twain while drinking rosé and doing shots of cheap tequila. You pick a floor length black dress with a slit that goes almost to your hip and drips low between your breasts and leaves your back bare. You leave your hair down, curling it loosely before applying minimal makeup, flirty false lashes and a vibrant matte red lipstick. The packaging says that it's guaranteed not to smudge for up to twelve hours. 

“We’ll test that tonight on drinks and men,” Laren says as she steals it from your hand and puts it on her full, pouty lips.

Jamie surprises you with a limo. Before getting in you swipe your JMK app open and save your half-finished preferences. Tonight is not about Joel or Tommy; tonight is about you, and you deserve to be celebrated.

The table Jamie managed to secure for your birthday is perfect. You’re just off the dance floor, but raised up so that you can see the entire club. The music is loud and the room is dark, dimly lit with light pinks and purples. As you settle into the booth a young icy haired blonde girl in small black shorts and a lacy bra wanders in. “Hey babes! I’m Jade, let’s get these bottles going! Here’s the menu.”

Her eyes fall to you as she hands the bottle service menu and you both freeze. It’s her, the girl from Joel’s desk. The thump of the music fades and all you can hear is her moans and cries, the squelching of her pussy as Joel finger fucked her hard and deep. Shit, fuck, why me. She smiles at you, “Oh hey! Good to see you again.”

A chorus of, ‘again?’ and ‘how do you know each other?’ comes from your friends, all of their wide eyes staring at you.

“We don’t really,” you rush. “Just a mutual acquaintance really.”

Luckily, she gets the hint and just nods along. “What are we getting to drink ladies? I’ve heard it’s on the house so pick something expensive!”

You pick a bottle of Clase Azul tequila, Jade saying she can make different cocktails with it so you’re not all just doing shots. After a few rounds you find yourself alone in the booth while your friends go to the bathroom. Jade sits on the black leather seat beside you. 

“Look, I just want to say that I’m sorry for what you saw the other week. Joel sort of forbade me from seeking you out, but if you’re in my section at the club I work at then I’m not really breaking any rules.” She’s even more beautiful up close, no fucking wonder Joel wants to give you to Tommy. It’s just you, sweet girl, only you. But you see it now, why he’d pass you along. You can’t compete with a woman like her, and from the sounds of it Joel has more than one gorgeous, tall, slender blonde at his beck and call. 

“No, it’s ok. I’m actually learning to be a sub soon.” You smile at her, trying to tamp down the jealousy that’s threatening to choke you.

“No way! Joel is amazing, I only see him like once a month now but you’re going to love it.” Suddenly your entire body feels like an open wound, and the lime and salt left on your hands from tequila shots burns through you. The back of your eyes burn, frustration and jealousy don’t mix well with Rosé and tequila. You blink a few times to stop the tears. 

“He actually set me up with Tommy,” you croak, “Said I’m more his type.”

Just as she opens her perfect pink lips you hear the unmistakable opening to your all time favourite Shania Twain song, and as if your friends appeared from thin air the four of you yell, “Let’s go girls!”. The icy blonde pats the top of the table in your booth with one hand and holds her other hand out for yours. You climb up onto the table, your friends getting on the chairs. 

Every insecurity dissipates from your body as you sing loudly with your friends, swaying your hips to the music. You surrender yourself to the genius that was Shania Twain and Mutt Lange. As you break into the chorus for a second time, a glint of silver across the club catches your eye. Standing on the other side of the dancefloor, leaning against the bar top, is Joel Miller. 

His eyes are locked on yours; he’s wearing brown dress pants and a white short sleeved button up shirt, the top few buttons are left undone and it pulls at his biceps perfectly. He looks so sexy and casual, hair pushed back as he swirls the amber coloured whiskey around in its glass. He smiles devilishly, shaking his head jovially at you as you put on a show for him. As the song ends he crooks his pointer and middle fingers at you, silently calling you over. The simple motion of his fingers makes your pussy flutter, wetness slicking your thighs since you decided to forgo underwear tonight. Risky choice with the high slit of the skirt but suddenly it’s feeling like it’s the best decision you’ve ever made.

“I’ll be right back,” you whisper to your girlfriends as they help you off the table. They call for more shots and you refrain from all out sprinting to Joel. 

“Quite the show you put on up there,” he says, grabbing your bicep like he did at the poker game and pulling you gently along with him.

“You didn’t seem to mind.” You twist your arm out of his grasp and stumble. You’re definitely well on your way to being drunk, but you don’t want him to know that.

He grabs for your waist to steady you. “Careful, you’re drunk.”

“I’m not. And even if I was, I’m celebrating, so I’m allowed to be drunk. Not allowed to be your sub, but allowed to be drunk.” His eyes darken and you know you’ve crossed some sort of undrawn line, but you’re at that reckless sass point in your tipsiness and you really don’t care. A saccharine sweet smile crosses your face as you plant your hands on your hips.

“You sure you wanna play this game, sweetheart?” He practically growls.

“I’m not your sweetheart, I’m Tommy’s,” it comes out poutier than you expect. You spin on the balls of your feet and head back to the dance floor. As always, you can feel his eyes on you as you walk away. When you approach the dance floor you see a handsome man about your age looking at you. A quick glance over your shoulder confirms Joel is watching, you grab the hand of the stranger and say, “Let’s dance.”

As all young, drunk boys do, he obliges. You spin and press your back in this body, grinding your ass into him and keeping your eyes locked on Joel. How did he find you here? Why would he be out at this particular club, unless of course he’s keeping an eye on the icy blonde woman. She confirmed they only see each other once a month though, so why? Is he following you somehow?

The boy's hands move to your hips, traveling up your abdomen. You wink at Joel, pulling your hair to the side and tilting your head so the boy behind you has access to the same spot on your neck that he had in his office. Just as his lips start to lower Joel snaps. Got him, you think. He takes a few long strides onto the dance floor, pulling you away like you’re some sort of toy, like he’s a caveman coming to take what’s his. You let him pull you, yelling an apology to the boy on the dance floor.

Even though you’re happy to go with him, you can’t let him know that. “Joel, stop it. You can’t kick me out of here too.”

He takes you down a quiet, dark hallway, barely illuminated by the red glow of the EXIT sign. “I own half this place, baby. So I can.”

You twist your arm free from his grip, “You’re the bane of my existence, Joel Miller.”

“Why haven’t you filled out your app yet?”

You scoff, anger and annoyance starting to replace the happy feeling you had when he pulled you from the dance floor. “Are you stalking me?”

“Don’t flatter yourself. Doms can see where their subs are at all times if they accept the location tracker on the app.”

Shit, all those menus that you just clicked ‘Accept All’ to at the beginning. Of course your dom would be able to find you, depending on the relationship they can control everything you do. “You’re not my dom!” You state.

Joel rolls his eyes. “I know. Tommy told me you hadn’t filled it all out yet and where you were. So, why haven’t you filled out the app?”

You lean back on the railing along the wall and slide your feet from your heels, placing them on the cool tile of the floor to soothe the ache in your arches. Your hands come back to grip the railing. “It’s none of your business.”

“Sweet girl, in this case it literally is my business. The JM stands for Joel Miller.”

This time you roll your eyes and then mumble, “Because I don’t want Tommy. I don’t think I’m going to fill it out anymore.”

Joel leans back against the railing across the small hall from you, pinching the bridge of his noise in annoyance, “Please. For me, can you just fill it out?”

“For you? You made it clear you don't want me. I’m filling it out for Tommy.”

He crosses his arms, biceps bulging even more against the tight fabric of his short sleeved button up, if he’s not careful he’s going to go full incredible hulk on that shirt. Not that you’d mind.

“That’s not what I’m sayin’ and that’s also where you’re wrong. You’re fillin’ that out for you. If you’re fillin’ it out for anyone else, then you’re doing this for the wrong reasons.”

You let out an unimpressed sounding huff, “I’m not.”

His lips press into a tight line as he considers his words carefully; Joel is old enough to know not to argue with a twenty-one year old who’s had tequila. “Ok, you’re not. So then why do you want to be a sub?”

He watches as your whole body seems to deflate, there’s a shift, almost like desperation in your body. Sadness lines your eyes as they meet his and your voice comes out small and uncertain. “Because I’m exhausted, Joel. I - I spend all day making decisions, and studying, and learning about civil rights law. I’m always having to come up with a plan A, and B, all the way to plan Z sometimes. And then,” your head falls back to the wall as you continue speaking to the ceiling with your eyes closed, “Then I do it all over again the next day. I can’t shut it off, my brain. It just keeps going and going. It's so loud, so constant, so fucking overwhelming and there’s no escape.”

You fall silent and he steps forward, slipping his large hand behind your neck and bringing your gaze to his. You continue, fighting against the boulder that’s forming in your throat, “I don’t think I’m good enough. Or strong enough…Smart enough. I want to see for once that I am, want to see what I can overcome. For once,” you sigh heavily. “For once I just want someone to tell me how well I’m doing.”

Joel’s eyes fall to your lips, his voice a hoarse whisper, “Fill out the app.”

You take a deep breath. You feel lighter after finally getting to confessing all of that to him. That was your plan for his office the other day, but something about him flusters you and you were completely knocked off the rails by that special unknown thing Joel has over you. You whisper, “I don’t want to do this with Tommy. Please, Joel.”

Joel’s forehead comes to rest on yours, you can see the golden flecks in his dark eyes at this proximity. He smells like mint, and that same ash and leather from his office the other day. You should ask him right now why he let you in his basement today, but he speaks before you can. “Can you please, just for once, show me that you can listen?”

“Kiss me,” you hum, trailing your hands up his strong arms.

He stiffens under your touch. “What?” he asks dumbfoundedly.

“Kiss me and I’ll go home right now and fill out the app,” you whisper, inching your lips closer to his. 

“You’ll go home, fill out the app, and you will not touch yourself.” It’s not a question, it’s a deep command.

Now it’s your turn to be confused as you say, “What?”

He crowds his body closer to yours, pulling his face back slightly so he can take you all in. You’ve never seen this expression before, that flash of darkness from the first time you called him Mister Miller in your car has permanently etched itself into your mind, but it’s almost like he’s transitioned into full dominant Mister Miller now. “If you want to convince me to be your dom, it’s not going to be through just a kiss. So prove to me that you can listen, prove to me that you can be a good girl. ”

The wetness between your legs starts to coat your thighs at the sound of him asking you to be a good girl. You clench your thighs together as his forehead meets yours again.

He continues, his voice just as commanding, “If I give you this kiss, you’ll go home alone, you will not touch that dripping little cunt, and you will fill out the app.”

Your pussy is throbbing with need. You should have known better than to sass him so hard tonight. Someone as competent and experienced as Joel would know exactly how to punish his sub when they were acting up. You nod your head and hum in agreement to his demands.

“Ask me nicely.” He murmurs.

“P-please…kiss me, Joel.” Butterflies assault  the inside of your stomach.

You didn’t think it was possible, but he manages to crowd you even more, your entire body pressed firmly against his. Every skin cell is screaming for his attention, every nerve firing off signals making you hyper aware of anywhere he’s touching you.

“Ask me again using that name I told you not to call me,” He knows he’s playing with fire, but at this exact moment he doesn’t care, he fucking loves the way his preferred dom name sounds coming off your lips. 

“Kiss me, Mister Miller. Please?” It’s airy and desperate, your knees feel weak below you and it feels as if you can’t get a full breath in. The anticipation is killing you. 

“Why?” he growls. Growing up you were always afraid of dark spaces, but if there were any monsters in this hallway they’d be running scared at the timbre of his voice right now.

Your back arches instinctively into him. You’re safe here, Joel Miller is your safety. “Because I need you, Mister Miller. Please. Just one kiss…then I’ll do anything. I promise. P-please. I need to feel you on me, Mister Miller.”

Joel bends slightly, his hands come to the back of your thighs and he lifts you, slamming you against the wall. You squeal, arms flinging around his neck as your ankles hook around his waist. He pins you to the wall with his hips and lets go of your thighs. Both of you are practically panting, his cock is hard as steel, pressing against his zipper and your bare pussy. Your skirt is covering you from exposing yourself to him but something about the glint in his eye when your bodies connect makes you think he might know you don’t have any panties on. 

His hands peel your arms from around his neck and he pins them with one hand above your head like he did in his office. You whimper and grind your hips against him. His free hand wraps around your throat, holding it gently. 

“No,” he growls and it takes every ounce of self control you have to stop your hips. “Say it again.”

He watches your mouth hungrily as you lick your lips and you fight back a moan. He can feel your pulse firing rapidly under his calloused fingertips. A needy whisper passes your lips, filling the miniscule space left between your bodies. “I need you, Mister Miller. Please kiss me.”

With that he slams his lips against yours. It’s a desperate and heady mess of tongue and teeth, your moans being swallowed by his greedy mouth. You tilt your head to allow him in more. His tongue devours every inch that it can reach. He nips at your bottom lip before diving back in. He takes whatever he wants from you and you let him. For the first time in years your brain is quiet. No anxiety about the quickly approaching LSAT, no thinking of whatever practice question you’re stuck on. That nagging fear of being rejected from all the law schools you’ve applied to goes silent. The worrying voice that tells you you’re not good enough disappears. Everything you are is replaced by whatever Joel gives. 

You grind down onto him as you flick your tongue against his; he’s so rough yet so very soft. His tongue tastes like mint and whiskey. You can feel your orgasm building, it’s going to happen embarrassingly fast at this rate. You feel light headed from lack of oxygen and the slight push of his fingers into the side of your throat. More, more, more, you yell in your head.

Joel breaks the kiss and puts you down on your feet, holding you steady as you find your legs again. His lips are puffy and even though it’s not the time to be thinking of this, you realize there isn’t a single drop of red lipstick on his face, so it really will last twelve hours without smudging. 

His thumb comes to your face, swiping along your bottom lip gently, “Put your number in my phone, sweet girl.”

He holds his brand new iPhone Max out to you and you tap your number in with shaky fingers. He sends a quick text when you hand his phone back and then he kneels in front of you, helping you back into your heels. As he stands his hand trails from your ankle, all the way up the slit of your skirt to settle on your clothed hip. “Go get your stuff and go home now, baby. There’ll be a car waiting for you out front.”

He pats your bum gently as you walk on shaky legs back to your VIP booth. You feel like a newborn giraffe as you make your way to your table. 

“Where have you been?” Jamie proclaims, holding up a tequila shot for you.

You wave her off, “I think I’ve had too much. I’m gonna go but I want you girls to stay. Enjoy your night for me.”

It takes a few minutes but you convince your friends to stay and that you’ll be fine and already have a ride arranged. As you exit the club there’s a gorgeous blacked out town car parked in front. An older gentleman in a suit looks at you and nods, “Good Evening, Miss. Are you the young lady Joel Miller has asked me to escort home?”

You nod back, trying to act like this is an everyday occurrence and not the most outrageous thing that’s ever happened to you. As soon as you get home you change into your most unflattering set of pajamas, hoping that if you feel unsexy then it’ll stop that insistent throb between your thighs. Joel was so fucking close again, and this time there was no underwear in his way.

You slide open the app, Tommy Miller is still set as your dom, but you go through the preferences carefully and answer as honestly as possible as to what you want. You try to focus on the questions even though you can still feel Joel's throbbing cock pushing against you, and his warm hands around your wrists and throat. You can still taste him on your lips. You shake the ghost of him off of you and remind yourself again what you want from this, aside from mind-blowing orgasms. 

You fill out every section and then hit save. Just as you are about to lock your phone and try to fall asleep your phone vibrates, the JMK app as a notification.

‘Your Assigned Dominant has changed to Joel Miller’

Your heart pounds behind your rib cage as you stare at the notification, your head feels fuzzy, possibly from the booze, or that kiss, but you can’t believe your eyes. You close out of the app and go back in, staring at where Joel’s name has replaced Tommy’s. Just as it all starts to feel real you get a text message from a number you don’t have saved. You click on the message app.

“No coming until I say so, I know you weren’t wearing any panties tonight. Messy little pussy ruined my pants. Go to sleep now, my sweet girl.”

