They have no clean drinking water and it’s your fault!

[Neapolitanicecream]

Watched Stacy Dooley “Fashion dirty secret” on BBC last night. Lost sleep over it. Michael Gove is clueless on the poisonings of water for millions of people. It’s a disaster and it’s our fault with buying cheap cotton. We need to do something! Kids are being poisoned 🤢 it made me cry

And that's specifically my fault? Surely your title should say it's OUR fault. Not excluding you

It’s a fucking disgrace that anywhere in the world there are people without good access to clean waster and basic sanitation,

And yes, it’s a travesty that clean water is found for crops sold to the really, really rich countries,

Give is in a position to do something about it though. It’s not his portfolio, but he’s senior in government and can lobby for aid money to align with priorities,

In the mean time, it’s down to charities, and the amount they can fo depends on the amount people give.

Bumping

People are dying of cancer.
People are dying from starvation.
People are dying of AIDS.
People are dying through dirty water.
People are dying through poor sanitation.
etc etc

Some of those are caused by us, some of those we are trying to solve, in the way that we found cures for other things that were wiping out millions of people.

There is far more going on than kids being poisoned by water and quite honestly it shouldn't matter whether its kids or adults. But unfortunately we, as a human race, are responsible for all sorts of things.

Did you see the report yesterday about how serious climate change is? And the damage ALL of us are doing there? Yet still hardly anyone talks about the elephant in the room which is overpopulation. Even Attenborough has said that needs to be talked about but everyone is afraid to.

Well I'm sorry but I'm not personally taking the blame on my own

@Neapolitanicecream I'm throwing your outrage back at you. Presumably as you lost sleep over this programme, you had plenty of time to decide what YOU, personally, can do to improve things for these kids. As you are part of "we" as in "we need to do something"?

Presumably you will cease to buy cheap cotton as of today? What else are you doing to do?

The world is going to hell in a handcart.

Eat drink and be merry...

Maybe (and here’s a taboo) stop having children. The world is massively over populated with rapidly depleting resources and we are at 11.59.

@Sexykitten2005 Ah, I'm not the only one then. Bravo.

I saw most of the programme but not the end. Shocking how much water is used to produce cotton clothing. I knew it was a high input but didn't realise the environmental impact, eg shrunk Aral Sea.

Couple of criticisms: the emphasis just on clothes (the programme was about the fashion industry) ignored other uses of cotton, eg bed linen and towels. So someone thinking "I don't buy much cotton clothing, most of my clothes are synthetic fabrics" might not make that connection. And I would have liked a comparison of the inputs to produce synthetic and natural fabrics. I prefer natural fabrics because they're a natural fibre and ultimately biodegradable, unlike oil-based synthetic fabrics. But if they use as much oil-based inputs (pesticides, petro chemicals and energy processing) do they really have less impact on the environment?

I'll certainly think twice before buying cotton items, especially when I just fancy something new before the old one has worn out, be that clothing, towels or bed linen.

@ShatnersWig

You are absolutely spot on. The root cause of all the planet's ills; climate change, habitat destruction, antibiotic resistance, food shortages etc etc. is overpopulation. It is the mammoth in the room. All other solutions are window dressing.

It was part of the megalomaniac program of diverting the rivers in what used to be USSR.

Having said that, we are all responsible for driving demand up now with the current throwaway clothing trend.

We need to realise we cannot keep consuming without consequences.

I understood it that cotton needs unbelievable amounts of water to grow and that it had seriously depleted the sea in an area they showed (can't remember where) - I didn't understand it to be cotton polluting the water. They they went to Indonesia (as an example) and showed the state of the rivers where the factories just pump all their chemicals used to dye clothes (not just cotton). The colour of the water was disgusting, they took an analysis and there was mercury and arsenic in it amongst other nasties. There were dead animals in the water and still children swam in it. The villagers all had skin rashes from the water.

It also went onto say that synthetic clothes that are abandoned in landfill pollute the rivers.

The upshot was that we need to be more savvy and buy less clothes and that the makers need to take responsibility.

Is it your fault too op or just ours?

slight derail but for bed linen please consider actual linen, it does enot require irrigation and grows in europe so youcan feel more assured children arent being exploited - itsexpensive but willlast years

@shatners definitely not. I’ve made a conscious decision not to. Yes I miss out on that experience and joy BUT what world would I bring them into. The next world war will be fought over something as simple as access to clean drinking water. Overpopulation is such that I believe we are due an apocalyptic event to “thin the herd” as it were.

@DeltaG I once had a raging argument with a Greenpeace chugger in the street. I normally avoid them but I was in that sort of mood. Was going on about what man has done to the planet and we need to do more etc. I said I quite agreed. "Great", he said, "can see we're on the same wavelength. It's so important to try and leave a better world for our children". Own goal. I asked how many he had. Three, apparently. I told him that he was irresponsible as he and his wife have added three more polluters to the planet. His family will produce far more waste than a childless couple or a couple with one child, no doubt all three children will have a car of their own because they won't be able to afford electric cars and we don't have good enough public transport, and that we should be giving tax breaks to people like me who don't have children. He was rather stumped.

Had argument with someone else once and they said "we have to repopulate". I asked why? We have no more right to live on this planet than any other creatures (and we've wiped out huge numbers of them through our arrogance and stupidity which passes for intelligence). If we, as a species die out, well, we die out. But it's not sustainable and the huge population growth over the last 100 years over the preceding 1000 is obscene. And even if we do think we should continue, we don't need to breed at the rate we are.

Irresponsible.

The export of water (in the from of foodstuffs) from drought-ridden countries to their markets in wealthier countries has been an obscenity for a long time.

However, stopping these practices and similar would involve a traumatic overhaul of our economies and social systems. It's a matter of urgency that we have public discussions about how drastic these changes would have to be and the realistic timescales for them.

White European birth rates are declining, some cultures/religions encourage large families though.

arranfan
I think you have a point. Yes something should be done but if we all stop buying cheap cotton tomorrow or flowers grown in Kenya etc. without putting anything in place to replace the gap in those economies then we cause a different type of harm. We have made some of those economies dependent on our buying power so will cause chaos if we just pull back.

Perhaps encourage organic cotton farming and pay more the end product?

Love how op watches something on telly and comes on here to preach to us all

I agree - stop the breeding. Third world countries need proper contraception education

We urgently need to get control of our population. Nothing else we do will make any difference whatsoever.

I don't think there was anything wrong with the core message of the programme which was to consume more mindfully. Not to get sucked into cheap, disposable fashion and those dreadful "haul" videos on youtube.

Buy quality, buy classics, but stuff you really love and will wear until it falls apart. Don't think it's OK to buy something you only wear once and then throw in the bin because it's really not OK.

Agree arran it's horrible, I also agree the population needs to be controlled properly. The WHO should have a worldwide policy of one living child to one person. So 2 for a couple. ONLY. (regardless of religion). It would take a long time to stabilise even if it began tomorrow.

I buy organic cotton sheets and that helps the producers, not sure about the water supply though.