Fashion; The Most Unethical Industry

By Riley Chon

Fast fashion is a design, marketing, and manufacturing method that rapidly produces and distributes high quantities of clothing. These clothing are usually cheaply made and unethically sourced. Furthermore, fast fashion has detrimental effects on our environment. One of these effects is overuse and pollution of water. The fashion industry is the world's second largest consumer of water. One cotton shirt uses 700 gallons and a pair of jeans uses around 2000 gallons. Additionally, textile dyeing has been ranked as the world's second largest water polluter as left over water is often dumped into streams or rivers. Furthermore, as companies shift towards synthetic materials such as polyester, nylon, and acrylic, levels of micro plastic increase. Synthetic materials can take around 20-200 years to decompose while biodegradable materials, such as cotton, are able to decompose in weeks.