Written by Emily Stephens (she/her) for The Rising Womxn Zine
Across the last few years, cancelling has become more prominent on social media. The act of cancelling, also referred to as cancel culture, describes a form of boycott in which an individual (usually a celebrity or influencer) who has acted or spoken in a questionable or controversial manner is boycotted. The YouTube beauty community seems to be on the receiving end of cancel culture more than other communities, however over the last few months, fast fashion brands such as Boohoo, Shein, Primark and Missguided are the latest to be boycotted.
Trendy clothing brands that offered a ridiculously cheap alternative to the labels being paraded across Fashion Week became more and more popular, especially with the rise of influencer power across social media. Fast fashion brands are often partnering with up and coming influencers to gain brand exposure. Fast fashion was highly praised, with consumers being able to wear the same outfits as their celebrities for only a fraction of the price.
However, the world received quite a shock in 2013 when the Rana Plaza clothing manufacturing complex in Bangladesh collapsed, tragically killing over 1,000 workers. This was when we got a true insight into the conditions inside sweat shops and prompted us to think more deeply about the garments we were buying at such cheap prices.
Before we delve further into the world of fast fashion, there are three kinds of fashion you need to understand first:
- High fashion: (also known as haute couture) expensive, fashionable clothes produced by leading fashion houses, often featured on catwalks of fashion weeks. Heavily influences celebrity fashion trends. This high-end fashion is cost specific, occasion specific, custom fitted, bespoke and extremely high quality.
- High Street fashion: These are clothes that you could buy on your average high street. These include high street brands that mass produce clothes catering to a larger target audience, are affordable and aren’t very occasion specific. These clothes are ready-to-wear and keep changing season to season. High street fashion is heavily influenced by high-fashion-week catwalks and celebrity culture.
- Fast fashion: This is inexpensive clothing produced rapidly by mass-market retailers in response to the latest trends. It is when designs move quickly from the catwalks of high-fashion-weeks to the racks in high street stores and allows mainstream consumers to purchase trendy clothing at an affordable price.
Even though the idea behind fast fashion is to get the newest and trendiest styles on the market as fast and as cheap as possible, the sad reality of fast fashion is that these garments are often discarded after only a few wears, which is creating a huge problem for the environment. Fast fashion contributes to the mindset that repeating outfits isn’t fashionable, and this is another reason why it is called fast fashion, as the market produces clothing that quickly that it convinces consumers that garments they may have only purchased the week before would now be out of fashion.
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Fashion production was slow pre-1800s. Materials like wool or leather had to be personally sourced and prepared, weaved and finally made into garments. New technology, like the sewing machine was introduced during the industrial revolution. History suggests it was around this time that the first sweatshops started to open, which brought an array of health and safety issues with it. The first major sweatshop disaster took place in New York’s Shirtwaist Factory in 1911, where a fire broke out and tragically took the lives of 146 workers, many of whom were young female immigrants.
The 60s and 70s started to see a significant rise in quicker changing fashion trends as younger people used this as a form of self-expression, but high fashion and high street fashion still remained strictly divided. Online shopping really began to take off in the late 1990s and early 2000s, and this is where fast fashion really started to come into its own. Shops we consider as retail giants now like Topshop, Zara and H&M began to take over the high street by reproducing the latest catwalk and celebrity trends at a quick and cheap rate. It’s not hard to imagine how many fast-fashion companies exist in today’s climate, with online shopping now becoming more favourable than high street shopping, and celebrity culture possibly at its most influential status in history.
Bangladesh is potentially the world’s most notorious location for sweatshops, with 3.5 million workers in 4,825 garment factories producing goods for export to the global market and generate 80% of the country’s total export revenue according to War on Want. Approximately 85% of these garment workers are women, and this is no accident. Gender discrimination runs deep throughout a number of countries where sweatshops are based. Not only is this the case in sweatshops, but also in the fashion industry as a whole.
Louison Webb (she/her), an ethically conscious fashion designer from London said, ‘Throughout my experience in the fashion industry, I have noticed that it is predominantly men who own the business and will hire females to work for them. Not only is this because of traditional and patriarchal views still holding the fort, but businesses in the textiles industry in particular get away with paying women a lot less than male counterparts, and this is why women are hired to do the hard labour.’
Women working in such conditions are often subject to verbal and physical abuse as well as sexual harassment. Louison said, ‘even though I’ve been lucky enough to work in ethical fashion businesses previously, I have still sadly faced sexual harassment with male colleagues making inappropriate comments about what I would wear to work. I acknowledge that there are women working in sweatshops in the UK and the rest of the world that face a much bigger scale of discrimination, harassment and assault much more severe than this, but it still all adds to the overall problem.’
Some garment factories in Banglasesh go as far as discriminating against women when it comes to family planning. According to Clean Clothes Campaign, women applicants are often asked if they are married, or plan on having children. Some employers will only hire unmarried women with no children, and some go as far as making women sign a document that they agree not to have children during their term of employment. Compulsory pregnancy testing during the recruitment process is also a common practice. If women refuse to be tested, or test positive, the likelihood of them being hired is very slim.
