When MAC hit the stores back in the 90s’s I was ALL about it, the beautiful colors lasted, especially on my lips. I would never leave the house without them being painted that deep luscious shade of aubergine or candy apple red. I was intimated by those who could walk around in pale sheer or pink gloss or even those who were totally bare. No not me, never. I was a painted girl, that is until last year… AND now the time has finally come, all the MAC is going back… back to be recycled.
Every single minute, 1,484 tubes of lipstick are sold in the United States. I was certainly a part of that habit for a long time.
Ingredients that harm
Here are the facts: on average, women who use cosmetics will consume 2 pounds of lipstick in their lifetimes, it’s on your lips, you will lick, and ingest the harmful ingredients that are in the luscious tube. A lot of lipsticks contain mineral oil, a petrochemical that pollutes the environment during production by releasing hazardous chemicals into the air and water.
Some lipsticks also contain palm oil, and the cultivation of this product produces a significant danger to the rain forest wildlife in Borneo and Sumatra, particularly orangutans. Companies could start choosing, castor oil. You could too. Lipstick with this ingredient is renewable and biodegradable.
In addition to petroleum-based oils, many conventional lipsticks also harbor preservatives, including BHA, a fragrance ingredient that has a negative impact on aquatic ecosystems and bio-accumulates in the tissues of organisms. BHA is one of the chemicals banned by the EU as a carcinogen and organ system toxin, but here in the good old USA we still permit it. Lipsticks also sometimes contain parabens, known endocrine disruptors that are not only detrimental to human health, but are also destructive to animal hormones and development.
Finally, most lipsticks contain pigments used for coloring, especially lead acetates or coal-tar dyes, frequently labeled as FD&C and D&C colors. These two ingredients contain carcinogenic impurities, as well as toxins that can affect the brain and nervous system.
This is just some of the well known facts about what we are placing on our lips… there is so much more. But for now, I am committing to the simple recycle plan that MAC has established… Just take it back.
There are other choices…
Clean products with color for those models who, like me won’t leave the house without their lips being brightly painted.