Next Chapter

[sugarcoated44]

Love the way you did your smau!! I would like to request one where reader is having baby fever??

lemme think about that... UH YES

JJK Men reacting to you having baby fever SMAU Pt.1

\\ All characters are aged up and 18+ | Minors DNI //

Warnings: I mean... directly talking about getting pregnant and what comes with it. (Also mention of firearms in Toji's)

I'm not responsible for your consumption of content.

Characters: Ryomen Sukuna, Yuji Itadori, Choso, Megumi Fushiguro, Toji Fushiguro, and Satoru Gojo.

SMAU + Little blurbs because I couldn't resist elaborating on these....

Gusnta be a 2 parter < 3

Masterlist | Part 2 (Coming Soon)

Post is below the linnneeeee

Ryomen Sukuna

You spring up from your bed, where you had been watching numerous baby videos on your phone. You had just heard a resounding cracking noise coming from the front door of your apartment and you flew up to it to look through the peep hole.

Unsurprisingly a pink head of hair that your recognized very quickly was seen on the other side of your door.

"Woman, you open this before I break it down you know I will."

It wasn't going to take any more than that, you quickly unlocked the door and swung it open steping aside for Sukuna to come in.

"Ryo-" you started off but he silenced you, his palm flying up to cover the lower half of your face.

"Did you mean it?" he asked, his piercing gaze cutting right into you.

It had been partially a joke but really, deep down, you had already decided for yourself that this was a man you wanted to have children with. Even though he could be a bit cruel sometimes, he was fiercly protective of you and you couldn't imagine him being any less for any children that were a product of him.

You slowly nodded your head, your mouth still covered by his palm.

He grinned wildly at you, "Good.", and with that one word he was picking you up, throwing you over his shoulder causing you to squeal.

You were in for it now.

Yuji Itadori

You chuckle at your cell, placing it down on the counter of your bathroom as you continue to brush your teeth. You adored texting your boyfriend with these cute little text gimicks, the way he responded was always so positive and adorable, it only made you fall deeper in love with him.

Finishing up in the bathroom you flicked the light off, walking up to the front door to ensure that you had locked it. Checking it swiftly, you turn away intent on heading back to your room to settle in for the night when you heard a rustling at you door that causes you to freeze.

You spin around in time to see the lock turn to the open position before the door swings open, revealing one Yuji Itadori on the other side of it, holding the spare key you had given him a couple months into dating.

"Yuji!?" you exclaim, happy to see him but a bit confused about his sudden appearance.

He smiles at you and shuts the door behind him, clicking the lock closed before kicking off his sneakers.

"Hi baby." he says happily, stepping forward to pull you into a tight bear hug.

You chuckle at him and pat his back, "Honey, its so late why are you here?" you ask him.

He sticks out his bottom lip at you pouting slightly, "I'm here to make a baby, duh." he says, giving you a toothy grin causing a violent blush to spread across your face.

"Yuji we aren''t ready for that yet!" you say, smacking him on the chest playfully.

He grins down at you still, unfaltering. "Yeah but we could certainly get some practice in!"

Choso

You run out of the bedroom to the top of the stairs where you see a half doubled over Choso trying to pull himself up on the railing.

"Choso!" you say, running down the steps quicklly to go help your boyfriend off the floor.

You pull him up and he immediatley wraps you in a tight hug, burying his face into your neck.

You hug him tightly in return, rubbing his back slowly.

"Honey are you okay?" you ask, pulling back slightly to get a look at his face. He hadn't been lying, his eyes were red and watery eyeliner smudged around them.

"You want to have a baby with me?" he asked, his voice wobbling as his arms wrapped around your waist keeping you pulled close to him.

Your head snapped back as you let out a laugh, worry for your lover easing out of your body.

You pulled his face down to yours, pecking his lips softly before resting your forehead against his to look into his still damp eyes.

"Of course I do baby." you said softly, bringing a hand up to wipe away the tears under his eyes.

"I want to do that too." he said, happy tears flowing down his face once again.

Megumi Fushiguro

You were sitting next to Megumi on the couch, one of his arms thrown over your shoulders as some made for tv movie played on Yuji's apartment TV.

The two of you had joined him and Nobara for a movie night and the two of them had picked some random movie that you and your boyfriend had never heard of.

You had remained unintrested for the majority of the film until a cute scene had started to play between the two main characters and their child causing your heard to melt.

You had mostly picked up your cell to text Megumi as a joke, since it seemed pretty clear from his bored stare that he was equally as unentertained by the film as you were.

You had not been expecting it to throw him off so harshly.

He stood up abruptly mumbling something about the two of you needing to leave before dragging you out the door while Yuji and Nobara protested in the background.

The door slammed behind the two of your and your boyfriend dragged you into the elevator with him slamming you up against the inside wall before the doors even closed.

"Megumi I-" you started, words getting caught in your throat as Megumi's lips found purchase on your neck causing a startled moan to stumble out of you.

"You think you can just say things like that and expect me not to drag you away?"

Toji Fushiguro

Half an hour later you were still grumbling while pulling open various drawers in your bedroom, you knew Toji had to be keeping bullets somewhere.. you had really been shocked when the gun hadn't just been loaded though you appreciated him not leaving a loaded firearm in the bed the two of you shared.

You hear a deep chuckle coming from behind you, turning you see Toji's large frame filling up the doorway.

"Good!" you say, turning back around to keep rifling through the drawer you had just opened, "You're here to help me find them!"

"Brat." he said, clearly trying to get your attention though you half ignored him.

"Y/n." he said again, his tone a little more snappy this time causing you to turn to look at him.

He was holding up something square shapped, though it had three massive holes in it.

He threw the item on the dresser in front of you and you looked at it, recognizing it as your birth control.. with bullet holes blown into it.

You looked back at Toji, taking a step towards him.

"Remember when I said you were crazy?" he asked, smile streching his scar across his face, "I like that, how about we start putting work into knocking you up?"

Satoru Gojo

You rush to the door of the house you had just moved into with Satoru a few month ago, finally breaking down on his constant requests to let him take care of you.

Sliding open the door you found him standing there with a crazed smile on his face, a large bouquet of flowers covering most of his arms and chest.

"Toru!" you exclaim, taking a could of steps towards him giggling at the giant arrangment of flowers, "Where did you get these?"

"Some market in Tokyo, don't worry I paid." he said, allowing you another moment to look at them before he tossed them onto the picnic table that was set up outside the house.

He rushed forward, picking you up to spin you around causing another laugh to fly out of you.

"We'rent you working?" you ask him when he finally sets you down, leaving his hands on your waist his forehead pressed against yours.

"Blegh, those losers in that meeting were boring me anyways." he said, sticking his tongue out.

If you remembered those "losers" were the Jujutsu Elders, but he didn't let you dwell on that long as he had moved to swooping his arms under your legs sweeping you off your feet princess style.

"Ah! Toru what???" you squealed, throwing your arms around his neck to try and hold yourself up.

"Did you not read my text?" he asked, smiling down at you, "I'm here to make a goregous blue eyed baby with you!"

Part one of this lovely request! I shall be putting out part 2 soonnnnn I've had a busy week so posts have been slow but IM STILL ALIVE BITCHES!!!!

REQs are still open as of now annndddd thats it love ya bye

< 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3 < 3

[dresshistorynerd]

The Real Cost of the Fashion Industry

Atacama Desert, in Alto Hospicio, Iquique, Chile. (source)

The textile industry is destroying the world. The industry is wasting massive amounts of energy and materials, and polluting the air, the ground and the water supplies. It overwhelmingly exploits it's labour and extracts wealth from colonized countries, especially in Asia. I assume we all broadly understand this, but I think it's useful to have it all laid out in front of you to see the big picture, the core issues causing this destruction and find ways how to effectively move forward.

The concerning trend behind this ever-increasing devastation are shortening of trend cycles, lowering clothing prices and massive amount of wasted products. Still in year 2000 it was common for fashion brands to have two collections per year, while now e.g. Zara produces 24 collections and H&M produces 12-16 collections per year. Clothing prices have fallen (at leas in EU) 30% from 1996 to 2018 when adjusted to inflation, which has contributed to the 40% increase in clothing consumption per person between 1996 and 2012 (in EU). (source) As the revenue made by the clothing industry keep rising - from 2017 to 2021 they doubled (source) - falling prices can only be achieved with increasing worker exploitation and decreasing quality. I think the 36% degrees times clothing are used in average during the last 15 years (source) is a clear indication on the continuing drop in quality of clothing. Clothing production doubled between 2000 and 2015, while 30% of the clothes produced per year are never sold and are often burned instead (source), presumably to prevent the returns from falling due to oversupply.

These all factors are driving people to overconsume. While people in EU keep buying more clothes, they haven't used up to 50% of the clothes in their wardrobe for over a year (source). This overconsumption is only made much worse by the new type of hyper fast fashion companies like SHEIN and Temu, which are using addictive psychological tactics developed by social media companies (source 1, source 2). They are cranking up all those concerning trends I mentioned above.

Under the cut I will go through the statistics of the most significant effects of the industry on environment and people. I will warn you it will be bleak. This is not just a fast fashion problem, basically the whole industry is engaging in destructive practices leading to this damage. Clothing is one of those things that would be actually relatively easy to make without massive environmental and human cost, so while that makes the current state of the industry even more heinous, it also means there's hope and it's possible to fix things. In the end, I will be giving some suggestions for actions we could be doing right now to unfuck this mess.

Carbon emissions

The textile industry is responsible for roughly 10% of the global CO2 emissions, more than aviation and shipping industry combined. This is due to the massive supply chains and energy intensive production methods of fabrics. Most of it can be contributed to the fashion sector since around 60% of all the textile production is clothing. Polyester, a synthetic fiber made from oil which accounts for more than half of the fibers used in the textile industry, produces double the amount of carbon emissions than cotton, accounting for very large proportions of all the emissions by the industry. (source 1, source 2)

Worker exploitation

Majority of the textiles are produced in Asia. Some of the worst working conditions are in Bangladesh, one of the most important garment producers, and Pakistan. Here's an excerpt from EU Parliament's briefing document from 2014 after the catastrophic Rana Plaza disaster:

The customers of garment producers are most often global brands looking for low prices and tight production timeframes. They also make changes to product design, product volume, and production timeframes, and place last-minute orders without accepting increased costs or adjustments to delivery dates. The stresses of such policies usually fall on factory workers.

The wage exploitation is bleak. According to the 2015 documentary The True Cost less than 2% of all garment factory workers earned a living wage (source). Hourly wages are so low and the daily quotas so high, garment workers are often forced through conditions or threats and demand to work extra hours, which regularly leads to 10-12 hour work days (source) and at worst 16 hour workdays (source), often without days off. Sometimes factories won't compensate for extra hours, breaching regulations (source).

Long working hours, repetitive work, lack of breaks and high pressure leads to increased risks of injuries and accidents. Small and even major injuries are extremely common in the industry. A study in three factories in India found that 70% of the workers suffered from musculosceletal symptoms (source). Another qualitative study of female garment workers and factory doctors in Dhaka found that long hours led to eye strain, headaches, fatigue and weight loss in addition to muscular and back pains. According to the doctors interviewed, weight loss was common because the workers work such long hours without breaks, they didn't have enough time to eat properly. (source) Another study in 8 factories in India found that minor injuries were extremely common and caused by unergonomic work stations, poor organization in the work place and lack of safety gear, guidelines and training (source). Safety precautions too are often overlooked to cut corners, which periodically leads to factory accidents, like in 2023 lack of fire exists and fire extinguishers, and goods stacked beyond capacity led to a factory fire in Pakistan which injured dozens of workers (source) or like in 2022 dangerous factory site led to one dead worker and 9 injured workers (source).

Rana Plaza collapse in 2013 is the worst industrial accident in recent history. The factory building did not have proper permits and the factory owner blatantly ignored signs of danger (other businesses abandoned the building a day before the collapse), which led to deaths of 1 134 workers and injuries to 2 500 workers. The factory had or were at the time working for orders of at least Prada, Versace, Primark, Walmart, Zara, H&M, C&A, Mango, Benetton, the Children's Place, El Corte Inglés, Joe Fresh, Carrefour, Auchan, KiK, Loblaw, Bonmarche and Matalan. None of the brands were held legally accountable for the unsafe working conditions which they profited off of. Only 9 of the brands attended a meeting to agree on compensation for the victim's families. Walmart, Carrefour, Auchan, Mango and KiK refused to sight the agreement, it was only signed by Primark, Loblaw, Bonmarche and El Corte Ingles. The compension these companies provided was laughable though. Primemark demanded DNA evidence that they are relatives of one of the victims from these struggling families who had lost their often sole breadwinner for a meager sum of 200 USD (which doesn't even count for two months of living wage in Bangladesh (source)). This obviously proved to be extremely difficult for most families even though US government agreed to donate DNA kits. This is often said to be a turning point in working conditions in the industry, at least in Bangladesh, but while there's more oversight now, as we have seen, there's clearly still massive issues. (source 1, source 2)

One last major concern of working conditions in the industry I will mention is the Xinjiang raw cotton production, which is likely produced mainly with forced labour from Uighur concentration camps, aka slave labour of a suspected genocide. 90% of China's raw cotton production comes from Xinjiang (source). China is the second largest cotton producer in the world, after India, accounting 20% of the yearly global cotton production (source).

Pollution

Synthetic dyes, which synthetic fibers require, are the main cause of water pollution caused by the textile industry, which is estimated to account for 20% of global clean water pollution (source). This water pollution by the textile industry is suspected of causing a lot of health issues like digestive issues in the short term, and allergies, dermatitis, skin inflammation, tumors and human mutations in the long term. Toxins also effect fish and aquatic bacteria. Azo dyes, one of the major pollutants, can cause detrimental effects to aquatic ecosystems by decreasing photosynthetic activity of algae. Synthetic dyes and heavy metals also cause large amounts of soil pollution. Large amounts of heavy metals in soil, which occurs around factories that don't take proper environmental procautions, can cause anaemia, kidney failure, and cortical edoem in humans. That also causes changes in soil texture, decrease in soil microbial diversity and plant health, and changes in genetic structure of organisms growing in the soil. Textile factory waste water has been used for irrigation in Turkey, where other sources of water have been lacking, causing significant damage to the soil. (source)

Rayon produced through viscose process causes significant carbon disulphide and hydrogen sulphide pollution to the environment. CS2 causes cardiovascular, psychiatric, neuropsychological, endocrinal and reproductive disorders. Abortion rates among workers and their partners exposed to CS2 are reported to be significantly higher than in control groups. Many times higher amounts of sick days are reported for workers in spinning rooms of viscose fiber factories. China and India are largest producers of CS2 pollution, accounting respectively 65.74% and 11,11% of the global pollution, since they are also the major viscose producers. Emission of CS2 has increased significantly in India from 26.8 Gg in 2001 to 78.32 Gg in 2020. (source)

Waste

The textile industry is estimated to produce around 92 million tons of textile waste per year. As said before around 30% of the production is never sold and with shortening lifespans used the amount of used clothing that goes to waster is only increasing. This waste is large burned or thrown into landfills in poor countries. (source) H&M was accused in 2017 by investigative journalists of burning up to 12 tonnes of clothes per year themselves, including usable clothing, which they denied claiming they donated clothing they couldn't sell to charity instead (source). Most of the clothing donated to charity though is burned or dumbed to landfills (source).

Most of the waste clothing from rich countries like European countries, US, Australia and Canada are shipped to Chile (source) or African countries, mostly Ghana, but also Burkina Faso and Côte d'Ivoire (source). There's major second-hand fashion industries in these places, but most of the charity clothing is dumbed to landfills, because they are in such bad condition or the quality is too poor. Burning and filling landfills with synthetic fabrics with synthetic dyes causes major air, water and soil pollution. The second-hand clothing industry also suppresses any local clothing production as donated clothing is inherently more competitive than anything else, making these places economically reliant on dumbed clothing, which is destroying their environment and health, and prevents them from creating a more sustainable economy that would befit them more locally. This is not an accident, but required part of the clothing industry. Overproduction let's these companies tap on every new trend quickly, while not letting clothing the prices in rich countries drop so low it would hurt their profits. Production is cheaper than missing a trend.

