Sneaky Sneaky!!!!

So I suspect in response to more and more people becoming aware of the changes to Animal Testing policy for many Personal Care companies, they are trying to get around it by giving vague statements that at face value lull their potential customers into believing they are not conducting these cruel tests. They use language like:

“Only where required by law” – I love that one. It means they are selling their products in a brick & mortar store in China which means they have to test by law. If they sold just on-line, they wouldn’t have to. But they are doing the money grab. The sad thing about this is that while many of these companies have a long and disgusting history of unnecessary, cruel animal testing, too many of them have a history of NOT testing on animals! And when they decided to expand into China they very quietly changed their policy. So unless you as a consumer actively checked their website, you wouldn’t know they went back on their prior policy. I know I thought I was virtuously using cruelty-free products. When I looked at the products in the grocery store and didn’t see the Leaping Bunny, PETA, or other identifier saying they didn’t test on animals or were cruelty free, I honestly thought it was because the industry as a whole was no longer testing on animals so taking up real estate on the bottle or box was unnecessary. BOY WAS I WRONG. So when you see this nice little “Only where required by law” on sites like Clinique (which I have used since I was in my 20s) or Estee Lauder, that means they are testing in order to sell in a store in China.

“The final product I not tested on animals” – wow. So all that means is that any number of components of the finished product were tested on animals. They could have tested each of the individual components on animals, combined them, and slapped that label on to try and make their customers feel better. I was sad to see that on one of my Rusk products this morning.

“We do not test on animals”. Be careful – that doesn’t mean they don’t pay an outside company to test for them!!! That is the ultimate sneaky in my opinion because until I did a lot of research, I thought these companies were ok! But not necessarily.

So, it is a lot of work. You may not want to go there. However, once you find some brands that ARE good, you can keep buying them and just check the Leaping Bunny, PETA, or other cruelty free websites that maintain lists.  You also have to consider if you are ok buying from a company that doesn’t test but is owned by a larger corporate entity that does. At this point I am ok with that. I am hopeful that my dollars spent with these companies will show their parent organizations that it is possible to do the right thing and still make money!

I am doing more research on some brands I use, but I was happy to find that Milani, Wet & Wild (yay my eyeliner is ok!!!), Burts Bees, Toms of Maine, and Paul Mitchell are a few that are supposed to be ok. So are Urban Decay and Bare Minerals.  So when you are considering where to spend your hard earned money, consider if you would be happy knowing that a poor rat or rabbit or cat or dog was subjected to cruel, invasive tests in order for you to have shinier hair or smell good.

Just because they are not MY pets doesn’t make it ok.

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Random musings

I became a vegetarian and striving vegan 3 or 4 years ago. My eyes were opened by the many Change.org petitions revolving around factory farming and other animal cruelty issues. As an animal lover for as long as I can remember (my first cat followed me home at age 5….) I could no longer “trick” myself to into being ok with eating a sentient animal. And a Vegetarian was born!

As with all “ex” whatevers (ex-smoker, ex-drinker, ex-meat eater, etc…) I find it hard to understand how my friends and family – all of whom love animals – don’t see what I see. People are funny. As soon as something becomes “real” to us, we tend to think we discovered it and that everyone else should feel the way we do. I’m wrestling with that when it comes to being vegetarian. I’m trying to make it to Vegan – it is tough. I am thinking about everything I eat, which is good, but I’m still not 100% there – but I won’t stop trying!

So having made the jump to not eating meat and being a voracious participant on Twitter on animal cruelty related topics (@Fl_Scubafiend), I’m now trying to make it to the next step – removing all animal tested products from my home.

WOW!

Having foolishly thought in this day and age all companies had eliminated animal testing at least from cosmetics and personal care it was a terrifying wake up call! The desire to sell in a brick & mortar site in China is such a huge driver for so many of these companies. It makes me sad that instead of using their power as huge international organizations to drive change and make countries like China become progressive in their stance towards animal cruelty, they are chasing the almighty dollar instead of ethics. That makes me sad. And when I ran across a blog listing all of the sub-entities of some of these huge organizations that are guilty of horrific animal testing practices, I realized that my home is about to have a major overhaul. I’m sad that so many of the brands I’ve trusted my whole life – like Clinique, Johnson & Johnson, Jergens and Coca-Cola to name a few – are no longer companies I can support with my dollars. I guess given that horrible activities like the Yulin Dog & Cat Meat “Festival” in China continue to go on, I shouldn’t be surprised that they do not see animal testing as wrong. 

I will vote with my dollars. I hope you will consider doing the same. The research is tough, but eye opening! Good luck!