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submitted 1 month ago by [email protected] to c/[email protected]
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[-] [email protected] 137 points 1 month ago

microbeads!

[-] [email protected] 102 points 1 month ago

That's really a shower thought...

[-] [email protected] 48 points 1 month ago

A shower memory.

[-] [email protected] 60 points 1 month ago

I thought they were using natural materials like ground coffee. Did some of them actually use plastic beads?

[-] [email protected] 76 points 1 month ago
[-] [email protected] 60 points 1 month ago

I didn’t realize America has banned them. Good. I just figured they were a fad.

[-] [email protected] 24 points 1 month ago

Hey we're actually ahead of the EU in something!

[-] [email protected] 15 points 1 month ago

I want to see more regulations around plastics. We have the ability to make biodegradable plastics and we can research better ones. Plastic is a bane to the environment.

[-] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago

Shit we can't allow that. I'm gonna go to the Euro Parliament to lobby for banning 10 random things.

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[-] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

I’ve been wondering what happened to that fad. Amazing that they were banned! Let’s do more

Edit: “replaced by metallized plastic glitter”? wtf

[-] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

I remember my sister telling me to use facial wash for acne with stuff like that in it. Thank fuck I've ADHD and never got a routine going with using it.

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[-] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago

Some used pumice (I think Lava Soap or something along those lines) but it's more harsh than the plastic microbeads OP is referring to.

[-] [email protected] 20 points 1 month ago

I know St Ives uses crushed up walnut shells and apricot pits for theirs.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

Can confirm as I am allergic to walnuts.

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[-] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Yes, most used micro plastics for a long time, charcoal and coffee grounds are a fairly new advent in the last few years.

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

LUSH uses almond hulls in their products, so they are fully compostable. If you want something with a scrub, check them out for sure.

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[-] [email protected] 48 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

There's still shampoo with silicone as an ingedient, so your hair feels silky smooth. Because it wraps every single hair in invisible plastic.

[-] [email protected] 54 points 1 month ago

Most conditioner is silicone-based. For anyone curious, if your conditioner lists dimethicone or any other -cone in the ingredients list, that's silicone.

[-] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago

I have to admit, I saw your comment and was like "no fucking way".

So I looked it up and... Yes fucking way. That's crazy!

[-] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago

Is this the part that I find so objectionable to my senses when I’m touching it and using it in my hair? I hate the feeling of conditioner in my hands when I’m applying it.

[-] [email protected] 9 points 1 month ago

Probably! I have a conditioner that's all-that-stuff free and it no longer grosses me out to touch.

And thank goodness because I have big, curly, loooong hair

[-] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

Thanks for replying. What conditioner do you use?

[-] [email protected] 16 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

This is going to sound crazy, but I use Suave Essentials Wild Cherry Blossom. It's like 1 or 2 bucks a bottle and thank goodness because I have to use half a bottle when I wash my hair. What I used to spend...

I found it through the Curly Girl approved products list. Here's a copy-paste of the entire ingredients (in case someone more knowledgeable comes along to tell me it has stuff in it I didn't know was bad for me).

Ingredients: Water (Aqua), Cetearyl Alcohol, Stearamidopropyl Dimethylamine, Fragrance (Parfum), Lactic Acid, Potassium Chloride, Disodium EDTA, PEG-150 Distearate, Tocopheryl Acetate, Methylchloroisothiazolinone, Methylisothiazolinone, Fragaria Vesca (Strawberry) Juice, Benzyl Alcohol, Hexyl Cinnamal, Limonene, Linalool, Red 33 (CI 17200), Yellow 5 (CI 19140).

The Curly Girl site I use says that the methyl ingredients can cause itchiness in a sensitive scalp so keep that in mind if you try it.

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[-] [email protected] 12 points 1 month ago

Silicone is a far cry from plastics though. It’s a non carbon based oil. Plastics are polymers. There’s no commonality whatsoever.

[-] [email protected] 7 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

Silicone is made from sand, and hydrocarbons that come from oil or natural gas. Silicone is still a petroleum product.

Don't confuse silicone for silicon. The names are similar, but one is basically rubber and the other is a crystal.

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[-] [email protected] 32 points 1 month ago

I totally thought those were some kind of thing that would dissolve at first. I thankfully just didn't like those body washes anyway, but I was super disappointed when I found out those 'exfoliating beads' were just micro plastic. What evil fuck ok'd that decision?

[-] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago

It didn't have to be an evil fuck. Could have just been an ignorant fuck. "Do not attribute to malice what can easily be explained by ignorance".

Disregarding what we know now: it would be great to have an exfoliating bead that didn't break down or decay. I used it, sometimes, and it worked well for its intended purpose. We just didn't think anything about it, and they probably didn't, either.

