“Every
day thousands of women buy makeup & thousands of Indian children are forced
to mine mica, the sparkles in the makeup.” (slaveryfootprint.org)
Does this fact shock you? It sure took me aback as I sat
there in the comfort and freedom of my home ironically wearing sparkly eye
shadow as I read this information. I immediately wanted to run to the bathroom
and wash all the make up off of my face.
I knew I couldn’t just read this fact, forget about it and
continue on my merry little way. So I immediately started researching this
issue.
Have you ever heard of Mica? Well let me tell you about this
tiny little mineral that affects thousands of children’s lives a day. It’s the
sparkle in your favorite make up that children spend hours beating out of a
stone.
Mica- is a
transparent mineral that is mined from the earth in thin sheets, and it is
often opalescent and sparkling, but can also be completely matte, and ranges in
color from gray to blue to green (foriegnpolicyblogs).
One of the biggest uses for Mica is in cosmetics, such as
eyeshadow, nail polish, lipstick, and concealer.
The impoverished hills of Jharkhand India, possesses one of
the largest deposits of mica, and this is where children are exploited and
forced to work in hard dangerous situations.
So now that you know this, what are you going to do about
it? I began my quest for finding ethically made cosmetic products. And as I was
searching and researching for ethically made make up without mica in it, I
found out that it was a lot harder than I had thought.
However, what shocked and bothered me the most, was that
during my research I found pages and pages of “ethically” and “cruelty free” cosmetic companies. This is what these
companies meant by this—that their products were not tested on animals and did
not use any ingredients that were derived from animals or harmful chemicals. Here’s an example of
this from the company that I found:
Here’s what bothers me the most: Since when are the lives
and wellbeing of animals more important than that of a child? Why is the
cosmetic industry more aware of and concerned with never using animal testing,
but yet they don’t mind profiting off of the child slavery and exploitation
that is going on across the world?
So maybe you should think twice before you apply that
lipstick as you walk out the door? Because it should not take the sparkles on
the hands of these children to make the rest of us in the world shimmer and
shine.
For those of you who are interested in ethically made
cosmetic, I am still researching different companies, but here are a few that I
have found so far.
-The Body Shop
- Epic Mineral Beauty
Stay tuned as I learn more about ethically and fairly made cosmetic products.
