My park’s in Sri Lanka

I’m quite certain that this article on Beyoncé’s clothing line is accurate.

‘Beyonce says she wants her Ivy Park gym gear to support and inspire women — while Topshop claims it “empowers women through sport”.

But poverty-stricken seamstresses making some of the clothes in the MAS Holdings ­factory in Sri Lanka earn just £4.30 a day.

It would cost them more than a month’s wages to buy a pair of Beyonce’s £100 leggings.’

Sorry Beyoncé, but you’re just not pushing hard enough.

 

 

Fluoride in your water and brain development

People ask why American and Chinese tourists are often very inconsiderate, and don’t really seem to have a sense of empathy or common sense when they’re functioning in different countries.

The answer may lie in the fluoride content of drinking water.

In Paris, the amount of fluoride in public tap water is 0,17 mg/l. (No wonder I enjoyed the taste of Parisian water).

 

In parts of China,

Fluoride, arsenic and iodine in China’s drinking water poisons 50 million people.

In San Francisco however the amount of fluoride maintained in tap water is 0,70 mg/l. That’s a significant difference. 

My local tap water in my borough of London apparently contains 0,20ppm of fluoride, or 0,20 mg/l.

Why does the USA maintain this level of fluoride in their water? Conspiracy theories often say that the reason is to dull-down the population to make it easier to control and subdue into political non-sense.

The Environmental Health Perspectives journal noted that, ‘A recent cross-sectional study based on individual-level measure of exposures suggested that low levels of water fluoride (range, 0.24–2.84 mg/L) had significant negative associations with children’s intelligence (Ding et al. 2011).’

So it seems to be the conclusion that fluoride levels higher than 0,24mg/l in your drinking water, especially if you drink a lot of water, could be damaging to your brain development, especially that of younger folk.

Not to mention the amount of fluoride in your toothpaste… (Sensodyne contains 1450 ppm fluoride. Wow. Even though you spit it out, how much gets left and absorbed by the membranes of your mouth…). Thoughts to consider.

If you’re concerned about the levels of fluoride in your drinking water, I would consider investing in a fluoride removing water filer. Ecobud and Berkey are two of a couple other options.

Time for me to head over to the shop and make my own toothpaste!

 

The Green School Model

I’m a bit surprised that very few people that I’ve interacted with in the field of sustainability in London are aware of The Green School model.

Before you talk to me, enrage me, and bore me with H&M’s ‘Conscious fashion’ or similar notions of ‘green washing’ for marketing purposes underpinned by egotistic, unspiritual, unsustainable greed, understand the founding principals behind this place to get a preliminary understanding of sustainability.