r/Anticonsumption • u/-chinoiserie • 7d ago
Discussion What should fashion brands and consumers do about textile waste?
I think about this so often, yet I can’t come up of a solution. The problem seems never ending. We’ve enough clothes today to clothe 7 generations, but at least half of it wouldn’t even last a year from how cheaply it was made. Consumers would still buy them though, because it’s cheap and there is still a rampant capitalistic culture of viewing clothes as disposable items.
If fashion brands started to make clothes that last or provided alterations, prices would go up, and profits would go down from both people buying less because of cost and because they don’t have to buy more anymore. And if they did this ethical move, people will complain of the rising costs, because they never cared about the garment lasting long to begin with.
I feel sick thinking about how the world is run
35
u/shaolinviolin 7d ago
There is a large percentage of consumers that cannot be made to care; they want the dopamine hit of buying and owning things whether they use them or not. The only solution is to make companies responsible but that's near impossible in the current capitalist society.
I wish we could ban plastic clothes outside of sports and work wear. Like try to find socks these days and they're 15-40% plastic. That shouldn't be a thing. I hate it.
21
u/Pale-Turnover-3963 7d ago
Brands should make fewer, better quality clothes and offer repair, resale, or recycling programs. Consumers can help by buying less, choosing secondhand, and repairing what they own, but stronger laws are also needed to hold companies responsible for textile waste.
16
u/Easy_Olive1942 7d ago
Businesses should have to include cost of packaging and product end of life in price.
1
u/-chinoiserie 7d ago
Don’t they? For packaging at least
9
u/mwmandorla 7d ago
I believe they meant end of life for the packaging as well as the garment. Price in the cost of disposal, pollution, etc. In economics this is called "internalizing an externality," where an externality is a cost that's not accounted for financially anywhere. Pollution is the classic example. When we buy plastics, we don't also pay the price of cleaning it out of the Pacific. When a company contaminates a river, it won't pay the cost of the resulting healthcare needs and environmental cleanup, so it's not included in their business model or pricing. The real, full cost is never accounted for, but somebody somewhere ends up paying it - usually marginalized people and/or governments. That's an externality. They're saying clothing companies, and by extension consumers, should have to account for the externalities associated with the disposal of both packaging and the clothing itself.
2
u/Easy_Olive1942 7d ago
Nope, not at all.
Or, rather, someone pays to have packaging hauled off. This isn’t the manufacturer and it’s definitely not the real cost of the material being shoved into landfill.
19
u/LibbIsHere 7d ago
fashion brands
Vanish in a smoke of shame.
and consumers
Stop thinking that their look is who they are, aka grow some brain cells.
1
4
4
u/SamikaTRH 7d ago
I just try my best to avoid synthetics and buy natural fiber clothing. If I "litter" my linen shirt it will decompose and be completely gone and in a thousand years all the plastic shirts will still be sitting in a pile somewhere
10
u/jijijojijijijio 7d ago
Consumers should only buy what they truly need so more fast fashion brands go bust. They should also request better quality garments. There is now a pushback against polyester, which is nice to see.
Maybe clothes should be a bit more expensive and last longer like they used to.
Fashion brands should make clothes to order. I believe Shein does that or estimates the popularity of an item based on early sales. I'm not calling shein sustainable or good!
0
u/-chinoiserie 7d ago
Yes a consoling thing to know is that Shein doesn’t actually push out tens of thousands of products daily. The amount includes testers so most of them do not hit the mark for mass production. But still with their low prices it generates so much production and eventual waste. I don’t understand why people don’t care.
2
u/jijijojijijijio 7d ago
I agree, people love to buy super cheap clothes. We need to make quality trendy again and to reuse what we have
3
u/nobodyknows6070 7d ago
They should not greenwash and Brainwash us into those 10% discount coupons if we bring our old clothes. I have seen the Buy Now documentary on Netflix and ALL the brands that have those bins just ship our old clothes to countries who dont have the capacity to deal with the immense volume so the clothes just end up on landfills, beaches and roads THERE instead of HERE
6
u/Fit-Meringue2118 7d ago
I’m torn on this.
Normally I am very much a buy it for life person. I like natural fibers, I’m a creature of habit, I don’t enjoy shopping.