Micro- and nanoplastics

There is massive amounts of micro- and nanoplastics in all of our environment. It's in our food, drinking water, even sea salt (source). Washing synthetic textiles accounts for roughly 35% of all microplastics released to the environment. It's estimated that it has caused 14 million tonnes of microplastics to accumulate into the bottom of the ocean. (source)

Microplastics build up into the intestines of animals (including humans), and have shown to probably cause cause DNA damage and altered organism behavior in aquatic fauna. Microplastics also contain a lot of the usual pollutants from textile industry like synthetic dyes and heavy metals, which absorb in higher quantities to tissues of animals through microplastics in the intestines. Studies have shown that the adverse effect are higher the longer the microplastics stay in the organism. The effects cause major risks to aquatic biodiversity. (source) The health effects of microplastics to humans are not well known, but studies have shown that they could have adverse effects on digestive, respiratory, endocrine, reproductive and immune systems. (source)

Microplastics degrade in the environment even further to nanoplastics. Nanoplastic being even smaller are found to enter blood circulation, get inside cells and cross the blood-brain barrier. In fishes they have been found to cause neurological damage. Nanoplastics are also in the air, and humans frequently breath them in. Study in office buildings found higher concentration of nanoplastics in indoor air than outdoor air. Inside the nanoplastics are likely caused mostly by synthetic household textiles, and outdoors mostly by car tires. (source) An association between nanoplastics and mitochondrial damage in human respiratory cells was found in a recent study. (source)

Micro and nano plastics are also extremely hard to remove from the environment, making it even more important that we reduce the amount of microplastics we produce as fast as possible.

What can we do?

This is a question that deserves it's own essays and articles written about it, but I will leave you with some action points. Reading about these very bleak realities can easily lead to overwhelming apathy, but we need to channel these horrors into actions. Whatever you do, do not fall into apathy. We don't have the luxury for that, we need to act. These are industry wide problems, that simply cannot be fixed by consumerism. Do not trust any clothing companies, even those who market themselves as ethical and responsible, always assume they are lying. Most of them are, even the so called "good ones". We need legislation. We cannot allow the industry to regulate itself, they will always take the easy way out and lie to their graves. I will for sure write more in dept about what we can do, but for now here's some actions to take, both political and individual ones.

Political actions

Let's start with political actions, since they will be the much more important ones. While we are trying to dismantle capitalism and neocolonialism (the roots of these issues), here's some things that we could do right now. These will be policies that we should be doing everywhere in the world, but especially rich countries, where most of the clothing consumption is taking place. Vote, speak to others, write to your representative, write opinion pieces to your local papers, engage with democracy.

Higher requirements of transparency. Right now product transparency in clothing is laughably low. In EU only the material make up and the origin country of the final product are required to be disclosed. Everything else is up to the company. Mandatory transparency is the only way we can force any positive changes in the production. The minimum of transparency should be: origin countries of the fibers and textiles in the product itself; mandatory reports of the lifecycle emissions; mandatory reports of whole chain of production. Right now the clothing companies make their chain of production intentionally complex, so they have plausible deniability when inevitably they are caught violating environmental or worker protection laws (source). They intentionally don't want to be able to track down their production chain. Forcing them to do so anyway would make it very expensive for them to keep up this unnecessarily complex production chain. These laws are most effective when put in place in large economies like EU or US.

Restrictions on the use of synthetic fibers. Honestly I think they should be banned entirely, since the amount of microplastics in our environment is already extremely distressing and the other environmental effects of synthetic fibers are also massive, but I know there are functions for which they are not easily replaced (though I think they can be replaces in those too, but that's a subject of another post), so we should start with restrictions. I'm not sure how they should be specifically made, I'm not a law expert, but they shouldn't be used in everyday textiles, where there are very easy and obvious other options.

Banning viscose. There are much better options for viscose method that don't cause massive health issues and environmental destruction where ever it's made, like Lyocell. There is absolutely no reason why viscose should be allowed to be sold anywhere.

Governmental support for local production by local businesses. Most of the issues could be much more easily solved and monitored if most clothing were not produced by massive global conglomerations, but rather by local businesses that produce locally. All clothing are made by hand, so centralizing production doesn't even give it advantage in effectiveness (only more profits for the few). Producing locally would make it much more easier to enforce regulations and it would reduce production chains, making production more effective, leaving more profits into the hands of the workers and reducing emissions from transportation. When the production is done by local businesses, the profits would stay in the producing country and they could be taxed and utilized to help the local communities. This would be helpful to do in both exploited and exploiter countries. When done in rich countries who exploit poorer ones, it would reduce the demand for exploitation. In poor countries this is not as easily done, since poor means they don't have money to give around, but maybe this could be a good cause to put some reparations from colonizers and global corporations, which they should pay.

Preventing strategic accounting between subsidiaries and parent companies. Corporate law is obviously not my area of expertise, but I know that allowing corporations to move around the accounting of profits and losses between subsidiaries and parent companies in roughly 1980s, was a major factor in creating this modern global capitalist system, where corporations can very easily manipulate their accounting to utilize tax heavens and avoid taxes where they actually operate, which is how they are upholding this terrible system and extracting the profits from the production countries. How specifically this would be done I can't tell because again I know shit about corporate law, so experts of that field should plan the specifics. Overall this would help deal with a lot of other problems than just the fashion industry. Again for it to be effective a large economic area like EU or US should do this.

Holding companies accountable for their whole chain of production. These companies should be dragged to court and made to answer for the crimes they are profiting of off. We should put fear back into them. This is possible. Victims of child slavery are already doing this for chocolate companies. If it's already not how law works everywhere, the laws should be changed so that the companies are responsible even if they didn't know, because it's their responsibility to find out and make sure they know. They should have been held accountable for the Rana Plaza disaster. Maybe they still could be. Sue the mother fuckers. They should be afraid of us.

Individual actions

I will stress that the previous section is much more important and that there's no need to feel guilty for individual actions. This is not the fault of the average consumer. Still we do need to change our relationship to fashion and consumption. While it's not our fault, one of the ways this system is perpetuated, is by the consumerist propaganda by fashion industry. And it is easier to change our own habits than to change the industry, even if our own habits have little impact. So these are quite easy things we all could do as we are trying to do bigger change to gain some sense of control and keep us from falling to apathy.

Consume less. Better consumption will not save us, since consumption itself is the problem. We consume too much clothing. Don't make impulse purchases. Consider carefully weather you actually need something or if you really really want it. Even only buying second-hand still fuels the industry, so while it's better than buying new, it's still better to not buy.

Take proper care of your clothing. Learn how to properly wash your clothing. There's a lot of internet resources for that. Never wash your wool textiles in washing machine, even if the textile's official instructions allow it. Instead air them regularly, rinse them in cool water if they still smell after airing and wash stains with water or small amount of (wool) detergent. Never use fabric softener! It damages the fabrics, prevents them from properly getting clean and is environmentally damaging. Instead use laundry vinegar for making textiles softer or removing bad smells. (You can easily make laundry vinegar yourself too from white vinegar and water (and essential oils, if you want to add a scent to it) which is much cheaper.) Learn how to take care of your leather products. Most leather can be kept in very good condition for a very long time by occasional waxing with beeswax.

Use the services of dressmakers and shoemakers. Take your broken clothing or clothing which doesn't fit anymore to your local dressmaker and ask them if they can do something about it. Take your broken and worn leather products to your local shoemaker too. Usually it doesn't cost much to get something fixed or refitted and these expert usually have ways to fix things you couldn't even think of. So even if the situation with your clothing or accessory seems desperate, still show it to the dressmaker or shoemaker.

If it's extremely cheap, don't buy it. Remember that every clothing is handmade. Only a small fraction of the cost of the clothing will be paying the wages of the person who made it with their hands. If a shirt costs 5 euros (c. 5,39 USD), it's sewer was only payed mere cents for sewing it. I'm not a quick sewer and it takes me roughly 1-2 hours to cut, prepare and sew a simple shirt, so I'm guessing it would take around half an hour to do all that for a factory worker on a crunch, at the very least 15 minutes. So the hourly pay would still be ridiculously low. However, as I said before, the fact that the workers in clothing factories get criminally low pay is not the fault of the consumer, so if you need a clothing item, and you don't have money to buy anything else than something very cheep, don't feel guilty. And anyway expensive clothing in no way necessarily means reasonable pay or ethical working conditions, cheep clothing just guarantee them.

Learn to recognize higher quality. In addition to exploitation, low price also means low quality, but again high price doesn't guarantee high quality. High quality allows you to buy less, so even if it's not as cheep as low quality, if you can afford it, when you need it, it will be cheaper in long run, and allows you to consume less. Check the materials. Natural fibers are your friends. Do not buy plastic, if it's possible to avoid. Avoid household textiles from synthetic fibers. Avoid textiles with small amounts of spandex to give it stretch, it will shorten the lifespan of the clothing significantly as the spandex quickly wears down and the clothing looses it's shape. Also avoid clothing with rubber bands. They also loose their elasticity very quickly. In some types of clothing (sport wear, underwear) these are basically impossible to avoid, but in many other cases it's entirely possible.

Buy from artisans and local producers, if you can. As said better consumption won't fix this, but supporting artisans and your local producers could help keep them afloat, which in small ways helps create an alternative to the exploitative global corporations. With artisans especially you know the money goes to the one who did the labour and buying locally means less middlemen to take their cut. More generally buy rather from businesses that are located to the same country where the production is, even if it's not local to you. A local business doesn't necessarily produce locally.

Develop your own taste. If you care about fashion and style, it's easy to fall victim to the fashion industry's marketing and trend cycles. That's why I think it's important to develop your personal sense of style and preferences. Pay attention at what type of clothes are comfortable to you. Go through your wardrobe and track for a while which clothing you use most and which least. Understanding your own preferences helps you avoid impulse buying.

Consider learning basics of sewing. Not everyone has the time or interest for this, but if you in anyway might have a bit of both, I suggest learning some very simple and basic mending and reattaching a button.

Further reading on this blog: How to see through the greenwashing propaganda of the fashion industry - Case study 1: Shein

Bibliography

Academic sources

An overview of the contribution of the textiles sector to climate change, 2022, L. F. Walter et al., Frontiers in Environmental Science

How common are aches and pains among garment factory workers? A work-related musculoskeletal disorder assessment study in three factories of south 24 Parganas district, West Bengal, 2021, Arkaprovo Pal et al., J Family Med Prim Care

Sewing shirts with injured fingers and tears: exploring the experience of female garment workers health problems in Bangladesh, 2019, Akhter, S., Rutherford, S. & Chu, C., BMC Int Health Hum Rights

Occupation Related Accidents in Selected Garment Industries in Bangalore City, 2006, Calvin, Sam & Joseph, Bobby, Indian Journal of Community Medicine

A Review on Textile and Clothing Industry Impacts on The Environment, 2022, Nur Farzanah Binti Norarmi et al., International Journal of Academic Research in Business and Social Sciences

Carbon disulphide and hydrogen sulphide emissions from viscose fibre manufacturing industry: A case study in India, 2022, Deepanjan Majumdar et al., Atmospheric Environment: X

Microplastics Pollution: A Brief Review of Its Source and Abundance in Different Aquatic Ecosystems, 2023, Asifa Ashrafy et al., Journal of Hazardous Materials Advances

Health Effects of Microplastic Exposures: Current Issues and Perspectives in South Korea, 2023, Yongjin Lee et al., Yonsei Medical Journal

Nanoplastics and Human Health: Hazard Identification and Biointerface, 2022, Hanpeng Lai, Xing Liu, and Man Qu, Nanomaterials

Other sources

The impact of textile production and waste on the environment (infographics), 2020, EU

Chile’s desert dumping ground for fast fashion leftovers, 2021, AlJazeera

Fashion - Worldwide, 2022 (updated 2024), Statista

Fashion Industry Waste Statistics & Facts 2023, James Evans, Sustainable Ninja (magazine)

Everything You Need to Know About Waste in the Fashion Industry, 2024, Solene Rauturier, Good on You (magazine)

Textiles and the environment, 2022, Nikolina Šajn, European Parliamentary Research Service

Help! I'm addicted to secondhand shopping apps, 2023, Alice Crossley, Cosmopolitan

Addictive, absurdly cheap and controversial: the rise of China’s Temu app, 2023, Helen Davidson, Guardian

Workers' conditions in the textile and clothing sector: just an Asian affair? - Issues at stake after the Rana Plaza tragedy, 2014, Enrico D'Ambrogio, European Parliamentary Research Service

State of The Industry: Lowest Wages to Living Wages, The Lowest Wage Challenge (Industry affiliated campaign)

Fast Fashion Getting Faster: A Look at the Unethical Labor Practices Sustaining a Growing Industry, 2021, Emma Ross, International Law and Policy Brief (George Washington University Law School)

Dozens injured in Pakistan garment factory collapse and fire, 2023, Hannah Abdulla, Just Style (news media)

India: Multiple factory accidents raise concerns over health & safety in the garment industry, campaigners call for freedom of association in factories to ‘stave off’ accidents, 2022, Jasmin Malik Chua, Business & Human Rights Resource Center

Minimum Wage Level for Garment Workers in the World, 2020, Sheng Lu, FASH455 Global Apparel & Textile Trade and Sourcing (University of Delaware)

Rana Plaza collapse, Wikipedia

Buyers’ compensation for Rana Plaza victims far from reality, 2013, Ibrahim Hossain Ovi, Dhaka Tribune (news media)

World cotton production statistics, updated 2024, The World Counts

Dead white man’s clothes, 2021, Linton Besser, ABC News

[probablyasocialecologist]

An essential component of the imperial mode of living is the expansion of industrial agriculture, which has gone hand in hand with land grabs and dispossession, expands the power of agricultural and food corporations, and requires ever greater energy input. As a part of a norm that ties increasing meat consumption to rising prosperity, expansion is accompanied by a ballooning system of industrial animal farming and the massive ethical and ecological problems that are part and parcel of this practice. Producing one calorie of poultry meat requires four times that amount in energy input; pork and milk require fourteen times the final amount of caloric energy; eggs thirty-nine times; and beef, depending on the type of feed, twenty to forty times. ‘Today, more energy is invested in agricultural production than is gained in its form as food. The large quantity of high-quality agricultural products fed to livestock is partially responsible for this.’

The Imperial Mode of Living: Everyday Life and the Ecological Crisis of Capitalism

[beguines]

Similarly, it is more than coincidence that the 1980s and 1990s saw the rise of self-help culture and the turn of psychological and counselling professionals towards "positive psychology" and "positive thinking". Laid thick with the values of neoliberalism, the discourse of "positive mental health" no longer focuses primarily on bringing the "insane" back to some state of normality but rather on the self-improvement of the individual. It is no longer enough to be "sane" or "normal"; one has to be constantly striving to be more positive and happier in life. This is a therapeutic quest which perfectly aligns with the neoliberal philosophy of personal responsibility and the need to constantly improve the self. It is a hegemonic discourse, thinly veiled as a therapeutic and medical expertise on the mind which promotes the values and goals of neoliberal capital. As Ehrenreich has stated of the "positive thinking" revolution in late capitalism, it promotes a model of deficit focused entirely on the individual:

"If optimism is the key to material success, and if you can achieve an optimistic outlook through the discipline of positive thinking, then there is no excuse for failure. The flip side of positivity is thus a harsh insistence on personal responsibility: if your business fails or your job is eliminated, it must [be] because you didn't try hard enough, didn't believe firmly enough in the inevitability of your success. As the economy has brought more layoffs and financial turbulence to the middle class, the promoters of positive thinking have increasingly emphasized this negative judgment: to be disappointed, resentful, or downcast is to be a 'victim' and a 'whiner.'"