Over the years, more reports have come to light of pregnant workers facing an alarming rate of harassment such as verbal abuse, higher production quotas, longer work hours and more difficult tasks. As a result, many female garment workers who become pregnant during their employment go to great lengths to try and hide it, often resulting in birth defects and other childcare issues. Louison told us, ‘how female workers are treated in fast fashion has inspired me to do what I do; activism through craft, and I will continue to be part of the movement in giving those women the voice that they deserve.'
If this harrowing information wasn’t enough, the majority of garment workers in Bangladesh earn below minimum wage which is 3,000 taka a month (which equates to £25). Many garment makers are forced to work 14-16 hours a day, seven days a week, with some workers finishing late hours into the night only to start again at early hours of the morning. Factories are often unsafe, cramped and hazardous, and since 1990 more than 400 workers have tragically died and several thousand more have been wounded in 50 major factory fires.
Fast fashion brand Boohoo is the latest brand to come under fire regarding working conditions and is facing an investigation into accusations of modern slavery after it emerged garment workers at factories in Leicester were being paid as little as £3.50 an hour, way below the national minimum wage which currently starts at £6.45. Louison said, ‘I love seeing people calling out big brands on social platform, it gives me life! The recent boycotting of fast-fashion brands has been a long time coming! The conditions that workers find themselves in is just disgusting and goes against all aspects of human rights.’ Given this information, it is easy to understand the uproar in the British media over the last few weeks with the new information regarding Boohoo. Owned by the Kamani dynasty, Boohoo is worth an eye-watering £5billion, which makes the revelations of sweatshop slavery even more appalling.
Fast fashion factories in Leicester are a long-standing issue, but sadly authorities often struggle to find evidence of modern slavery despite the prevalence of sweatshops in the city. Many reports were published in 2019 surrounding the notorious Spinney Hills – the heart of Leicester’s textiles industry. Stories emerged of immigrant women working in poor conditions for an hourly rate way below the minimum living rate.
The impact of fast fashion is devastating, not only to its workers that are exploited and underpaid, but to the planet too. As of 2018, the UK had 26.7kg consumption of new clothing per head, which is currently the highest in Europe. 235 million items of clothing were sent to landfill in 2017. 700,000 fibres are released in a single domestic wash and 1.2 billion tonnes of carbon emissions are produced annually by the global fashion industry. With the current boycotting and ‘cancelling’ of fast fashion brands on social media, many are campaigning for the use of creating a more ethically sourced wardrobe.
A few years back, an app we all may know by now, Depop emerged. Depop is marketplace that encourages account holders to sell and buy second-hand garments. Of course, eBay has always been a platform for doing the same thing, as well as donating to charity shops, but Depop made second-hand clothing fashionable again. ASOS followed suit, with ASOS marketplace housing thousands of second-hand clothing.
Not only has ‘thrifting’ become more popular - which is basically a cool term for second-hand shopping – more ethical fashion companies are popping up across the globe. Being an ethical fashion designer herself, Louison said, ‘sustainability within your business or product should be a priority, it is not only vital for the planet but the consumer has become more aware and educated with the production of clothing It may have become a trend, but the consumer will willingly research the ethics of a brand and ones that don’t act sustainably will have less chance of selling their products. Buying fashion should be a conscious choice. We should all consider where our clothes have come from, the impact on the environment and the conditions for the workers.’
While many high-street and online fashion brands still choose to utilise fast fashion, others are pledging to make a positive change, no matter how small. ASOS were already trailblazers by featuring a marketplace full of second-hand items for consumers to buy, but they also feature a number of eco-conscious garments that are made from recycled materials as well as moving towards using more eco-friendly packaging. Louison said, 'it has become a lot more common for brands to enforce sustainability whether it be in the production of their clothes or the use of recyclable packaging. Although many of the larger names see this as an advertising opportunity and will use it to entice the customer, stating that they use second-hand materials but still pay below minimum wage to their workers or predominantly use synthetic materials which causes extreme negative impacts towards the planet. What I have seen most is the smaller, independent brands that will implement a more ethical approach to starting a business, this is truly refreshing, and I wish that people supported these more!'
It is important that more clothing brands take a step towards becoming more sustainable with a specific socio-conscious focus because, ‘as designers and brands, we have a responsibility to highlight and include important societal issues within our work given the size of the platform we have. There are so many events taking place right now that need a voice to educate people on what is happening not just to the planet but also to the people that inhabit it. Most pieces of work coincide with a description, this could include, inspiration, process’ and meaning. A lot of people will be reading this and not including an important message would be a missed opportunity to help where we can.’
Louison wanted to add, ‘during this piece, I have revisited events that I had subconsciously ignored, and it then spurred me to have conversations online with other females that have been a victim to similar issues. This can be an uncomfortable topic to talk about, I urge that people don’t stop! Talk about your experiences and teach and learn that you are not alone, and this is the start to systemic change.'
To find out more about Louison and her ethical fashion, visit: https://www.instagram.com/verteej/
