Unpopular idea: Fighting Fast Fashion

There is a whole world behind the world of fast fashion. The western countries had never faced or realized that there is a huge problem behind fast fashion. A problem that affects us all eventually. Not only it causes huge environmental issues, but also it traps the people in a non-ending psychological ritual. While at the same time no-one's thinking how and why the clothes are so cheap. Just take a few minutes and look at your closet? Where are your clothes from mostly? Where are they made and how much do they cost? And most importantly do you actually need them all? Fast fashion industry has grown in the last decades and that’s taking place only in the western world. Firstly I will focus on the environmental cost that fast fashion causes. The industry produces 8-10% of global CO2 emissions, which adds up to 4-5 million tonnes annually (1). Fashion industry consumes also a lot of water (79 trillion litters per year) (2). Let alone the primary microplastic pollution that is found in the oceans and the textile waste, much of it ends up in landfill or is burnt (3). Who is responsible for all that? Humans tend to throw responsibilities to big companies that are trying to sell. Well, I believe it isn’t news to anyone that companies will always try to sell and to survive with the cheapest way possible so that they can get bigger and bigger. This is how the world works. So then, who is to blame? We can’t expect the companies to give priority on morals and ethics and sacrifice their profit for our planet or for human lives. Nothing matters for them. Everything is sacrificed for the profit. With that being said I believe that the responsibility lands on us. What if each one of us would take responsibility, not the full amount of it but just some, so that everyone would do something about it. If you feel responsible for something only then you feel the need to change it. With that being said I don’t mean that we have to fight all the fast fashion companies in an active way. That would require a lot of legal and other means. We could just not buy clothes! It is that simple and I am sure that at the end of the day we don’t actually need that many clothes. And here is the other point. Marketing works amazing, like brainwashing us and making us 'need' as many clothes as possible. The clothes are cheap so we buy, but we never worry that our 'need' to buy is just a translation of other need: need to feel different, need to feel confident, need to feel part of the group or need to feel important.

Shopping therapy is a concept that first world has built in the expense of the environment and sometimes maybe on human mistreatment. Has anyone thought why are the clothes so cheap? The answer is not that the companies want us to spend less and less. Shopping therapy is actually helping us feel happier for some minutes. Chemically speaking when we shop the levels of serotonin, dopamine and endogenous opioids are changing. So not only do we feel happy when we shop but this last some hours or some days so we need to feel happy again so we have to shop again. This can result in shopping addiction which is a compulsory buying disorder. It works the same like drugs as it is basing on craving urges and impairment inhibition (4). This is not well known as it doesn't help marketing purposes. Taking all of these into consideration, I would like once more to remind you that even though it is difficult to do something against fast fashion you can just stop shopping items that you don't actually need. We are just humans, we are not rich, we have no power to influence and we have no resources to fight those companies, but we CAN just stop buying. Everyone is responsible for the rising of fast fashion, and since every one of us is responsible we have to do something about it. Next time that you would like to buy a new top that is slightly different from your old one, think of your contribution that you are doing to human mistreat and your contribution to ruining the environment of your children.

1. (United Nations Climate Change. UN helps fashion industry shift to low carbon. unfccc.int https://unfccc. int/news/un-helps-fashion-industry-shift-to-low-carbon (2018).

2. Global Fashion Agenda (GFA) & The Boston Consulting Group (BCG). Pulse of the fashion industry. globalfashionagenda.com https://www. globalfashionagenda.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/05/ Pulse-of-the-Fashion-Industry_2017.pdf (2017).

3. Dahlbo, H., Aalto, K., Eskelinen, H. & Salmenperä, H. Increasing textile circulation — consequences and requirements. Sustain. Prod. Consumption 9, 44–57 (2017).

4. Murali, V., Ray, R., & Shaffiullha, M. (2012). Shopping addiction. Advances in psychiatric treatment, 18(4), 263-269.