In the same way, psychiatric labels have come to focus on deficits and failings in character which threaten the productivity and consumption activities of the individual in many social and economic arenas of life. Thus, the psychiatric discourse seeks to both depoliticise the fundamental inequalities and structural failings of capitalism as individual coping problems while reinforcing the values of competition and self-improvement as common sense and taken for granted. Speaking similarly of psychotherapy, Parker states that the individual's "'adaptation' to capitalism requires psychotherapists not merely to ameliorate the worst excesses of the system, but to ensure that this adaptation is geared to inciting and channelling the critical reflexive energy of citizens so that the very critique that they make of the economy serves to fine-tune it . . . Thus psychotherapy becomes crucial to the state health apparatus as a practice devoted to the balance of dissatisfaction and yearning requisite for consumption and production."

Bruce M.Z. Cohen, Psychiatric Hegemony: A Marxist Theory of Mental Illness

[nenelonomh]

guys,, don't forget to do your research (AI)

researching ai before using it is crucial for several reasons, ensuring that you make informed decisions and use the technology responsibly.

it actually makes me angry that people are too lazy or perhaps ignorant to spend 15ish minutes reading and researching to understand the implications of this new technology (same with people ignorantly using vapes, ugh!). this affects you, your health, the people around you, the environment, society, and has legal implications.

first, understanding the capabilities and limitations of ai helps set realistic expectations. knowing what ai can and cannot do allows you to utilize it effectively without overestimating its potential. for example, if you are using ai as a study tool - you must be aware that it is unable to explain complex concepts in detail. additionally! you must be aware of the effects that it poses on your learning capabilities and how it discourages you from learning with your class/peers/teacher.

second, ai systems often rely on large datasets, which can raise privacy concerns. researching how an ai handles data and what measures are in place to protect your information helps safeguard your privacy.

third, ai algorithms can sometimes exhibit bias due to the data they are trained on. understanding the sources of these biases and how they are addressed can help you choose ai tools that promote fairness and avoid perpetuating discrimination.

fourth, the environmental impact of ai, such as the energy consumption of data centers, is a growing concern. researching the environmental footprint of ai technologies can help you select solutions that are more sustainable and environmentally friendly.

!google and microsoft ai use renewable and efficient energy to power their data centres. ai also powers blue river technology, carbon engineering and xylem (only applying herbicides to weeds, combatting climate change, and water-management systems). (ai magazine)

!training large-scale ai models, especially language models, consumes massive amounts of electricity and water, leading to high carbon emissions and resource depletion. ai data centers consume significant amounts of electricity and produce electronic waste, contributing to environmental degradation. generative ai systems require enormous amounts of fresh water for cooling processors and generating electricity, which can strain water resources. the proliferation of ai servers leads to increased electronic waste, harming natural ecosystems. additionally, ai operations that rely on fossil fuels for electricity production contribute to greenhouse gas emissions and climate change.

fifth, being aware of the ethical implications of ai is important. ensuring that ai tools are used responsibly and ethically helps prevent misuse and protects individuals from potential harm.

finally, researching ai helps you stay informed about best practices and the latest advancements, allowing you to make the most of the technology while minimizing risks. by taking the time to research and understand ai, you can make informed decisions that maximize its benefits while mitigating potential downsides.

impact on critical thinking

ai can both support and hinder critical thinking. on one hand, it provides access to vast amounts of information and tools for analysis, which can enhance decision-making. on the other hand, over-reliance on ai can lead to a decline in human cognitive skills, as people may become less inclined to think critically and solve problems independently.

benefits of using ai in daily life

efficiency and productivity: ai automates repetitive tasks, freeing up time for more complex activities. for example, ai-powered chatbots can handle customer inquiries, allowing human employees to focus on more strategic tasks.

personalization: ai can analyze vast amounts of data to provide personalized recommendations, such as suggesting products based on past purchases or tailoring content to individual preferences.

healthcare advancements: ai is used in diagnostics, treatment planning, and even robotic surgeries, improving patient outcomes and healthcare efficiency.

enhanced decision-making: ai can process large datasets quickly, providing insights that help in making informed decisions in business, finance, and other fields.

convenience: ai-powered virtual assistants like siri and alexa make it easier to manage daily tasks, from setting reminders to controlling smart home devices.

limitations of using ai in daily life

job displacement: automation can lead to job losses in certain sectors, as machines replace human labor.

privacy concerns: ai systems often require large amounts of data, raising concerns about data privacy and security.

bias and fairness: ai algorithms can perpetuate existing biases if they are trained on biased data, leading to unfair or discriminatory outcomes.

dependence on technology: over-reliance on ai can reduce human skills and critical thinking abilities.

high costs: developing and maintaining ai systems can be expensive, which may limit access for smaller businesses or individuals.

further reading

mit horizon, kmpg, ai magazine, bcg, techopedia, technology review, microsoft, science direct-1, science direct-2

my personal standpoint is that people must educate themselves and be mindful of not only what ai they are using, but how they use it. we should not become reliant - we are our own people! balancing the use of ai with human skills and critical thinking is key to harnessing its full potential responsibly.

🫶nene

[prettieinpink]

hey! do u have any advice on how to stop feeling guilty during self care? i was taking care of myself by watching my fave show in bed, and I genuinely felt rested. Until I remembered that I used to do the same thing during my lowest/lazy era. but at the same time, it’s like I was in bed to take care of myself, not to be lazy. so how do I get rid of the sort of unproductive feeling? I also feel like im wasting my time doing self care like that while other people are out doing more :(

REMINDER, SELF-CARE IS NOT BEAUTY OR CONSUMPTION. This is a reminder for everyone, that self-care is not beauty practices or purchasing items. 

ACKNOWLEDGE THAT SELF-CARE IS ESSENTIAL. Self-care is vital to maximize our productivity. You have to separate the negative connotation of watching TV as laziness. It’s a way for you to rest your mind and body. 

If you feel lazy while doing this self-care activity, pair it with another low-energy productive activity. For example, while watching TV, you can make any important list like a to-do list, groceries, or project ideas. 

REFRAME YOUR MINDSET. Instead of saying to yourself ‘I feel like I’m wasting my time’, write down a reminder on your device saying that ‘self-care is a time for me to regenerate my energy’. Every time you get this thought, refer back to that note. 

ASSOCIATED WITH INDULGENCE. The most common self-care practices we see, are typically the behaviours of people who tend to be over-indulgent or lazy. True self-care requires intention and mindfulness, and not mindless consumption. 

As long as you intend to rest, and you’re doing it in a mindful manner that allows your mind to slow down, is not laziness. 

MAKE TIME DAILY. Self-care is not a treat, it’s a daily need that both of our physical and mental selves need to rejuvenate for tasks that require energy. So, it’s easy to feel guilty if we’re not practicing self-care every day. 

This time can be used whenever in your day, but it’s most effective when your energy levels are the lowest. When you make it a habit, you’re going to feel less guilty over time as you get used to the feeling of self-care. 

SET BOUNDARIES. It’s easy for intentional time for ourselves to turn into mindless indulgence. So, you may also feel like you’re neglecting your responsibilities or tasks that you need to do. Most of the time it’s just a feeling, but it can happen.  If you feel like you need to set boundaries for yourself, go for it. Set a timer for an hour before you get back to your to-do list, make a list of non-negotiables before self-care time, and be realistic about what self-care means to you.

[transmutationisms]

thoughts on veganism? i find it pretty complicated considering how many leftists view the ethical + environmental complications while knowing i will never be vegan bc Eating Disorder.

i mean i don't think those two positions are actually in tension though. like, anybody with serious communist political commitments understands that individual consumption patterns are not the same as a political movement for systemic change—there is value in trying to collectively reduce meat consumption, & for some people a vegan consumption pattern is just the only ethical response to the issues of interspecies justice that animal product consumption raises. but people who are serious about both communism and veganism are not asking you to endanger yourself by following dietary rules that are unsafe for you, nor do they think that the entire animal agriculture industry would collapse if only you as an individual would agree to do so. if food justice is something you care about i think there are much broader conversations and political movements to get involved with here, which ultimately aim to provide all people with sufficient food that is produced in ways that don't cause massive ecological damage or needless animal suffering. a just and sustainable food system will probably never be able to provide people with the amount of meat / dairy that, eg, usamericans are accustomed to eating, and plant foods definitely do need to become more reliably available, affordable, sustainably produced, &c. but like, i'm talking here about massive fundamental changes to the entire system of growing, processing, and distributing food; these are questions of political import that you can absolutely care about & be involved in even if, in present circumstances, eschewing all animal products is not practicable for you.

[dailyanarchistposts]

E.6 What is the population myth?

The idea that population growth is the key cause of ecological problems is extremely commonplace. Even individuals associated with such radical green groups as Earth First! have promoted it. It is, however, a gross distortion of the truth. Capitalism is the main cause of both overpopulation and the ecological crisis.

Firstly, we should point out that all the “doomsday” prophets of the “population bomb” have been proved wrong time and time again. The dire predictions of Thomas Malthus, the originator of the population myth, have not come true, yet neo-Malthusians continue to mouth his reactionary ideas. In fact Malthus wrote his infamous “Essay on the Principles of Population” which inflicted his “law of population” onto the world in response to the anarchist William Godwin and other social reformers. In other words, it was explicitly conceived as an attempt to “prove” that social stratification, and so the status quo, was a “law of nature” and that poverty was the fault of the poor themselves, not the fault of an unjust and authoritarian socio-economic system. As such, the “theory” was created with political goals in mind and as a weapon in the class struggle (as an aside, it should be noted that Darwin argued his theory of natural selection was “the doctrine of Malthus applied to the whole animal and vegetable kingdom.” [quoted by Peter Marshall, Nature’s Web, p. 320] In other words, anarchism, indirectly, inspired the theory of evolution. Perhaps unsurprisingly, in the form of Social Darwinism this was also used against working class people and social reform).

As Kropotkin summarised, Malthus work was “pernicious” in its influence. It “summed up ideas already current in the minds of the wealth-possessing minority” and arose to combat the “ideas of equality and liberty” awakened by the French and American revolutions. Malthus asserted against Godwin “that no equality is possible; that the poverty of the many is not due to institutions, but is a natural law.” This meant he “thus gave the rich a kind of scientific argument against the ideas of equality.” However, it was simply “a pseudo-scientific” assertion which reflected “the secret desires of the wealth-possessing classes” and not a scientific hypothesis. This is obvious as technology has ensured that Malthus’s fears are “groundless” while they are continually repeated. [Fields, Factories and Workshops Tomorrow, p. 77, p. 78 and p. 79]

That the theory was fundamentally ideological in nature can be seen from Malthus himself. It is interesting to note that in contrast, and in direct contradiction to his population “theory,” as an economist Malthus was worried about the danger of over-production within a capitalist economy. He was keen to defend the landlords from attacks by Ricardo and had to find a reason for their existence. To do this, he attacked Say’s Law (the notion that over-production was impossible in a free market economy). Utilising the notion of effective demand, he argued that capitalist saving caused the threat of over-production and it was the landlords luxury consumption which made up the deficit in demand this caused and ensured a stable economy. As Marxist David McNally points out, the “whole of this argument is completely at odds with the economic analysis” of his essay on population. According to that, the “chronic … danger which confronts society is underproduction of food relative to people.” In his economics book, the world “is threatened by overproduction. Rather than there being too little supply relative to demand, there is now too little demand relative to supply.” In fact, Malthus even went so far as to argue for the poor to be employed in building roads and public works! No mention of “excess” population there, which indicates well the ideological nature of his over-population theory. As McNally shows, it was the utility of Malthus’s practical conclusions in his “Essay on the Principles of Population” for fighting the poor law and the right to subsistence (i.e. welfare provisions) which explained his popularity: “he made classical economics an open enemy of the working class.” [“The Malthusian Moment: Political Economy versus Popular Radicalism”, pp. 62–103, Against the Market, p. 85 and p. 91]

So it is easy to explain the support Malthus and his assertions got in spite of the lack of empirical evidence and the self-contradictory utterances of its inventor. Its support rests simply in its utility as a justification for the inhuman miseries inflicted upon the British people by “its” ruling class of aristocrats and industrialists was the only reason why it was given the time of day. Similarly today, its utility to the ruling class ensures that it keeps surfacing every so often, until forced to disappear again once the actual facts of the case are raised. That the population myth, like “genetic” justifications for race-, class- and gender-based oppression, keeps appearing over and over again, even after extensive evidence has disproved it, indicates its usefulness to the ideological guardians of the establishment.

Neo-Malthusianism basically blames the victims of capitalism for their victimisation, criticising ordinary people for “breeding” or living too long, thus ignoring (at best) or justifying (usually) privilege — the social root of hunger. To put it simply, the hungry are hungry because they are excluded from the land or cannot earn enough to survive. In Latin America, for example, 11% of the population was landless in 1961, by 1975 it was 40%. Approximately 80% of all Third World agricultural land is owned by 3% of landowners. As anarchist George Bradford stresses, Malthusians “do not consider the questions of land ownership, the history of colonialism, and where social power lies. So when the poor demand their rights, the Malthusians see ‘political instability’ growing from population pressure.” [Woman’s Freedom: Key to the Population Question, p. 77] Bookchin makes a similar critique:

“the most sinister feature about neo-Malthusianism is the extent to which it actively deflects us from dealing with the social origins of our ecological problems — indeed, the extent to which it places the blame for them on the victims of hunger rather than those who victimise them. Presumably, if there is a ‘population problem’ and famine in Africa, it is the ordinary people who are to blame for having too many children or insisting on living too long — an argument advanced by Malthus nearly two centuries ago with respect to England’s poor. The viewpoint not only justifies privilege; it fosters brutalisation and degrades the neo-Malthusians even more than it degrades the victims of privilege.” [“The Population Myth”, pp. 30–48, Which Way for the Ecology Movement?, p. 34]

Increased population is not the cause of landlessness, it is the result of it. If a traditional culture, its values, and its sense of identity are destroyed, population growth rates increase dramatically. As in 17th- and 18th-century Britain, peasants in the Third World are kicked off their land by the local ruling elite, who then use the land to produce cash crops for export while their fellow country people starve. Like Ireland during the Potato Famine, the Third World nations most affected by famine have also been exporters of food to the developed nations. Malthusianism is handy for the wealthy, giving them a “scientific” excuse for the misery they cause so they can enjoy their blood-money without remorse. It is unwise for greens to repeat such arguments:

“It’s a betrayal of the entire message of social ecology to ask the world’s poor to deny themselves access to the necessities of life on grounds that involve long-range problems of ecological dislocation, the shortcomings of ‘high’ technology, and very specious claims of natural shortages in materials, while saying nothing at all about the artificial scarcity engineered by corporate capitalism.” [The Ecology of Freedom, p. 350]

In a country that is being introduced to the joys of capitalism by state intervention (the usual means by which traditional cultures and habits are destroyed to create a “natural system of liberty”), population soon explodes as a result of the poor social and economic conditions in which people find themselves. In the inner-city ghettos of the First World, social and economic conditions similar to those of the Third World give rise to similarly elevated birth rates. When ghetto populations are composed mostly of minorities, as in countries like the US, higher birth rates among the minority poor provides a convenient extra excuse for racism, “proving” that the affected minorities are “inferior” because they “lack self-control,” are “mere animals obsessed with procreation,” etc. Much the same was said of Irish Catholics in the past and, needless to say, such an argument ignores the fact that slum dwellers in, for example, Britain during the Industrial Revolution were virtually all white but still had high birth rates.

Population growth, far from being the cause of poverty, is in fact a result of it. There is an inverse relationship between per capita income and the fertility rate — as poverty decreases, so do the population rates. When people are ground into the dirt by poverty, education falls, women’s rights decrease, and contraception is less available. Having children then becomes virtually the only survival means, with people resting their hopes for a better future in their offspring. Therefore social conditions have a major impact on population growth. In countries with higher economic and cultural levels, population growth soon starts to fall off. Today, for example, much of Europe has seen birth rates fall beyond the national replacement rate. This is the case even in Catholic countries, which one would imagine would have religious factors encouraging large families.