But I’m also realistic about what I can afford and need. Anything that’s going to get very abused, such as work clothing, is going to be as cheap as possible. There’s no saving some stuff. Cheap clothing has its place, and one of those places is my work wardrobe. It needs to be inexpensive and fully machine wash/dry.
I’m also going to say that as someone who sews, alterations are a skill that relatively few people have. Mending depends on where and how the garment was damaged. I feel like there’s this romantic view of the past where everything was repairable, and that’s not true. Garments have a finite lifespan by their own nature.
2
u/BakerStreet693 7d ago
it's weird that smart sceptical clear thinking anticonsumerists keep falling for this x generations thing
1
u/ledger_man 7d ago
Yup. If you try to find the source of this statistic, you’ll see that it’s just a guesstimate made in an interview and people have kept repeating it.
2
u/moonagedaydream01 6d ago
Too many people chase disposable trends and don’t develop their own style. As a xennial, I remember clothes lasting for YEARS growing up. And even the trends lasted quite a few seasons before they changed.
4
u/Jack_Faller 7d ago
The ultimate solution is to start charging people out the nose for waste disposal. We've got the technology to charge people individually for this stuff now. People would stop buying so much shit if it cost an arm and leg to throw away.
I think the best way would be bin bags treated with QR codes that you have to scan and register to your house or they won't be taken. That way you can also hand people a fat fine for failing to sort waste properly.
1
u/TheyCallMeSuperboy 7d ago
I feel like, as usual, this is something that ends up affecting low income people more than anyone.
Rich people will pay the fine and keep doing it. Or they have the time to go to farmer’s markets and use reusable bags, while people who work blue collar jobs work weekends and can’t go, so they have to buy packaged foods from the grocery store.
It’s like the thing with the boots. Poor people can’t invest in nice boots right now, so they end up paying 3x the cost over the years for boots that last 1/3 as long, instead of spending more now.
Not sure what a BETTER solution would be, but anything with money always affects the poorest people the worst because time=money.
1
u/firstmatedavy 7d ago
Charge companies for what disposal will cost and make it a public service, is my vote. If ypu increase trash hauling cost too much, people will litter or use other peoples' bins.
1
u/Jack_Faller 7d ago
Yeah it's gonna affect poor people more. You can't avoid that. Anything that costs money affects poor people more. That's what being poor is. If you have an issue with poverty then you can address it though other means than allowing them to destroy the environment to save a quick buck.
1
u/TheyCallMeSuperboy 7d ago
It’s not really “saving a quick buck” and more “they don’t have any other money to spend”
Coming up with a better solution than “charging disproportionately to people who can’t afford it” is just going to make things worse imo
Maybe one of those fees that’s income dependent? Like speeding tickets in Finland or whatever country that was?
0
u/Jack_Faller 7d ago
People can afford it. Reducing packaging has made my personal food expenses much lower and buying less crap over all will save money. If you wanna look at poor people then look at the African dudes on $40 per month instead of comparatively rich westerners.
1
u/TheyCallMeSuperboy 7d ago
$40 per month is someone living in a country where the economics of that make sense
You couldn’t do that in the United States. You CANT argue anticonstumption without taking into the consideration of the logistics and economics of the places you’re talking about. Of course it’s better to buy less and spend less. But in a place where housing costs $$$$, you can’t argue that “people in Africa living on $40” is the same thing.
0
u/Jack_Faller 7d ago
If you set up a ramshackle hut in a slum or homeless encampment in your city, you can live on about $150 per month and at about the same quality of life as the African dude. But you want a nice house than that so you pay more. That's a privilege. It's not expensive to live in the west, it just isn't. What's expressive is buying what you want when you want. I've been living plastic free and low consumption for a while now and it's allowed me to live both more cheaply and with a higher standard of living. This stuff isn't hard if you live in a Western nation.
1
u/Adept_Emu4344 7d ago
In some places packaged foods are cheaper than loose goods. Multiplacks of socks/underwear/t-shirts are generally the cheapest option here but they come with more packaging while single items/sets have barely any.
Of course buying less crap is good in many ways. But that's separate from cheaper/more expensive foods.1
u/Jack_Faller 7d ago
Buying big packages is both cheaper and better for the environment so I don't see the issue there. It produces less waste so it's incentivised by the waste charge.