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[-] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago* (last edited 1 month ago)

It would have been a chemist right? At some point some chemist who knew they don't dissolve pitched the idea that their company could use microplastics.

A mini wikileaks that acted as a repository for internal emails would be so much fun. Something like https://www.climatefiles.com/collection-index/

[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

Somebody somewhere figured out that you can sell grit to women if you refer to it as "exfoliant." Because that terrycloth towel you're going to dry yourself with isn't nearly rough enough to remove dead skin cells, right girls?

Meanwhile washing a man is mostly a matter of degreasing which is why a man's shower has one bottle of mostly sodium laurel sulfate in it labeled "everything wash."

[-] [email protected] 31 points 1 month ago

My dentist recommended me a stupid toothpaste called "Pearls & Dents" which also contained literal plastic balls. Such a stupid and corrupt person. I believe Dentists are paid by Elmex in germany too.

[-] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

They are. I went through pre-med for my postmortem science degree and am still close with my doctor/dentist friends from the program. They get kickbacks from companies if they successfully sell a brand. Sometimes the results are great, like Wakix (my Narcolepsy medication that actually helped), but other times, it's a garbage product. If the medical professional has a fancy pamphlet or offers you coupons for the product, that means the company is paying them.

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[-] [email protected] 23 points 1 month ago

Damn is that what they were? I thought it was sand

[-] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

Sand is too expensive

[-] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago

"Now with the cleansing power of asbestos!"

[-] [email protected] 22 points 1 month ago

It is as Benjamin Franklin once said: "Life is microplastics, it's micro-fantastic."

[-] [email protected] 21 points 1 month ago

I remember ads claiming it was cutting edge nanotechnology! And I thought oh cool, you mean like there are tiny robots running around in the shampoo? But no, it was microplastics.

[-] [email protected] 17 points 1 month ago

I thought Axe Snakepeel was so cool. I thought it had titanium beads. Turns out, the beads were plastic and titanium (dioxide) was normal soap stuff (though I think just to artificially make the soap opaque). It disappeared before I was aware

[-] [email protected] 14 points 1 month ago

Titanium dioxide is often used as a white pigment

[-] [email protected] 11 points 1 month ago

I work in the plastics industry. TiO2 is definitely our pigment of choice for white colorant

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[-] [email protected] 13 points 1 month ago

Hold up- when I read micro infiltrated blood, Intuit breast milk, glaciers etc, I pictured microscopic. You're telling me plastic materials large enough to see and feel are what they're referring to?

[-] [email protected] 25 points 1 month ago

As I understand it, there's a range of sizes that are problematic, from small to micro to nano and beyond.

The problem is the more plastic we make, and the smaller it starts, the easier it is for it to get worn down into smaller and smaller bits that become more problematic for us.

One of the problems with all the macro plastics in the ocean is that that as they get churned up and baked in the UV from the sun, smaller and smaller bits break off and become part of the... Everything.

Micro plastics are so prevalent that they can't even do proper studies on how harmful it might be to us, because there are no control groups that have no plastics inside their bodies to compare against. Even babies in the womb have plastic in them. You have plastic in you right now, almost a 100% guarantee.

There's probably more to it than that even, but that's my understanding of it.

[-] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

Ahhh.. that whole, plastic seeps into your possessions thing... That might be the ocean, not the hot soup in your nalgene. Man.. there is a lot of macro in the ocean to break down. I've been following environmental news and science for almost 35 years and I keep learning new and exciting shitty things for the first time. It only gets worse!

[-] [email protected] 10 points 1 month ago

As opposed to metaphorical microplastics?

[-] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

Figurative micro plastics.

Micro surgeries

[-] [email protected] 6 points 1 month ago

Language evolves over time. Prescriptivism always fails.

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[-] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

There is a bar soap currently for sale that does that

[-] [email protected] 8 points 1 month ago

Well, ain't that old fashioned - bar soap! I can remember my Mother and Grandmother making soap every fall at home. Stuff could take the hide right off you some years, but you got clean for sure. It also made a fine laundry soap too. I can remember watching my Mother shave slivers of it off into the washing machine when I was little.

But thanks for reminding me, I need to put bar soap on my shopping list. I need to also order another puck of shaving soap too.

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[-] [email protected] 5 points 1 month ago

Its not even a decade ago. Its closer to 5 years ago that they got banned

[-] [email protected] 4 points 1 month ago

Exfoliating plastics!

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this post was submitted on 29 Apr 2024
142 points (94.9% liked)

Showerthoughts

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A "Showerthought" is a simple term used to describe the thoughts that pop into your head while you're doing everyday things like taking a shower, driving, or just daydreaming. The best ones are thoughts that many people can relate to and they find something funny or interesting in regular stuff.

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