To be clear, we are not saying that overpopulation is not a very serious problem. Obviously, population growth cannot be ignored or solutions put off until capitalism is eliminated. We need to immediately provide better education and access to contraceptives across the planet as well as raising cultural levels and increasing women’s rights in order to combat overpopulation in addition to fighting for land reform, union organising and so on. Overpopulation only benefits the elite by keeping the cost of labour low. This was the position of the likes of Emma Goldman and other radicals of her time:

“Many working-class radicals accepted the logic that excessive numbers were what kept the poor in their misery. During the nineteenth century there were courageous attempts to disseminate birth-control information both to promote lower population and to make it possible for women to control their own reproductivity and escape male domination. Birth control was the province of feminism, radical socialism and anarchism.” [Bradford, Op. Cit., p. 69]

Unlike many neo-Malthusians Goldman was well aware that social reasons explained why so many people went hungry. As she put it, “if the masses of people continue to be poor and the rich grow ever richer, it is not because the earth is lacking in fertility and richness to supply the need of an excessive race, but because the earth is monopolised in the hands of the few to the exclusion of the many.” She noted that the promotion of large families had vested interests behind it, although working class people “have learned to see in large families a millstone around their necks, deliberately imposed upon them by the reactionary forces in society because a large family paralyses the brain and benumbs the muscles of the masses … [The worker] continues in the rut, compromises and cringes before his master, just to earn barely enough to feed the many little mouths. He dare not join a revolutionary organisation; he dare not go on strike; he dare not express an opinion.” [“The Social Aspects of Birth Control”, Anarchy! An Anthology of Emma Goldman’s Mother Earth, p. 135 and pp. 136–7] This support for birth control, it should be stressed, resulted in Goldman being arrested. Malthus, like many of his followers “opposed contraception as immoral, preferring to let the poor starve as a ‘natural’ method of keeping numbers down. For him, only misery, poverty, famine, disease, and war would keep population from expanding beyond the carrying capacity of the land.” [Bradford, Op. Cit., p. 69]

Unsurprisingly, Goldman linked the issue of birth control to that of women’s liberation arguing that “I never will acquiesce or submit to authority, nor will I make peace with a system which degrades woman to a mere incubator and which fattens on her innocent victims. I now and here declare war upon this system.” The key problem was that woman “has been on her knees before the altar of duty imposed by God, by Capitalism, by the State, and by Morality” for ages. Once that changed, the issue of population would solve itself for ”[a]fter all it is woman whom is risking her health and sacrificing her youth in the reproduction of the race. Surely she ought to be in a position to decide how many children she should bring into world, whether they should be brought into the world by the man she loves and because she wants the child, or should be born in hatred and loathing.” [Op. Cit., p. 140 and p. 136]

Other anarchists have echoed this analysis. George Bradford, for example, correctly notes that “the way out of the [ecological] crisis lies in the practical opening toward freedom of self-expression and selfhood for women that is the key to the destruction of hierarchy.” In other words, women’s “freedom and well-being are at the centre of the resolution to the population problem, and that can only be faced within the larger social context.” That means “real participation in social decision-making, real health concerns, access to land, and the overthrow of patriarchal domination.” [Op. Cit., p. 68 and p. 82] Bookchin makes the same point, noting that population growth rates have fallen in developed countries because “of the freedom that women have acquired over recent decades to transcend the role that patriarchy assigned to them as mere reproductive factories.” [“The Future of the Ecology Movement,” pp. 1–20, Which Way for the Ecology Movement?, p. 19]

This means that an increase of freedom will solve the population question. Sadly, many advocates of neo-Malthusianism extend control over people from women to all. The advocates of the “population myth,” as well as getting the problem wrong, also (usually) suggest very authoritarian “solutions” — for example, urging an increase in state power with a “Bureau of Population Control” to “police” society and ensure that the state enters the bedroom and our most personal relationships. Luckily for humanity and individual freedom, since they misconceive the problem, such “Big Brother” solutions are not required.

So, it must be stressed the “population explosion” is not a neutral theory, and its invention reflected class interests at the time and continual use since then is due to its utility to vested interests. We should not be fooled into thinking that overpopulation is the main cause of the ecological crisis, as this is a strategy for distracting people from the root-cause of both ecological destruction and population growth today: namely, the capitalist economy and the inequalities and hierarchical social relationships it produces. As such, those who stress the issue of population numbers get it backward. Poverty causes high birth rates as people gamble on having large families so that some children will survive in order to look after the parents in their old age. Eliminate economic insecurity and poverty, then people have less children.

Some Greens argue that it is impossible for everyone to have a high standard of living, as this would deplete available resources and place too much pressure on the environment. However, their use of statistics hides a sleight of hand which invalidates their argument. As Bookchin correctly argues:

“Consider the issue of population and food supply in terms of mere numbers and we step on a wild merry-go-round that does not support neo-Malthusian predictions of a decade ago, much less a generation ago. Such typically neo-Malthusian stunts as determining the ‘per capita consumption’ of steel, oil, paper, chemicals, and the like of a nation by dividing the total tonnage of the latter by the national population, such that every man, women, and child is said to ‘consume’ a resultant quantity, gives us a picture that is blatantly false and functions as a sheer apologia for the upper classes. The steel that goes into a battleship, the oil that is used to fuel a tank, and the paper that is covered by ads hardly depicts the human consumption of materials. Rather, it is stuff consumed by all the Pentagons of the world that help keep a ‘grow-or-die economy in operation — goods, I may add, whose function is to destroy and whose destiny is to be destroyed.” [“The Population Myth”, pp. 30–48, Which Way for the Ecology Movement?, pp. 34–5]

Focusing on averages, in other words, misses out the obvious fact we live in a highly unequal societies which results in a few people using many resources. To talk about consumption and not to wonder how many Rolls Royces and mansions the “average” person uses means producing skewed arguments. Equally, it is possible to have more just societies with approximately the same living standards with significantly less consumption of resources and less pollution and waste produced. We need only compare America with Europe to see this. One could point out, for example, that Europeans enjoy more leisure time, better health, less poverty, less inequality and thus more economic security, greater intergenerational economic mobility, better access to high-quality social services like health care and education, and manage to do it all in a far more environmentally sustainable way (Europe generates about half the CO2 emissions for the same level of GDP) compared to the US.

In fact, even relatively minor changes in how we work can have significant impact. For example, two economists at the Center for Economic and Policy Research produced a paper comparing U.S. and European energy consumption and related it to hours worked. They concluded that if Americans chose to take advantage of their high level of productivity by simply shortening the workweek or taking longer holidays rather than producing more, there would follow a number of benefits. Specifically, if the U.S. followed Western Europe in terms of work hours then not only would workers find themselves with seven additional weeks of time off, the US would consume some 20% less energy and if this saving was directly translated into lower carbon emissions then it would have emitted 3% less carbon dioxide in 2002 than in 1990 (this level of emissions is only 4% above the negotiated target of the Kyoto Protocol). If Europe following IMF orthodoxy and increased working hours, this would have a corresponding negative impact on energy use and emissions (not to mention quality of life). [David Rosnick and Mark Weisbrot, Are Shorter Work Hours Good for the Environment?] Of course, any such choice is influenced by social institutions and pressures and, as such, part of a wider social struggle for change.

In other words, we must question the underlying assumption of the neo-Malthusians that society and technology are static and that the circumstances that produced historic growth and consumption rates will remain unchanged. This is obviously false, since humanity is not static. To quote Bookchin again:

“by reducing us to studies of line graphs, bar graphs, and statistical tables, the neo-Malthusians literally freeze reality as it is. Their numerical extrapolations do not construct any reality that is new; they mere extend, statistic by statistic, what is basically old and given .. . We are taught to accept society, behaviour, and values as they are, not as they should be or even could be. This procedure places us under the tyranny of the status quo and divests us of any ability to think about radically changing the world. I have encountered very few books or articles written by neo-Malthusians that question whether we should live under any kind of money economy at all, any statist system of society, or be guided by profit oriented behaviour. There are books and articles aplenty that explain ‘how to’ become a ‘morally responsible’ banker, entrepreneur, landowner, ‘developer,’ or, for all I know, arms merchant. But whether the whole system called capitalism (forgive me!), be it corporate in the west or bureaucratic in the east, must be abandoned if we are to achieve an ecological society is rarely discussed.” [Op. Cit., p. 33]

It is probably true that an “American” living standard is not possible for the population of the world at its present level (after all, the US consumes 40% of the world’s resources to support only 5% of its population). For the rest of the world to enjoy that kind of standard of living we would require the resources of multiple Earths! Ultimately, anything which is not renewable is exhaustible. The real question is when will it be exhausted? How? Why? And by whom? As such, it is important to remember that this “standard of living” is a product of an hierarchical system which produces an alienated society in which consumption for the sake of consumption is the new god. In a grow-or-die economy, production and consumption must keep increasing to prevent economic collapse. This need for growth leads to massive advertising campaigns to indoctrinate people with the capitalist theology that more and more must be consumed to find “happiness” (salvation), producing consumerist attitudes that feed into an already-present tendency to consume in order to compensate for doing boring, pointless work in a hierarchical workplace. Unless a transformation of values occurs that recognises the importance of living as opposed to consuming, the ecological crisis will get worse. It is impossible to imagine such a radical transformation occurring under capitalism and so a key aim of eco-anarchists is to encourage people to consider what they need to live enriched, empowering and happy lives rather than participate in the rat race capitalism produces (even if you do win, you remain a rat).

Nor it cannot be denied that developments like better health care, nutrition, and longer lifespans contribute to overpopulation and are made possible by “industry.” But to see such developments as primary causes of population growth is to ignore the central role played by poverty, the disruption of cultural patterns, and the need for cheap labour due to capitalism. There are always elevated birth rates associated with poverty, whether or not medical science improves significantly (for example, during the early days of capitalism). “Industrialism” is in fact a term used by liberal Greens (even when they call themselves “deep”) who do not want to admit that the ecological crisis cannot be solved without the complete overthrow of capitalism, pretending instead that the system can become “green” through various band-aid reforms. “Controlling population growth” is always a key item on such liberals’ agendas, taking the place of “eliminating capitalism,” which should be the centrepiece. “Population control is substituted for social justice, and the problem is actually aggravated by the Malthusian ‘cure’,” points out feminist Betsy Hartmann. [quoted by Bradford, Op. Cit., p. 77]

After all, there is enough food to feed the world’s population but its distribution reflects inequalities in wealth, power and effective demand (this is most obviously seen when food is exported from famine areas as there is no effective demand for it there, a sadly regular occurrence). The “myth that population increases in places like the Sudan, for example, result in famine” can only survive if we ignore “the notorious fact that the Sudanese could easily feed themselves if they were not forced by the American-controlled World Bank and International Monetary Fund to grow cotton instead of grains.” [Bookchin, Remaking Society, p. 11] Hence the importance of class analysis and an awareness of hierarchy. We can hardly talk of “our” resources when those resources are owned by a handful of giant corporations. Equally, we cannot talk about “our” industrial impact on the planet when the decisions of industry are made by a bosses and most of us are deliberately excluded from the decision making process. While it makes sense for the ruling elite to ignore such key issues, it counter-productive for radicals to do so and blame “people” or their numbers for social and environmental problems:

“The most striking feature of such way of thinking is not only that it closely parallels the way of thinking that is found in the corporate world. What is more serious is that it serves to deflect our attention from the role society plays in producing ecological breakdown. If ‘people’ as a species are responsible for environmental dislocations, these dislocations cease to be the result of social dislocations. A mythic ‘Humanity’ is created — irrespective of whether we are talking about oppressed minorities, women, Third World people, or people in the First World — in which everyone is brought into complicity with powerful corporate elites in producing environmental dislocations. In this way, the social roots of ecological problems are shrewdly obscured … [W]e can dismiss or explain away hunger, misery, or illness as ‘natural checks’ that are imposed on human beings to retain the ‘balance of nature.’ We can comfortably forget that much of the poverty and hunger that afflicts the world has its origins in the corporate exploitation of human beings and nature — in agribusiness and social oppression.” [Op. Cit., pp. 9–10]

Looking at population numbers simply misses the point. As Murray Bookchin argues, this “arithmetic mentality which disregards the social context of demographics is incredibly short-sighted. Once we accept without any reflection or criticism that we live in a ‘grow-or-die’ capitalistic society in which accumulation is literally a law of economic survival and competition is the motor of ‘progress,’ anything we have to say about population is basically meaningless. The biosphere will eventually be destroyed whether five billion or fifty million live on the planet. Competing firms in a ‘dog-eat-dog’ market must outproduce each other if they are to remain in existence. They must plunder the soil, remove the earth’s forests, kill off its wildlife, pollute its air and waterways not because their intentions are necessarily bad, although they usually are … but because they must simply survive. Only a radical restructuring of society as a whole, including its anti-ecological sensibilities, can remove this all commanding social compulsion.” [“The Population Myth”, pp. 30–48, Op. Cit., p. 34] A sane society would not be driven by growth for the sake of growth and would aim to reduce production by reducing the average working week to ensure both an acceptable standard of living plus time to enjoy it. So it is not a case that the current industrial system is something we need to keep. Few anarchists consider a social revolution as simply expropriating current industry and running it more or less as it is now. While expropriating the means of life is a necessary first step, it is only the start of a process in which we transform the way we interact with nature (which, of course, includes people).

To conclude, as Bradford summarises the “salvation of the marvellous green planet, our Mother Earth, depends on the liberation of women — and children, and men — from social domination, exploitation and hierarchy. They must go together.” [Op. Cit., p. 68] By focusing attention away from the root causes of ecological and social disruption — i.e. capitalism and hierarchy — and onto their victims, the advocates of the “population myth” do a great favour to the system that creates mindless growth. Hence the population myth will obviously find favour with ruling elites, and this — as opposed to any basis for the myth in scientific fact — will ensure its continual re-appearance in the media and education.

[omegaphilosophia]

The Philosophy of Minimalism

Minimalism, in philosophical terms, is a lifestyle and mindset that emphasizes the value of simplicity and the intentional reduction of excess in various aspects of life. It is often associated with reducing material possessions, but it also extends to decluttering the mind, simplifying relationships, and focusing on what truly matters. Here’s a detailed exploration of the philosophy of minimalism:

1. Core Principles of Minimalism

Intentionality: Minimalism is about making conscious choices about what to keep and what to eliminate. It involves a deliberate focus on what is essential and meaningful.

Simplicity: The philosophy advocates for simplifying one’s environment and lifestyle to reduce stress and distractions. This can include decluttering physical spaces, simplifying schedules, and streamlining routines.

Focus on Quality: Minimalism emphasizes quality over quantity. This means valuing well-made, durable items and meaningful experiences over an abundance of possessions or superficial engagements.

2. Minimalism and Material Possessions

Decluttering: A central aspect of minimalism is the reduction of material possessions. This involves removing items that do not add value or joy to one’s life.

Sustainable Consumption: Minimalists often advocate for mindful and sustainable consumption. This includes buying less, choosing eco-friendly products, and reducing waste.

Financial Freedom: By focusing on needs rather than wants, minimalism can lead to financial savings and a greater sense of financial security.

3. Minimalism and Mental Clarity

Mental Decluttering: Minimalism extends to mental and emotional spaces. It encourages reducing mental clutter by letting go of negative thoughts, unnecessary worries, and mental distractions.

Mindfulness: Practicing mindfulness and being present in the moment are key aspects of minimalism. This helps individuals appreciate what they have and reduces the constant craving for more.

4. Minimalism in Relationships

Quality Over Quantity: Minimalism in relationships focuses on deep, meaningful connections rather than a large number of superficial relationships.

Boundaries and Prioritization: It involves setting healthy boundaries and prioritizing relationships that bring joy, support, and growth.

5. Minimalism and Technology

Digital Declutter: Minimalism encourages a mindful approach to technology use. This can involve reducing screen time, simplifying digital spaces, and being intentional about online activities.

Focus on Essential Tools: Using technology that serves a clear purpose and enhances one’s life, rather than getting caught up in the latest gadgets or apps.

6. Philosophical and Ethical Considerations

Minimalism and Ethics: The philosophy of minimalism often intersects with ethical considerations such as sustainability, consumerism, and social responsibility. It challenges the culture of overconsumption and promotes a more conscious way of living.