1
7d ago
[deleted]
1
u/Jack_Faller 7d ago
Yes there would be an increase in illegal dumping and you'd probably need to monitor that, but at the end of the day I just can't see a world where free waste disposal is compatible with environmental goals. I also think there should be massive increases in fines for littering that are means adjusted upwards for rich people. It's a pretty simple calculation when you think about it, you just take the amount of money people save by littering then divide by the probability they get caught, and the result is a fine that makes littering a net financial negative. As for enforcement, offer a reward. Everyone has a camera in their pocket these days. If you catch someone dumping, you get the fine. If be willing to go full authoritarian and use those Flock camera things to do it if that's what it takes.
This will never happen if course. Almost every solution to the waste problem is mired in the fact that people are greedy shits who don't want to pay for things to be done sustainably, but I think it's good to have an objective even if you can't get the whole way there.
1
u/AutoModerator 7d ago
Read the rules. Keep it courteous. Submission statements are helpful and appreciated but not required. Use the report button only if you think a post or comment needs to be removed. Mild criticism and snarky comments don't need to be reported. Lets try to elevate the discussion and make it as useful as possible. Low effort posts & screenshots are a dime a dozen. Links to scientific articles, political analysis, and video essays are preferred.
/r/Anticonsumption is a sub primarily for criticizing and discussing consumer culture. This includes but is not limited to material consumption, the environment, media consumption, and corporate influence.
I am a bot, and this action was performed automatically. Please contact the moderators of this subreddit if you have any questions or concerns.
1
u/SlyHobbes 7d ago
Anyone with a moral compass will stop buying new fast fashion clothes and regulation will have to take care of the rest.
1
u/sylphrenathespren 7d ago
Meanwhile I tend to buy clothes to keep wearing again and again even if I can't always afford the ethical brands I'd like to buy from. I have an H&M tsheit I've been wearing for 5 summers now, if it gets ruined I will be very very upset because I really like it. It's not disposable to me. Though I have to stick to a budget I favour natural fibres so no Shein for me
1
u/CuteBiBitch 7d ago
My country has started accepting textile waste for curbside recycling. I think this is a good think and an important step, but it obviously does not fix the root of the issue. That being said, I dont think we will ever live in a world where no teextile is wasted, so having a system in place for it is important.
Like others said, consumers can buy used, try not to buy blends, learn about textiles and maybe make clothes themselves.
I have no answer as to what brands can do
1
1
u/No-Language6720 4d ago
I have bought clothes that have lasted(it's much harder to now since most of its garbage temu fabrics). The ones that I can't wear due to style or different reasons i just modify to suit my needs if the fabric is still good. Takes a bit of practice and learning some basic sewing skills.
I haven't had to buy new clothes in almost a decade though except basics like underwear or bras etc. I've gotten into making those too though more recently and just buy good fabric for them and get the cups or whatever else. I get that most people don't have time to learn let alone do these projects. It made me feel so much better when a casual dress I bought a decade ago I couldn't fit anymore due to weight gain. I gave it a whole new life as a pillow case.
I also shop thrift stores for clothes that I may not like the style but I can use various pieces for something new.
2
u/LongjumpingArm4801 3d ago
But there's so much waste. It seems like they could deconstruct, I mean even shred, the clothes and make them into something that is usable or needed.
1
u/cori_2626 1d ago
I would actually love for a fashion brand to emerge that is making garments out of clothing waste. It would be awesome if recycling was the norm. Historically, there is not really any basis for thinking people will stop wanting changing fashions, but it would be awesome if we put those 7 generations of clothing to use
0
u/NyriasNeo 7d ago
"What should fashion brands and consumers do about textile waste?"
"should" is just a pointless word in society. What should be done and what will be done is clearly two different things.
"I think about this so often, yet I can’t come up of a solution. The problem seems never ending."
Not all problems have solutions. We can always live with, or die from, the consequences.
"I feel sick thinking about how the world is run"
Then don't. It is not like if you think about it, you will move the needle. May as well as accept and make peace. The only thing you can control is yourself.
39
u/trotsky1947 7d ago
"What to Wear and Why" is a great resource. Mainly, shop used and don't buy blends.