Fashion's excuses are worn out

Author

Nia Shalise
June 09, 2022

It’s no coincidence that communities already squeezed by social oppression are also at the greatest risk from climate change: treatment of marginalized communities and the earth are intricately connected—and the time has long passed for environmental efforts that are not also built on social justice. Adequately addressing climate change will require a true revolution of our societies’ fabrics, which center exploitation of both our planet’s resources and its people.

It takes a lot of confidence to plaster empowerment of women across t-shirts while the very women who make them may never earn enough to take care of themselves and their families. And it’s incredibly bold to promote the earth through “eco-friendly” collections while producing more clothing that we could ever need. With little governmental regulation and consumers intentionally distanced from the rest of the supply chain and convinced that more is better, the fashion industry’s actions and impact claims have easily gone unchecked, leaving workers, the land, and its inhabitants far beyond manufacturing sites to bear costs left unmeasured. Social and environmental injustices collide all around us, and you need look no further than your own closet.

What was once the fashion industry’s dirty little secret has since blown into a well-known fact: there’s a major lack of sustainability across its supply chains, from harmful chemicals and processes to mistreated and underpaid workers. While sustainability is often thought of in purely environmental contexts, the ability of workers to support themselves and build a foundation for their families is a crucial piece to the puzzle. Plus, intersectionality, a recently popularized concept by Kimberlé Crenshaw, tells us that mainstream fashion’s disregard for the health of garment workers, animals, water, and air all stem from the same oppressive systems.

Down to its response to COVID, in which brands withheld billions of dollars of pay for orders already placed, it’s clear that the fashion industry—and especially its cheap and trend-based subgenre, fast fashion—operates with a primary goal to make capital, no matter the cost to the people who make it, the people near it, or the pieces of the planet they inhabit and discard their hazardous waste.

Take what you need from the buyerarchy of fashion

We can consult the reduce, reuse, recycle hierarchy to guide our part in curbing clothing overconsumption and cutting into careless brands’ profits: in short, being a lot more strategic about the pieces we buy, taking care of them and repairing them as necessary, and finding them a new home when they no longer fit into our lives.

At the same time, there are a number of barriers to clothing that may embody one’s sustainable and ethical values, including financial, location, and size restrictions. For example, secondhand finds may be a thrill and creative outlet for some, but they might not carry the same connotation when they’re a necessity. And I love a good Reformation dress more than the next girl, but have you seen those prices?? Bridging the gaps between the contexts of our clothing’s worth and the hard earned money we hope to enjoy seems to be a complex yet all-too-valuable road, especially when we’re trained to crave material goods.

Demand action from those in power

Not making unnecessary purchases from fast fashion brands is a great start (and can be a whole process in itself if you’re a lover of cute clothes like myself), and voicing your concerns to policymakers and brands you frequent takes your impact to the next level! The fashion activism community’s demands include drastically cutting production, cleaner manufacturing processes, product and labor transparency, and third party impact reviews. Fashion Revolution offers tons of resources and templates for reaching out.

While it’s important to reflect and take appropriate action on our consumerist roles, we must also remember that the responsibility largely lies with those managing clothing production and those who should be protecting natural resources and their citizens to ensure that products are not just up to code but reflect a circular economy.

Brands absolutely must hold themselves accountable for the impacts of their operations, and continuous governmental regulation needs to apply for brands and the factories they contract. Those in power are taking notice—Fast Company’s proposal of a “fashion czar” gained attention last year—but widespread action is still to be seen. The proposed New York Fashion Sustainability and Social Accountability Act may enable standardized environmental and social impact transparency and spur similar legislature.

Crafting the circular future of fashion, a system that values unique self expression and respects all its agents over profits, will require a diverse range of solutions supported by active public engagement. Thank you for learning and taking time to play a more intentional role with me.

Over his time working in garment curation, Fit Culture has picked up a few things on finding well-crafted standout pieces—and he wants you to know they’re usually vintage.

From luxury secondhand marketplace The RealReal‘s expansion to unapologetic celebrities and influencers challenging the social media era’s outfit rewearing shame, the mainstream aversion to secondhand, already-seen, and otherwise “old” items is softening. It certainly helps that today’s clothing widely lack the quality of their smaller batch predecessors made with top-notch materials.

“If anything, they’ve become more popular because people realize that they can’t get that same quality anymore,” Fit Culture says.

What started as a hobby for Fit Culture evolved into a profession in curation after a friend found an opportunity to start a consignment shop and do pop-ups in Boston. Now, he styles clients and sources from a variety of secondhand stores for his Depop, pop-ups, and other opportunities in the growing secondhand ecosystem.

Over time, he’s come to appreciate the big benefits in sourcing secondhand items: making use of what would otherwise be thrown away, saving a few coins in the process, and gaining great value from unique finds, often at major discounts and made even more valuable by the fashion industry’s cyclical reemergence of decades-old trends.

“I feel like it’s important to promote that and offer that to people as a more sustainable source to provide yourself variety in your wardrobe and speak to your uniqueness,” he says.

Follow Fit Culture on IG and on Pinterest, and stay tuned for our upcoming collabs!

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About me

Nia Shalise is an environmentalist content creator (an eco-creative, if you will) passionate about educating and empowering her peers to lead environmentally-mindful lifestyles. Find more content on YouTube, Instagram, and niashalise.com. If you enjoy my free content, you can donate the cost of a chai latte here.

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