Existential Minimalism: Some minimalists explore the existential dimension of simplicity, questioning the nature of fulfillment and the meaning of life. This can lead to a deeper understanding of what truly brings happiness and contentment.

7. Cultural and Historical Perspectives

Historical Roots: Minimalism has roots in various philosophical and religious traditions, such as Stoicism, Buddhism, and Transcendentalism, which all emphasize simplicity and the reduction of desires.

Modern Minimalism: The contemporary minimalist movement has been popularized by figures like Marie Kondo and the Minimalists (Joshua Fields Millburn and Ryan Nicodemus), who advocate for decluttering and simplifying life.

The philosophy of minimalism offers a pathway to a more intentional, simplified, and meaningful life. By focusing on what is essential and reducing the excess, minimalism can lead to greater mental clarity, stronger relationships, financial freedom, and a deeper sense of fulfillment. It challenges the norms of consumer culture and invites individuals to reconsider their values and priorities.

[hellish-hyperfixation]

hheleleoll!! i wanna request a changbin x male reader fluff where changbin has a crush on the reader!! myb changbin gets a little clingy w the reader too,,, have a nice day <333

safe haven | seo changbin x male reader

Changbin struggled with his lack of privacy in public as an idol, and asked Chan in desperation. He received a new friend, and more.

requested

word count: 2.7k

reblogs and comments are always appreciated^^

a/n: hey:) i normally dont take this long to get a fic out, but lifes been kicking me in the ass. it's not my best work, but hope you still enjoy!

It wasn’t often that Changbin was able to escape the idol lifestyle. Everybody assumes that it’s a blast, that he pumps out songs like it's nothing, and that every interview and performance is always a joy — but there are downsides to any job. Being an idol was no exception.

For Changbin, the worst downside was the lack of privacy. He felt like he couldn’t go anywhere other than the dorm, the studio, or the company without being watched, interviewed, approached, or photographed. Every time he was at a restaurant for a quick bite, or walking along the Han river for some fresh air, he would end up stopped by a fan who wanted his signature, or journalists looking for a new scoop, which ruined his illusion of being a normal person who’s able to enjoy normal things, normally. As much as he loved his fans and his job, he hated it.

He wanted a safe place where he could be himself, without worrying about the side effects of fame catching up to him like the immortal snail that’s a million times faster and more persistent.

Changbin thought he’d never find it. He’d gone to practically every restaurant, cafe, and library that he could find tucked away in a corner. All of them had a fan, a person who recognized him, a journalist, or sometimes even his coworkers who knew he wasn’t supposed to be wandering around. He was just about to give up. Resign to the inescapable consumption of his privacy.

He thanks every god in existence and non-existence that he didn’t.

________

“A flower shop?”

Changbin went to Chan with his problem in the middle of production when they were both stuck, hoping for some advice or at least for someone to listen, and received the former.

“Yeah, behind that cafe next to the gym. I go there sometimes to grab flowers for my parents when they visit, and the florist is great. He knows about…” he trails off and gestures vaguely to their surroundings, “but treats me like a close friend instead of a celebrity” he finished with a wide grin.

After a moment of silence and thought, Changbin came to a conclusion.

“We’re done for the day, yeah?” He didn’t bother waiting for Chan’s response as he started packing up his stuff, and Chan simply snorted at his eagerness.

“Tell him I said hi.” Chan tossed his hand in the air as a half-assed wave while Changbin nodded, already halfway out the door.

________

It was a fairly slow day, unsurprising as it wasn’t a particularly busy season, so you were taking it easy in the flower shop by reorganizing some out of place pots and cleaning up in little nooks and crannies you usually had no time for. You were even considering closing up early, as nobody had stopped by for a few hours, when the quiet jingle of your front door opening resonated throughout the small area.

“One moment, please!” You called out to the visitor and got up from your cleaning spot on the floor, dusting the soil off the front of your apron, before making your way to the visitor.

“Hey, welcome in! Looking for anything in particular?” You started your usual spiel, when you noticed exactly who it was in your shop.

Seo Changbin.

You didn’t show any signs of recognition and treated him as you would any other customer. You’d heard enough times from Chan to know that any special treatment was rarely welcome for celebrities, after all.

“H-hi, um–hello! No, there’s nothing, really. I’m just, uh… Just browsing.”

How eloquent.

Changbin mentally slapped himself at the stumble, but in his defense, he hadn’t expected to be caught so off guard by how cute you were. The dirt on your face and stray roots in your hair, the apron with your shop’s (also adorable) logo on the front, and even the little nametag with a chibi version of yourself next to it — oh what a gorgeous name it was.

More importantly, though, you seemed friendly. Not obsessed, nor faking in order to pry information out of him, but genuinely friendly. The rapper could cry at how wonderful it felt.

Maybe he was exaggerating a little, but the quaint little shop felt straight out of a fairy tale, and he couldn’t help but blow the goodness of it a bit out of proportion.

“Alright, then! Let me know if you need anything, I’ll be just over here.” You resumed your work, although you opted for cleaning a few shelves rather than the floor, just to maintain your image. Changbin nodded in response and stood in the middle of your shop, rather dumbly, realizing he didn’t have a particular reason to be in a flower shop of all places.

He looked around and spotted a section for small household plants.

I guess we could do with some greenery in the dorm.

He knew it was a flimsy excuse, but he took it and made his way over to the plants, pretending he knew what he was looking for. It took longer than it should’ve to pick one out, as his eyes were often occupied with observing you humming to yourself while dusting off the shelves. Some of the tunes sounded suspiciously similar to the ones he’d heard hundreds of times in his studio, and he found it endearing.

He thought he was being rather discreet about his observations. Unfortunately for him, he was anything but. You felt a gaze on you and looked up at the rapper, only to be met with his eyes already on you more than once. His most common reaction was to look away guiltily with a newfound flush on his cheeks and ears. Sometimes, he’d try to play it off by looking at signs above your head or flowers on the shelf you were cleaning.

It was cute.

The next time you looked up, it was to Changbin inching his way towards the counter with a plant in his hands. You took that as your cue to make your way to the counter as well.

“A heartleaf philodendron, huh?” You commented on the plant in his hands, ringing him up.

“Sorry?” He responded, once again rather dumbly, making you chuckle.

“This lil guy,” you pat one of the leaves, “is called a heartleaf philodendron. Fun fact, they represent love of nature and growth in some folklore.”

“I totally knew that! Because I picked this plant intentionally, because that's why I came here, to buy a heartleaf phil.. um….” he trailed off with a weak embarrassed chuckle, and his shoulders tensed up the slightest bit.

“You didn’t come here to buy something, did you?” You stated more than asked, though not unkindly. His sheepish smile was everything you needed to know the answer.

“Yeah, I don’t know anything about plants. I just came here because Chan told me how cool you were, and I wanted a place to be able to hang out without… well, you know.” He expected you to be mad at him, or at least irritated, but he was mistaken.

“You could’ve just said so! I’m more than fine with you hanging out in the shop, even if you don’t buy anything.” You invited him with a wide grin and a wink, and Changbin visibly relaxed at your words.

“Really? You wouldn’t mind?”

You waved him off.

“I’d enjoy the company. Beats sitting around waiting for customers all day alone.”

Changbin left the store with a new number in his phone, a new plant for the dorm, a new friend, and a new crush.

________

You became a common topic of conversation in the dorm, very quickly. Many rooms in the dorm were slowly filling up with various plants and flowers, and each Stray Kids member’s brains were quickly filling up with information about you that Changbin learned and couldn’t wait to share, or things you did that had Changbin weak in the knees.

Meanwhile, in the shop, Changbin became a commonly found sight at the little desk behind the counter. When he wasn’t on tour, working out, or practicing, he was in the flower shop doing his own work or helping you with yours. It got to the point that, more often than not, he would help you close up and the two of you would talk for hours afterward over drinks (that you went out to buy).

At a certain point, it became undeniably true.

Changbin had a crush on you.

He stayed in denial for a few weeks, brushing off his excitement as simply enjoying having a new friend and place to hang out, but quickly learned that spending time with friends doesn’t typically make his chest ache, hands shake, and mind stay awake during ungodly hours of the night while thinking about them.

He wasn’t sure what to do with his feelings. As much as he was a part of the production of romantic songs, the next moves weren’t as clear as a sweet confession and happily ever after.

This is what brought him to once again go to Chan for help. As little romantic experience as the man had, he was wise, and Changbin trusted in his judgment.

Similarly to the last time Changbin went to Chan for advice, they were in the studio, in the middle of a lyric rut. Unlike last time, Jisung was there too, and both friends were quickly informed of Changbin’s dilemma.

“Have you tried asking him out?” Jisung suggested from his position upside down on the couch, tossing a candy wrapper at the lovesick producer, which Changbin threw back with practiced ease. It hit Jisung’s forehead and he sat upright.

“Yes, and it went so well that we got married and bought a house in the suburbs and– no, of course I didn’t ask him out, why do you think I’m here?” Jisung rolled his eyes at the sarcastic response, and Chan rolled his eyes at the two’s antics.

“In all seriousness, it’s not a bad idea, Bin.”

Changbin’s head nearly fell off with how quickly he turned it to face Chan.

“How is it not a bad idea? What if he hates me? What if he thinks it’s creepy? What if he thinks I was using him and his kindness for my-”

“You know he’d never do that.”

It was as though the entire room fell into a void of silence. Chan’s words cut through Changbin’s seemingly endless stream of self-deprecating thoughts, and it was silent. For the first time since Changbin started debating what to do with his feelings, it was silent.

He felt it deep in his soul: that Chan was right.

You would never judge him.

Chan was soon met with the familiar sight of Changbin leaving the studio in a hurry, and he and Jisung kept working without a word, silently coming to the agreement that they would tease him relentlessly later.

_______

"Bin!" You called out when you saw the familiar figure slip into your shop. Almost immediately, he was by your side and helping you lift up a flower pot onto a shelf. You didn’t really need it, but you allowed it because he was cute.

It was nearly closing time. The evening sun shone through the large windows of the shop, making the entire room appear to shine various shades of orange and yellow. You shone with it, Changbin thought. He felt breathless looking at you, who smiled at him even though he felt like he did nothing to deserve it. Had he been in one of his cheesier moods, he’d say your smile was brighter than the sun.

“H-hey! Um… I actually wanted to talk to you about something. If you have time, that is.” Changbin managed to spit out while reaching out for your hand, just to fidget with your fingers. It was a habit you, once again, found cute. When you weren’t busy around the shop or tending to customers, you often sat next to him at his desk, and (after some initial awkwardness) he wasn’t shy about touching. The producer often played with your hands, placed his head on your shoulder, or tapped your foot with his. Sometimes, after you guys close up together and have (alcoholic or nonalcoholic) drinks on the little couch in the back, he would place your head on his lap and run his fingers through your hair.

You swung your hand between yours and Changbin’s bodies, making him sway a little with the force as you responded.

“I’ll always have time for you, Bin.”

The two of you quickly closed up, a little earlier than usual, and Changbin tried to ignore the heat gathering at the tips of his ears the entire time.

After you double checked all the locks and the inventory, you plopped down next to Changbin on the little couch with two cans of his favorite drink, nearly crushing his thigh with how closely you sat.

“So, what did you wanna talk about?” You questioned, handing him his drink.

Changbin didn’t respond right away. Rather, he took a moment to do a quick breathing exercise, which worried you. Was it that serious?

He eventually looked back up at your face, and you could see a not-so-subtle blush on his cheeks.

“I… I guess it’s better to just get it out. I really like you.”

He shut his eyes as though he were afraid, then reopened them as though he regretted the decision. His hands were endlessly fiddling with your fingers and the hem of your shirt. He was nervous.

“I-it’s okay if you don’t feel the same. These feelings were just… too much. I wanted to let you know.”

You didn’t know how to respond. Of course you liked him as well, who wouldn’t? But your next words were some of the most important that you’d say in your life, and you didn’t want to mess them up.

Changbin was beginning to mistake the silence as rejection, and you mentally punched yourself for letting the silence stretch out that long.

“W-we can still be friends, right?” He asked hopefully, and you were still on pause.

“Wait–Changbin, I like you too,” you finally got out. The change on his face from utter defeatedness to confusion to blush was almost worth the silence.

“Really?” His face lit up. Like a puppy seeing his owner walk through the door. You could only chuckle at his excitement.

“Then– do you wanna go on a date? With me?"

You just managed a nod before you were pulled into a bone-crushing hug. You couldn’t breathe very well, but humored Changbin and antics. He was too cute to bring his infectious happiness down, after all.

Once he let you go, Changbin cupped your face with his hands, squishing your cheeks together just a little bit. You’re sure your smile was crooked, and you probably didn’t look your best in that moment — covered in dirt and messy hair from having run your hands through it all day — but he didn’t mind. Oh, how could he? This moment is easily contested with his first performance as an official member of Stray Kids as one of the happiest in his life.

After a little more squealing and smiling and hugging and holding, Changbin managed to tear himself off of you to go back to the dorms. It was a little earlier than he usually left, which nearly irritated him, but reminding himself that it was in order to get ready for tomorrow's date was enough to bring back the giddy feelings.

Tomorrow's date.

With you.

He nearly squealed out loud again, but your hand grabbing his stopped him. The sound he made in response to the touch was akin to what a question mark would sound like in webtoons.

"Oh--hey! Is something wr-" his breath left him before he could finish.

You leaned in quicker than he could react and left the softest of kisses on his cheek. It could hardly be considered a kiss — maybe a brush of skin would be a better term — but it was more than enough to get Changbin's face red once more.

"I– that— you— wha–"

"Bye, Binnie~" you nudged him the rest of the way out the door and closed it once he was out, making sure to send a wink his way first.

With all the teasing Changbin received once he went back to the dorm, he should've regretted asking you out, but nothing could've taken away the pure joy he felt at even the mere thought of going on a date with you.

[hanslanda77]

Crafting a Transformative Healthy Daily Routine: Your Path to Wellness

In the hustle and bustle of modern life, it's easy to neglect our well-being while tending to various responsibilities. But adopting a healthy daily routine can have a profound impact on our physical, mental, and emotional well-being. Whether you're a student, a working professional, or someone seeking a more balanced life, here's a comprehensive guide to help you create a transformative healthy daily routine.

1. Rise and Shine with Intent: Morning Rituals The way you start your day sets the tone for the rest of it. Begin by waking up at a consistent time to regulate your body's internal clock. Engage in activities that promote mindfulness and positivity, such as meditation, deep breathing exercises, or journaling. Avoid immediately reaching for your phone or electronic devices to prevent a rush of information before you're mentally prepared.

2. Nourish Your Body: Balanced Breakfast Breakfast is often touted as the most important meal of the day, and for good reason. Fuel your body with a nutritious breakfast that includes a mix of complex carbohydrates, protein, and healthy fats. Opt for whole grains, fruits, yogurt, eggs, or smoothies to provide sustained energy throughout the morning.

3. Move and Groove: Physical Activity Incorporate exercise into your daily routine to boost your physical fitness and enhance your mood. Whether it's a brisk walk, a yoga session, or a full gym workout, find an activity you enjoy and make it a non-negotiable part of your day. Regular exercise improves cardiovascular health, increases metabolism, and releases endorphins, the "feel-good" hormones.

4. Structured Work (or Study) Time: Maintain Productivity For those with professional or academic commitments, structuring your work time is crucial. Break your day into focused work intervals, such as the Pomodoro technique (25 minutes of work followed by a 5-minute break). This approach enhances productivity while preventing burnout.

5. Mindful Consumption: Balanced Meals and Hydration Make conscious choices about what you eat and drink throughout the day. Consume a variety of nutrient-rich foods, including lean proteins, colorful vegetables, and healthy fats. Stay hydrated by drinking water regularly. Limit processed foods, sugary snacks, and excessive caffeine.

6. Mental Recharge: Short Breaks and Hobbies Intersperse your day with short breaks to relax your mind. Engage in hobbies you're passionate about, whether it's reading, playing a musical instrument, or practicing a craft. These moments of mental recharge enhance creativity and reduce stress.

