I know I’m about to piss a lot of people off with this blog entry but let me just preface what I want to get off my chest by saying I am an environmentalist and have been for years. I live in the Pacific Northwest and as a community and personally we have been ecologically aware for decades. I know polluting our world is a serious problem and we all need to do everything we can to reduce our carbon footprint, but I have had enough with the fear mongering, propaganda, and outright brainwashing the organic and natural skin care product lines throw at consumers. Even mainstream companies have gotten in on the act (L’Oreal actually advertises their Everpure hair-care line claiming it is better because it doesn’t contain sulfates, which is a bunch of crap because all of their other products from Garnier to Kerastase contain sulfates. Why didn’t they stop selling those if sulfate-free is so much better?).

Let me just say this up front: skin care products are not killing us, causing cancer, or any other dire condition. Women have no more higher incidence of cancer then men (breast cancer doesn’t count as men don’t have estrogen in the first place and women don’t get prostate cancer for obvious reasons as well). The insane, misleading information about mineral oil, petrolatum, parabens, and even toluene in nail polishes is just bizarre. The research doesn’t exist to prove any harm is being done, not even remotely. Not to mention natural and organic products contain problematic ingredients that effect the environment and our health as well.

I’m not sure how this all got started but the natural organic fanatics want you to be very afraid and, of course, only buy their products because they are pure and won’t harm you (forget the fact that there isn’t any research showing their products are effective and that many aren’t all that natural in the first place). Even more obnoxious is their blatant hypocrisy. I am fairly certain almost every single owner, employee, or lobbyist for any organic/natural cosmetic company in the world uses computers, talks on cell phones, drives cars, flies in airplanes, mostly lives in cities, and myriad other things that are far more problematic for the environment and health then any cosmetic could ever be. Breathing auto exhaust fumes and adding to landfills with outdated cell phones and computers (and all manner of outdated electronics) are where the concern should be, not the cleanser or moisturizer you are using.

But back to skin care. I want to remind all of you that I have a ton of research on my web site about all this, including these links:

http://www.cosmeticscop.com/skin-care-facts-preservative-problems-risks-benefits-of-parabens.aspx?filter=itemtype%3acontent

http://www.cosmeticscop.com/skin-care-facts-sodium-lauryl-sulfate-sodium-laureth-sulfate.aspx

http://www.cosmeticscop.com/skin-care-facts-mineral-oil-safety-nonirritating-moisturizer.aspx

If you want to send this rational, documented information to your friends and family that would go a long way to helping them make better decisions about what skin care and makeup products to buy. Right now I am just overwhelmed and the voice of reason is drowned out by the endless garbage (brain pollution) the natural/organic cosmetic industry can’t help spilling into the minds of women like an oil slick that can’t be cleaned up. Just in case you’re still not willing to believe that cosmetics aren’t killing us, below are some rational, voice-of-reason quotes from respected sources.

“FDA believes that at the present time there is no reason for consumers to be concerned about the use of cosmetics containing parabens.”

— Food and Drug Administration

“[The 2004 Darbre Study] did not prove that parabens cause breast tumors. The authors of this study did not analyze healthy breast tissue or tissues from other areas of the body and did not demonstrate that parabens are found only in cancerous tissue.”

— National Cancer Institute

“There is no sound scientific evidence that cosmetics as they are typically used cause cancer.”

“Parabens have a long history of safe use and have been specifically recognized as safe by the FDA.”

— American Council on Science and Health

“… The technical accuracy of the initial reports [linking parabens to cancer] have come under challenge,” noted Sandra Porter, Clariant. “Recent reports published and available in the public domain indicate that there is no conclusive evidence of harmful effects from parabens in cosmetics at typical usage levels.”

— Household and Personal Products Industry Magazine

I also want to share this letter I received from a physician on this issue; it succinctly sums up the manipulation we suck up like water in the desert without any benefit:

Paula,

First of all thank you for speaking up about a topic that has been very important to me for a long time. In fact I created a blog simply to address this issue: http://parabenmyth.lexli.com/
My frustration with philosophies such as this stem from the fact that I treat patients with breast cancer on a daily basis, and am very cognizant of what is good or not for them. I have spent a long time researching the paraben issue and found the same conclusions as you have. Such negative, panic provoking tactics against ingredients has almost become a norm for a number of “big beauty” marketers. Unfortunately, it works on consumers who may be unaware of the whole picture, and in many cases do not have access to in-depth scientific facts. To condemn an ingredient just because it might, possibly, might, remotely mimic, seem like, maybe etc. is incredibly unjustified. The evidence linking paraben absorption via skin care products, mimicking estrogen and in turn affecting breast cancer rates is extremely farfetched at best. I suspect your chances of taking in estrogen like substances is higher from food intake of animal and plant products, such as cow’s milk! But, obviously certain negative marketing, using scant scientific findings and manipulating it is much more potent at molding the human mind than presenting the facts. I applaud you on your ability to go against the flow and try to reach the truth.

