Wednesday, May 30, 2007

Paper or plastic or your trendy eco-tote made by child labor?

Sometimes? Saving the environment is just so hard: "The 'I'm not a plastic bag' comes with a blue tag which explains the bag offers an alternative to plastic bags which 'have a negative impact on the environment.'" It's also "a must-have fashion item....made by leading designer Anya Hindmarch and they are changing hands on eBay for £225. Today Sainsbury's was accused of hypocrisy after it admitted the bag was made in China and was neither organic nor fair trade."

You'd think that would be a sort of scandal. A high-profile designer, a venerable retailer -- how could they recover from the lies? According to Fashionista, though, no worries: "It's true that the bag is hypocrital [sic, swear], and it's unfortunate that it doesn't follow the standards it wants to set. However, if it's driven hundreds of thousands of women to carry it - or any reusable bag - instead of requesting plastic bags in supermarkets and shoppinging [sic, can you believe it?] centers, isn't that the whole point?" Well, sure. Especially when the $340 is already gone from your PayPal account.

Still, isn't this greenwashing? If so, shouldn't Fashionista readers be more upset? I mean, didn't the Town & Country green issue -- my God, right there on p 177 of the special recylced paper section -- warn everyone about that? When did it become OK to be hypocritical? And is this proof that authenticity does or does not matter?

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