7. Connect and Communicate: Social Interaction Human beings thrive on social connections. Dedicate time to interact with friends, family, or colleagues. Engaging in meaningful conversations or spending quality time with loved ones can uplift your spirits and provide emotional support.

8. Evening Wind-Down: Unplug and Relaxation As your day winds down, shift into relaxation mode. Limit screen time before bed to avoid the disruption of sleep-inducing hormones. Instead, read a book, take a warm bath, or practice gentle stretching. A calm evening routine sets the stage for a restful night's sleep.

9. Prioritize Sleep: Restorative Rest Sleep plays a pivotal role in overall health. Aim for 7-9 hours of quality sleep each night. Create a sleep-conducive environment by keeping your bedroom dark, quiet, and at a comfortable temperature. Establish a consistent sleep schedule to regulate your body's internal clock.

10. Reflection and Gratitude: Nighttime Journaling End your day by reflecting on your accomplishments and expressing gratitude. Write down a few things you're thankful for and acknowledge the progress you've made, no matter how small. This positive practice sets the tone for the next day.

Incorporating these elements into your daily routine takes time and commitment, but the benefits are worth the effort. A healthy daily routine can improve your physical health, enhance your mental well-being, and contribute to a more balanced and fulfilling life. Remember, it's not about perfection, but rather about progress and consistency on your journey to wellness.

[cognitivejustice]

The current landscape of hyper-local urban farming across Asia

Globally, urban farming is evolving as cities seek innovative solutions to sustainably feed their growing urban populations. Techniques like vertical farming and hydroponics are at the forefront, allowing crops to be grown in layered setups or water-based environments, minimizing land use, and reducing water consumption.  

Urban farming in Asia presents a rich tapestry of approaches, each shaped by the unique challenges and priorities of the region’s diverse cultures and economies. The rapid urbanization and dense population clusters in Asia make urban agriculture not just a choice but a necessity, driving innovation and adaptation in several key areas. 

China 

China has become a leader in urban agriculture through heavy investment in technology and substantial government support. Initiatives like the Nanjing Green Towers, which incorporate plant life into skyscraper designs, exemplify how urban farming can be integrated into the urban landscape.  

The government has also implemented policies that encourage the development of urban farming, providing subsidies for technology such as hydroponics and aquaponics, which are vital in areas with contaminated soil or water scarcity. 

Japan 

With its limited arable land, Japan has turned to creative solutions to maximize space, such as rooftop gardens and sophisticated indoor farming facilities.  

One notable example is the Pasona Urban Farm, an office building in Tokyo where employees cultivate over 200 species of fruits, vegetables, and rice used in the building’s cafeterias.  

This not only maximizes limited space but also reduces employee stress and improves air quality. 

Singapore 

Singapore’s approach is highly strategic, with urban farming a crucial component of its national food security strategy. The city-state, known for its limited space, has developed cutting-edge vertical farming methods that are now being adopted globally.  

The government supports these innovations through grants and incentives, which has led to the success of vertical farms. These farms use tiered systems to grow vegetables close to residential areas, drastically reducing the need for food transportation and thereby lowering carbon emissions. 

India 

In contrast to the technology-driven approaches seen in other parts of Asia, India’s urban farming is largely community-driven and focuses on achieving food self-sufficiency.  

Projects like the Mumbai Port Trust Garden take unused urban spaces and convert them into flourishing community gardens. These projects are often supported by non-governmental organizations and focus on employing women, thus providing both social and economic benefits. 

Thailand 

Thailand’s urban farming initiatives often blend traditional agricultural practices with modern techniques to enhance food security in urban areas. In Bangkok, projects like the Chao Phraya Sky Park demonstrate how public spaces can be transformed into productive green areas that encourage community farming. These initiatives are supported by both local municipalities and private sectors, which see urban farming as a way to reduce food import dependency and improve urban ecological balance. 

The Philippines 

In the Philippines, urban farming is an adaptive response to urban poverty and food insecurity. Metro Manila hosts numerous community garden projects that are often grassroots-driven, with local government units providing support through land and resources. These gardens supply food and serve as educational platforms to teach urban residents about sustainable practices and nutritional awareness. 

[dresshistorynerd]

How to see through the greenwashing propaganda of the fashion industry - 1

For some background info I made an overview about the impact of fashion industry.

In the light of the Shein brand trip nonsense, I was thinking about how literally every clothing company now engages in greenwashing, even when it's such obvious lie like with Shein. And while most people are not fooled in such blatant cases like that, most cases are not as blatant. To see through the less obvious propaganda often needs a lot of knowledge of the clothing industry, which the average person doesn't have, yet the average person still needs clothing. So instead of trying to expose every company for their bad practices, I thought it might be more helpful to make a post on how to detect greenwashing. I'm going to use four examples, all in the different levels of honesty and responsibility, Shein, H&M, Burberry and Tentree. First I will go into frankly unnecessary amount of detail on Shein, because I fell into a horrifyingly fascinating research rabbit hole and I think it's excellent example on how companies can get away with blatant crimes (allegedly of course). In this first part we will just look into Shien, it's propaganda and reality behind it.

But before I go deeper into this, I want to stress one thing: this is not to say that you can never buy from any brand engaging in dishonest greenwashing, because then you couldn't buy almost any clothing, and you do need clothing. Though I will say, please don't buy from Shein if you in any way can afford not to. There is levels of how bad business practices can be, and they can't be much worse than Shein's, and even beside that, even when super cheep, it's not worth your money. There are other cheep options too. Though I won't hold it against anyone if they buy individual pieces from Shein from time to time, but I would implore at least to considerate, if they really need it and if it might be possible to get something similar from somewhere else. But my point in this is not necessarily to help you make better consumer decisions, because consumption will not save us, but to see through the corporate propaganda and not become complaisant after hearing comforting lies. The corporations are doing everything they can to make you believe they are already fixing the problems within the industry and there's no need for government intervention pinky promise, just keep consuming. But that's all bullshit and government intervention is exactly what is needed.

Before taking a look at our cases, I'll outline the key things I think are good to look for, when presented with sustainability PR.

TRANSPARENCY - Companies are not required to publish much of the information about their practices, but as it has become clear to everyone that the whole fashion industry is a massive problem, opacity has become rightly seen as suspicious. It has become also a sort of marketing method to disclose any evidence of good practices, so when a company is not doing that, and missing out on well working marketing, it raises the question, what are they hiding. Companies may try to give the appearance of transparency, without actually disclosing information. They might write in an easily accessible page about all their lofty goals, promises and achievements in a very vague language, they might talk about being transparent and publishing their data, but that data might be buried somewhere, where it's not easily accessible. Good sign on the other hand would be for example providing supply chain information for a product in the product description.

RELIABLE INFORMATION - Usually it's safer for a company to be vague or silent than to lie, because that might lead to legal consequences, but by cherry-picking and subtly twisting data, it can be turned to be flattering for them. Small companies might provide raw evidence of their facilities and supply chain, like photos, locations, contractor names etc. to give proof for their word. For bigger companies this is not of course possible as their supply chains might be massive and they might have thousands of facilities. However, there are many different independent and governmental organizations that give different kinds of certifications. The certifications are meant to give some reassurance of quality and/or accurate information. However not all certifications are made equal. Most reliable certifications don't have ties to the industry (aka are actually independent, not just in name), have governmental oversight and are given access to the data, from which they do the research themselves.

SUPPLY CHAIN - Giving the origin country of the final product is nowadays standard information to give, as it's required by law for example in EU. It's a red flag, if it's produced in a country, that has lacking environmental or labour laws, poor oversight and/or little protections for people. However, this does not mean that all production in those countries is unethical or questionable, but the risk for that is higher and the need for evidence of the working conditions is also higher. This is however just one part of the production. Before clothing can be sewn, the raw material for fiber must be made/acquired, that material must be turned into fiber, which must be turned into yarn and then the yarn must be woven into fabric. All of these steps in the process need workers, who deserve good working conditions. And depending on what fabric is in question, there's potential for major environmental issues in the different processes. This is why it's important to know more than just the country where the clothing was sewn. There could be certification for ethical sourcing of the fabric for example. With supply chain it's also better if the materials are sourced as locally as possible, to avoid a lot of extra carbon emissions from transportation. Best case scenario would be if the company manages the supply chain themselves locally, so they can know for sure where their materials come from and also avoid middlemen.

BUSINESS MODEL - The reason why it's often so hard to get information on the supply chain is that many companies, especially the large ones, outsource as much as possible. This might seem unintuitive, as the middlemen make production less efficient and costly as everyone takes a cut. However, they do it to outsource risks and responsibility. They don't have to invest into factories or raw material production and they have plausible deniability, if and when there's issues in their supply chain. The complexity of the supply chain provides opacity that is impossible and unreasonable to monitor, which allows the company to buy materials that are unreasonably cheep, while feigning ignorance of worker exploitation. How much the clothing cost can also give some idea on their business model. If it's super cheep, the only way for it to be that cheep is if workers are not payed enough and everything is poorly made. Cheep is always a red flag, though, if it's fairly cheep and I mean basic clothing is not much more than 100 eur (little more in USDs) but not much less than 50 eur, it can be okay or even good quality and with proper pay for workers, if the company doesn't take massive margins and don't have a ton of middlemen in their supply chain. However, expensive is not insurance of quality or good pay for workers. Many expensive brands take massive margins while their production has little difference to fast fashion and their products are poor quality.

CASE STUDY 1: SHEIN

Let's start with the propaganda. In Shein's About Us page, they say:

"SHEIN is a global fashion and lifestyle e-retailer committed to making the beauty of fashion accessible to all."

You see, their goal is to make fashion accessible to everyone, not just privileged few. They back this up by informing how they work in 150 countries, have very wide variety of clothing, are one of the most popular shopping apps, connect with the customers on where they are - social media - and, of course, have ridiculously low prices. Their team of nearly 10,000 employees (of which 58% are women for your information) loves to serve their many many customers, who are most important for Shein. They use "cutting-edge technology" and digitized agile supply chain to track sales and demand and adjust their manufacturing in real time. When they notice a new trend, they immediately put something trendy on sale, make prototypes and order small batches from factories. This is how they keep their inventory waste low and get products quickly to their customers. In their own words:

"By developing proprietary logistics and ecommerce technology, we are disrupting the fashion space and improving outcomes for manufacturers, suppliers and consumers."

We will see, if the "outcomes" are really "improved".

Shein group's website has very extensive information about their sustainability goals and efforts, giving the impression of transparency. It's pretty clear this is in an effort to combat all the allegations towards them. To make their business sustainable in addition to their reduced inventory waste they are "accelerating their transition" to use recycled polyester, promoting their "peer-to-peer resale platform" for Shein products, "eshtablishing" a recycling program for end-of-life products, tracing the material supply chain through their own material tracking platform and conserving forests by replacing viscose with "next generation fibers".

Most of the information they provide is fully meaningless corporate speak and should be taken with the biggest bucket of salt, so let's ask some questions.

DO THEY PROVIDE SPECIFIC DATA ABOUT THEIR PRODUCTION? Surprisingly Shein is much more transparent than I expected. (Though of course the info is in different website than where the average consumer would go.) Shein hasn't taken the standard route, which is to provide as little information as possible, and keeping it vague too, se they could just keep feigning ignorance. As I said, I think it's pretty clear they are providing this much information because their reputation is so bad. Their lack of transparency has been taken as an admission of guilt, so it's not working anymore, and they have taken a new approach into maintaining their plausible deniability. In their website, they provide a sustainability report from years 2021 and 2022. I took a look at the latest one. In it there's a lot of fluff, but they show actual numbers of how many code of conduct violations have been found in audits to supplier facilities, the carbon emissions of their supply chain and the amounts of different fabrics they have used during 2022. That's not nothing, so we have a relatively good start here.

WHO DID THE RESEARCH? The research is not at all independent, but done in-house. They have all the financial incentives to cherry-pick and frame their research in a way that shows them in the best possible light, even if we assumed they would not tamper with their own evidence, which I don't think we can fully assume either. There's an attempt though to convince us to believe the data they are showing:

"We have reported with reference to the Global Reporting Initiative (GRI) 2021 standard for certain sections of this report. Selected information in this report was assured, to the limited assurance standard, by an external independent assurer as per ISAE 3000."

Emphasis by me. So even if they did the research themselves, they did get it independently audited to get an assurance that they did follow the GRI standards in their reporting and that it doesn't contain lies. However, the "certain sections" and "selected information" with "limited assurance" does not give me much assurance, in fact, my assurance is very limited. To understand what does this actually mean, I did a bit of googling and delved into the annex of the report.

ISAE 3000 is a standard for auditing financial information issued by International Auditing and Assurance Standards Board, which an independent body that has governmental oversight. Financial information can get either reasonable assurance or limited assurance. Reasonable assurance is the most assurance this standard allows. Limited assurance is given, if the information provided to the assurer, time or extent of the procedure is lacking, but from those limited resources the assurer doesn't find anything that suggests "the subject matter information is materially misstated" aka that the company is lying. GRI is the most used reporting standard for sustainability for businesses and other organizations. I'm a bit suspicious of how effective their standards are, if they are most widely used, since most companies are absolutely terrible about sustainability yet they all claim they are great with it. So I decided to check who is in the board. Unsurprisingly it's mostly representatives of massive corporations, including Coca Cola and DuPond, a professor of accounting, national research director of Australia's Mining and Energy Union and one (1) environmental scientist.

The annex revealed quite interesting details. The only information that was AssuredTM (in a limited manner) for accurate information was the data on Shein's emissions and that of code of conduct violations. Only the report on emissions was AssuredTM (in a limited manner) to follow GRI standards. Shein got to select and prepare the relevant data for the audition, which was according to it, lacking. Crucially the audition report states that they didn't verify the results of supply audits or any potential violations of labor law found in them, rather they just checked that the math on the grading of the audits matched with Shein's stated criteria and that they actually did the audits. So if you really think about it, the (limited) assurance is that they graded themselves like they promised they would, not that their reporting of the amounts of violated labor laws or even just their own code of conduct was accurate. Additionally assurance of the accuracy of the emissions was only of Shein's own facilities, which do not produce any of their products, but not of their supply chain. 99,7% of their emissions come from their supply chain. So keep all this in mind when we look at the data itself.

WHAT ARE THEIR CARBON EMISSIONS AND HOW ARE THEY CALCULATED? Shein's emissions were 9,17 million tonnes of CO2, or 9,22 million tonnes if we don't count them purchasing Renewable Energy Credits. To put it into perspective that would be around 0,27-0,3% of the estimation of the annual emissions of the whole textile industry. Now that would be pretty low. In fact, suspiciously low. The fact that they got their own emissions auditioned, but not the emissions of their supply chain, suggests to me that perhaps, their numbers don't hold up to scrutiny. They also don't disclose their methodology for the numbers of the supply chain, like they do with their own facilities. Of course their response would be to say it's so much easier for them to calculate their own emissions than their suppliers. But I say that's not a bug, that's a feature.

Though looking at the methodology of the emissions from their own operating sites, which includes warehouses and offices, they don't take into account at all any emissions from building anything. They grew massively between 2021 and 2022 and I find it hard to believe they didn't built any of the new offices or warehouses they gained. Certainly they would have bought a lot of new equipment even if they moved to existing buildings. But none of this is taken into account in their calculations. And I must assume, it's not taken into account in their supply chain calculations either.

Even if we took them at their word, by their own admission, their carbon emissions have grown from 2021 to 2022 52%, which is alarming. (Interestingly they use the 2021 numbers in their actual website, which I think is so misleading that it's basically a lie.) They write it off as just side effect of their massive growth in production volume, which had 57% increase during the same time frame.

"We are at the beginning of our mitigation journey and began implementing decarbonization programs at the end of fiscal year 2022."