I was recently in our local Nordstrom store, checking out some new philosophy makeup products. Because fall is upon us and lots of cosmetic companies are gearing up for big launches, the philosophy salesperson was eager to inform me of what was coming to the counter soon. Along with a new foundation and some other potentially intriguing makeup items was the claim she kept repeating: “…which will be paraben-free.” At one point I stopped her and asked what was so bad about parabens (I was curious to see what she’d say). Her reply was “Well, they cause cancer, especially breast cancer.” I replied that from the research I’ve seen there is no definitive link between breast (or any other type of) cancer and parabens. I asked where she got her information, to which she replied “That’s what they tell us in training.” Sigh. Cosmetic companies love using scare tactics to sell their products.

As I continued to take notes on the new makeup items, I asked her what was so bad about parabens. She admitted she didn’t know for sure, but philosophy is moving away from using them because “it’s just better for the products”. “Besides”, she said, “parabens aren’t natural.” Without wanting to further the debate since I was done with my research, I just smiled and nodded. So that’s what she was getting at all along. Never mind that parabens are, in fact, derived from a natural source (berries) the real theme is that philosophy is changing their marketing message to the familiar theme of natural = good, synthetic = bad, health-threatening, toxic, insert-your-own-unpleasant-adjective-here.

If I had more time to spend discussing this with her (she really was helpful and quite earnest in her fervor for philosophy) I would’ve mentioned that it would be far better if philosophy took an inventory of all the irritating ingredients in their formulas, many of which are natural, and removed those instead of parabens. But such a move would never happen because most consumers are convinced beyond a doubt that any natural ingredient is preferred to one of synthetic origin (often referred to as “chemicals” even though everything in our world is composed of chemicals). The truth is there are good and bad ingredients of either origin, not to mention that most cosmetic formulas wouldn’t be nearly as elegant or effective without the synthetic ingredients that play integral parts-and that includes parabens and other preservatives.

One more thing about my trip to Los Angeles to meet with some of the labs that help us formulate our products, almost without exception the most common comment I get is how different it is when my team and I meet with them. Why different? Because we talk ingredients, we ask for studies, we want products with no fragrance and no coloring agents, we provide air tight containers, we ask for plant extracts and vitamins with proven benefits, we only want “natural” or “organic” ingredients that can make a difference for skin, we want effective exfoliants, effective anti-bacterial agents for acne, effective antioxidants, cell communicating ingredients, and skin identical ingredients, and we want an honest discussion about how to make a product stable. Primarily what we don’t want is the hype. It usually takes awhile to wade through all but eventually we do get to the other side.

Eternally perplexing to the cosmetic chemists we work with is the need to see in an ingredients deck (the proposed formula as it would appear on the ingredient label) before we see the product. I’ve been formulating products for more then 15 years and it is the rare lab that does this. Their system is to send the product because no one is all that curious about what the product contains (they only want the “special” ingredient they can showcase to the consumer); they want to know how it feels and smell. Feel and smell is important but if the ingredients aren’t healthy for skin why bother. From my perspective it is a waste of time and money, show me the ingredients.

At some point I’m always expecting this to change, that at some point there will be a learning curve and our account representative and chemist will cut back on the salespitch but that has yet to happen. They see dozens of companies a month and we appear to be the only one asking for formulation details. I shouldn’t be that shocked, that’s my learning curve, I never get used to the way my industry works.

“We only use natural ingredients; synthetic ingredients are bad for your skin because they are fake and made from gasoline, such as mineral oil and petrolatum.”

I have yet to see any cosmetic that is “all” natural. Some synthetic ingredients are awesome for your skin, and regardless of the protestations of cosmetics companies to the contrary, every cosmetics product in the world contains its share of synthetic ingredients.

Synthetic ingredients are derived from many sources, but they all start as natural because everything comes from our environment; nothing is created via alchemy. Petrolatum and mineral oil are indeed by-products of the gasoline industry, but what is unnatural about that? Ironically, gasoline, which is derived from crude oil, is decidedly natural in and of itself as it comes from organic material, such as tiny aquatic plants and animals, that has been buried in the earth for millions of years. Petrolatum and mineral oil are remarkably good skin-care ingredients; they are also recognized by cosmetics chemists the world over for being superior emollients and completely harmless (Source: Dermatologic Surgery, June 1998, pages 661–664). Even the claim that these ingredients are occlusive (blocking) and, therefore, bad for skin is also without proof (Source: Contact Dermatitis, September 1996, pages 163–168).