So they first scale their business as fast as they can, having absolutely no care of the environmental effect, so that when they have massive market share, and they reduce their massive emissions slightly, they can be like "oh look we did something!" They can then moan and wail how hard and time consuming it is to reduce the emissions of an existing supply chain, when they were the ones who decided to not take that into account from the start. Their "science based goal" (which they repeatedly stress in their website) is to reduce their emissions 25% by 2030. It's nothing. Less than nothing. They scaled without care their production in a time, when our ecology is collapsing, and then they claim that it's just science we possibly can't do anything about it. Apparently it's a natural law that they just have to make more and more money, like gravity.

WHAT MATERIALS DO THEY USE? Last year 64% of Shein's clothing (measured in weight) was polyester. Production of polyester is estimated to count for 40% of all carbon emissions of the textile industry. It's also a plastic made out of oil, so we have to take into account the fracking and refinement of oil and the eventual release of the CO2 from the oil that would have been secured in the ground otherwise. This most certainly is not counted into the supply chain emissions. Shein loves to pay lip service to the idea of circular economy, but they don't actually think about it. Because if they did, they would have taken into account the microplastics polyester fabric sheds when it's washed. When microplastics get into the soil and freshwater, they get into the organs of animals, including us, and they don't easily come off. Already it has been shown that they have led to the decrease of small soil fauna, which are very important for the fertility of the soil. Over time microplastics also break down further into nanoplastics. There's already evidence of nanoplastics being small enough to pass through veins into the brain, and that causing behavioral changes in fish. We don't know the long term consequences off this micro and nano plastic pollution yet, and we're just seeing the effects they have on small animals, but as they built up over years and decades inside our organs, we well likely see much larger effects.

Important for the lifecycle thinking is not just focusing on how much burden the production puts on the environment, but also how long it lasts and how can it be reused and eventually the impact of the end of it's lifecycle. If you remember from the beginning, Shein claims to take all this into account by having a resale program, somewhere in the future establishing a recycling program for unusable old clothes and increasing their share of recycled polyester. This is nothing. Again it's less than nothing. Polyester is not only bad fabric because of the things I've already said, but it's also just as a material for clothing very weak. It's not warm or breathable, which makes it at the same time sweaty and cold. It has no anti-bacterial qualities at all (which basically all natural fabrics have at least to small extent), so when you get easily sweaty in it, it starts also smelling very easily, and so needs washing very often. On top of washing releasing microplastics, it also weakens the fabric, because polyester doesn't get stronger when wet unlike plant fibers, like cotton and linen. Other synthetic fibers even get weaker when wet. Polyester is also very hard to dye effectively and has bad color retaining properties, so it needs chemical treatments and strong industrial dyes, all of which adds to it's carbon footprint and toxic pollution. Bad color retaining properties though also mean it looses it's color quite easily when washed. All of this makes it's life span significantly shorter than natural fabrics. I mean with some natural fabrics like wool and silk we are talking about multiple decades, with polyester it's easily in the low one digit years. These are inherent issues with polyester, but Shein clothes have repeatedly got complaints of their poor quality in general. This makes the resale program frankly meaningless.

On the surface the recycling program for polyester sounds good, right? You don't have to use more oil and use as much energy in making of it (according to Shein themselves, which again not a trustworthy source, it saves up to 70% emissions). Shein has promised to increase their share of recycled polyester to 31% of their polyester usage by 2030. Currently less than 1% of their production is recycled polyester. This is however a terrible solution. It still sheds microplastics and it's even worse as a fabric than virgin polyester. It is weaker and stiffer, making it impossible to use on it's own in fabric but when mixed with other fibers in a fabric significantly shortens it's life span. When we take into account the lifecycle of a clothing, the length of it and it's lifetime emissions become much more important than the production emissions. If you have to produce from scratch new clothing three times, in the time you could be using another clothing, it doesn't really matter if the emissions during the production were somewhat lower. (There's little reliable and comparable data available on production emissions of different fabrics, so I don't know how exactly recycled polyester compares to different natural fabrics.) Especially when we take into account the consumer use emissions, which in the case of polyester are 30% of it's lifetime emissions. And wast majority of it comes from washing, which you have to do more with polyester (how much more depends on what fabric you compere it to). Any responsible disposal of polyester at the end of it's lifecycle, especially any attempts at recycling it, cause additional emissions, unlike with natural fibers, which naturally degrade.

WHERE ARE THE SUPPLIERS? Shein boasts having fully integrated digital supply chain and with it they can track the whole supply chain of individual product. However they don't reveal any of that information publicly. Or rather only thing we know is that their factories making the end products are in China. But the question is, where does their fabrics come from? There's no countries listed in their report in any capacity and none of their products have any information of their origins nor the origins of the fabrics. This is very suspicious in my opinion. We can get no indication on how fibers might have been produced and made into fabric from the labor and environmental laws and practices of different countries. However, there is an interesting bit in the report about cotton:

"For cotton products, to further enhance our compliance with US laws, we request that our manufacturing suppliers only source cotton from Australia, Brazil, India, the United States and other approved regions."

This sentence is there pretty obviously because they have been caught selling clothing with cotton grown in Xinjiang in US markets, which US has banned. This is because Xinjiang, the Autonomous Uighur region, where 90% of China's raw cotton is grown, has been accused of genocidal oppression of the Uighur population, including having massive forced labour camps for Uighurs. Because of the police state nature of Xinjiang, there's no reliable numbers on how much of the cotton is produced with forced labour, but presumably most of it. Moreover, China limits the imports of cotton, which is why only 20% of cotton used by the textile industry in China is imported. Shein claims they know exactly where their fabrics come from, but the wording of the sentence above makes it clear they don't even plan on enforcing any policy to use imported cotton by their suppliers. Cotton is just 10% of fabric they used last year, but given their massive production volume, it's still a lot. This gets us to our next question.

IS THERE PROOF OF GOOD WORKING CONDITIONS? Shein reports doing in total 2 812 audits into 1 941 of their 5 400 contract manufacturers. According to them it accounted for 84% of their Shein branded products (so not their other 10 brands). This information, if you remember, was given limited assurance, by the audition into their numbers. However, we are to trust Shein alone that the reports of their auditions are accurate. I'm not really willing to trust them, but let's sustain our disbelief for a moment to look at their findings. From their report:

"A: 90 points and above: minor flaws. Continued improvement is advised. B: 75 to 90 points: some general risks. Continued improvement is advised. C: 60 to 75 points: 1-3 major risks. Corrective action is required. D: below 60 points: >3 major risks. Corrective action is required. ZTV: Zero Tolerance Violation detetected. Immediate corrective action is required."

Even without knowing what do these things mean in practice, I don't think this paints a pretty picture. Only 4% of their manufacturing facilities had minor flaws and 82% of their facilities have major risks or worse? Does that mean none of their manufacturers fully comply with their Code of Conduct? They try to make it sound like it looks this bad because they have tightened their criteria and still the numbers are better than last year, but even with all of that, this is imo unacceptable. But it gets worse.

The report shows the amount of each ZTV found in the audits. This was explicitly not assured in any way by an independent party, so considering this information is given despite the lack of oversight and the interests of Shein, it's grim. Most of the 11% of ZTVs were gross safety violations. For example 4,2% of the audits, which means 118 facilities, found lacking emergency exits. However, they also found child labour in 6 facilities and forced labour in 3 facilities. So according to their own reporting, their manufacturers have used child labour and forced labour. And just to remind you, this is covering just 36% of their contract manufacturers. What I found interesting (read disturbing), was that violence or sexual misconduct against workers were not among Zero Tolerance Violations. I know it's not a situation, where they don't consider it violation of Code of Conduct, but rather just calls the police and let them handle it, because the violations counted here are based on their CoC, in which there's an item 7 named "No harassment or abuse of employees", which explicitly forbids physical, sexual, mental and verbal abuse. They don't however breakdown the make up of the non-ZTV violations that have occured, nor do their reveal how are they graded the ratings, so there's really no way to know what the 71% of their manufacturers have done to warrant their low (C or D) grading.

Would you at this point be surprised, if I told you it gets worse? Yeah, their so called Zero Tolerance Violations are not very zero tolerance after all. You might think zero tolerance means, that if manufacturers are caught doing it, their contract is immediately terminated and they are reported to authorities? Well, let's look what is the "immediate corrective action" outlined in their Responsible Sourcing Policy. Among the ZTVs they define even more zero tolerance violations, let's say negative tolerance violations. These are 1. forging documents, bribery or refusing to get assessed 2. child labour and 3. forced labour. Surely these lead to immediate contract termination and reporting to authorities?

So if Shein encounters slavery or probable coverup of it in their facilities, they stop placing new orders until the enslaved people and children are taken somewhere else or otherwise their contracts are fixed (at least for now), so there's no more slavery in sight, when someone comes back to assess them again and decides it's all good to continue business as usual. They have 30 days to make everything look like there's no issues, which sounds pretty easy task, and after that they can grab the kids and the slaves back there like nothing happened. Also notice how they didn't say they demand stopping the work entirely in the facility, just that they'll stop placing orders? Yeah, they don't stop production even if they find literal children or enslaved people producing them. Gotta get those dresses to the customer.

If they find any other ZTV, they come back in 30 days, and if the violation continues, they give a warning, come back again in 30 days, and if still the issue is there, then they stop placing orders. After that it continues like with child or forced labour violations. If after another 30 days it's not fixed, the contract is terminated. If a supplier gets two ZTVs within two years, they go straight to the even less than zero tolerance model straight away. If they get three ZTVs in two years, then their contract is immediately terminated. Nothing different happens though, if you get caught doing child or forced labour two times in two years, so you can just get caught once a year as long as you always pretend to stop doing it. But even if you do get caught third time in two years, or fail to pretend you fixed it, it's fine, you'll just have to do other stuff for the next year, and then you can apply again to work with Shien. Also the policy does not at any point require reporting these alleged crimes to authorities. If they at some point stop placing orders for a supplier (for example because of child or forced labour), they have to just sent all the files and documents of the goods that are produced by that supplier during the time they aren't giving them new orders to the relevant tax and customs authorities.

To answer the question I started this section with, sounds like Shein provides more evidence of bad working conditions in their suppliers' facilities, than they provide evidence of good working conditions. They even give evidence that their monitoring of those conditions is just a joke, and they have no mechanisms to actually get rid of suppliers who have inhumane working conditions. Elsewhere they try to give very weak evidence of good working conditions. The influencer brand trip to their facility in China was a PR stunt like that. However, it's easily dismissable, as the facility was not at one of the factories, where their clothing is made, all of which are third parties, but Shien's own facility they call Innovation Center. There they innovate new technologies, train their suppliers to use their new technologies and consult their suppliers on how to make new factories, which I assume means they have factory templates to give to their suppliers.

However, independent sources give much more reliable evidence of terrible working conditions in their factories. Like when undercover operation into one of their factories found employees working 18 hours a day earning 2 cents per item. When asked for comment, they answered: "Any non-compliance with this code is dealt with swiftly, and we will terminate partnerships that do not meet our standards." This is not severe ZTV, so what they mean by "dealt with swiftly" is "told to stop breaking labour laws, given some time, given warning, given more time, stopped giving new orders, given even more time and if after three months they have not stop then they gotta go". Because yes, they do terminate those who don't meet their standards. Their standards are just in the gutter.

HOW IS THE COMPANY STRUCTURED? While falling down this rabbit hole I came to the realization that Shein is the Uber of fashion. It's just the gig economy all over again. Let me explain. Unlike traditional fashion companies, Shein has outsourced even the sewing of the clothing. Shein itself is an app company, like Uber, though they technically do design their own clothes. I say technically because they have been repeatedly accused of copyright infringement to the point where they are now sued for racketeering. Allegation from the lawsuit:

"Shein has grown rich by committing individual infringements over and over again, as part of a long and continuous pattern of racketeering, which shows no sign of abating."

It relates to the other reason why I say their only technically design too, because a huge amount of their designs are also outsourced. In their sustainability report, they boast about how their SHEIN X program is meant to "empower" young designers to get their business off the ground, by taking their designs and using them for their clothing productions. This sounds a lot like SHEIN X designers are gig workers. They are basically just designers for Shein, but oh no they are not workers, labour laws won't apply! Shein specifically targets young designers, even students, so it's clear that they really just want impressionable people desperate for money and work experience. Obviously they won't get much money for their designs, since there's such a massive flood of products and designers, Shein says they have 3 000 designers in SHEIN X, and the products are so, so cheep. It's the exact same thing as with Uber and the like, they put their "workers" into competition with each other. To tie it back to the lawsuit, they use these third party designers as fodder against accusations of copyright infringement. They did not steal the design from the independent artist, they are just the platform provider.

This is also exactly how they operate with their factories. When their massive production is spread across all the 5 400 small separate suppliers, they are forced to compete for scraps. They can't organize together to demand better pay or better working conditions, and Shein can act like they have no part in them. Moreover, due to their extremely low prices, Shein has to offer only really low rates for the production of their clothing. On top of that because of the contractor structure, the actual fanctory owners taken an extra cut from those low rates, leaving extremely little for the actual workers. The prices are so low, they demand inhumane working conditions. It's impossible to sell clothing in the prices Shein does and pay well for the workers, especially with their business structure. All the talk about technological innovation is also bullshit, because this gig economy competition model ensures that most of the gig workers (in this case factories) will stay poor, so they can hardly invest in the new technologies.

This model is also what Shein holds as their most significant sustainability claim, because it allows them to cut most inventory waste. Traditional fashion companies always have a significant overhead, because their supply must always be higher than demand, otherwise, they would loose customers to their competitors. Because Shein orders small batches from large amount of factories, they can change their production in real time, adjusting to the demand much quicker than any competitor. Yes, it means they have minimal inventory loss, but it's not actually efficient. Or rather not efficient in any other way than for maximizing profits. There is a massive amount of overlap of facilities, machinery, organization structures and bureaucracy, if we look at Shein's whole production, because the small factories are all producing same things, but because Shein drives them to compete with each other, they don't have to pay for that overlap. More than that, it's extremely inefficient way to maximize people getting clothed while minimizing materials. And I don't mean producing as much clothes as possible while minimizing materials, because that is what they are doing, but the goal shouldn't be as much clothes as possible, but maximizing everyone having enough clothing, which is much less that what we produce today. And if clothing was made to last instead of making as many of them as possible, even less could be made and still everyone would have enough clothes.

Shein's extremely quick rise to the top of fashion markets was due to how effectively they managed to use the pandemic for their advantage. During the lock-downs around the world, people spend increasingly more time on their phones and social media, which Shein managed turn into their profit. They utilize social media and influencers effectively for marketing. Their platform also uses many of the same psychological tricks social media uses to keep customers scrolling and consuming. This is on itself is not at all new, but because of their business model, they turned attention into sales and sales into more attention. All that combined with their ability to response in real time to new trends and scale production extremely quickly, turned any new trend in social media into hype and micro-fashion cycles, which they would burn through increasingly fast. Their competitors wouldn't even have the time to get into that trend before it would be replaced with a new trend. Then all they needed to do was to contract new small factories, they didn't even have to spend time and money to built them, and they could take over the fast fashion market.

Shein's effect won't stop there though. Their competitors will and are already starting to adapt their methods. It means quality of clothing will keep getting worse, the whole industry will keep increasing their carbon emissions and the working conditions from cotton farmers to designers will get worse as gig economy spreads in the industry. I'll talk more about this in the conclusions of the second part, but to fix this, there needs to be government intervention. It's good that there's a lawsuit over their wider practices, not just a singular act, but it won't be enough. If they don't face significant consequences, every other company will take note that they can profit off of (allegedly) systematic crimes.

IN CONCLUSION Shein as a company is a glorified optimization algorithm which only real function is to drive up consumption and in exchange take all the profits from everyone else's labour. They use the modern classic Uber model to take the neoliberal principle of outsourcing risks and responsibilities to it's logical conclusion. Their extremely exploitative business model only works if their designers and factories and other gig workers break laws. They do the absolute bare minimum to comply with law and (allegedly) not even that when they believe they can get away with it by blaming others, which is fucking bad indictment of those laws, since my god they are terrible. Their greenwashing propaganda is honestly laughable, it's a joke and they must know it. It feels more like gaslighting than propaganda.