There Are No Girls on the Internet - Shein is hurting all of us and influencers are helping them do it — BEST OF TANGOTI

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00:01:06.800 Amazon is the largest online retailer in the entire world.

00:01:10.880 So Amazon's business decisions really matter because they can set the tone for the entire retail space.

00:01:16.060 And this week, Amazon announced they were building out their own super cheap fast fashion retail site where items will ship directly from China to the United States to compete with the suspiciously low cost Chinese online retail giant Xi'an.

00:01:31.360 Now, Xi'an is a huge and not to mention not super ethical player in the retail space.

00:01:37.140 After a disastrous Shein influencer brand trip, I spoke to Aja Barber, author of Consumed, Colonialism, Climate Change, and Consumerism, about the cycle of fast fashion, Shein, and how it's doing real harm to all of us.

00:01:54.380 All of a sudden, everyone's an expert because a brand has flown you first class to tour their facilities.

00:02:00.440 Like, come on.

00:02:07.140 There Are No Girls on the Internet is a production of iHeartRadio and Unblossed Creative.

00:02:15.260 I'm Bridget Todd, and this is There Are No Girls on the Internet.

00:02:21.080 Lately, folks have been having conversations about our consumption habits and the Internet.

00:02:26.540 Like, should we really be fawning over the Kardashians' overconsumption on social media?

00:02:31.740 And for a hot second, de-influencing was a thing,

00:02:34.800 where rather than telling you to buy more stuff,

00:02:37.940 influencers actually told you what stuff not to buy.

00:02:41.460 Until, that is, the whole thing was kind of co-opted by brands,

00:02:45.060 who were basically like, yeah, girl, de-influence.

00:02:48.460 Don't buy this stuff, buy our stuff instead.

00:02:51.800 And of course, those fashion hauls,

00:02:54.200 where people on TikTok show off bags and bags of stuff they bought

00:02:57.660 from fast fashion retailers. 1.00

00:03:00.740 Now, it is impossible to talk about fast fashion without talking about she-in.

00:03:05.720 Pronounced she-in, as in she-in trouble for those TikTok videos, as Madison Malone-Kircher put it at the New York Times.

00:03:13.100 She-in clothes are cheap, suspiciously cheap.

00:03:17.040 Cheap enough that it makes you think, how could this dress really only cost $6?

00:03:21.940 Well, if a slew of recent reports are any indication,

00:03:25.960 the answer is forced labor, human rights violations,

00:03:29.520 stealing designs, gamifying our online shopping habits,

00:03:32.880 wreaking havoc on our environment,

00:03:34.500 and selling us clothes full of chemicals that make us sick.

00:03:37.340 Last year, Wired did a great investigative deep dive

00:03:40.580 about the toll that all of this takes

00:03:42.300 on both the people who make Shein's clothing

00:03:44.000 and the people like us who buy it.

00:03:46.360 And there's another thread to this web too, influencers.

00:03:49.840 The people who go on social media and chill for brands online for profit.

00:03:55.280 So, given all this, all of this harm, can influencers, many of whom talk a big game about causes like supporting women or championing the environment,

00:04:04.440 can they ethically hype up fast fashion retailers?

00:04:08.380 Last week, after a disastrous Shein brand trip, the internet answered with a resounding and loud, no.

00:04:16.700 And Aja Barber, author of Consumed,

00:04:19.280 the need for collective change, colonialism,

00:04:22.060 climate change, and consumerism,

00:04:24.100 says that the internet's reaction might be a sign

00:04:27.000 that maybe what we're really craving

00:04:28.660 isn't a $5 crop top at all,

00:04:31.540 but a new and better system,

00:04:33.980 one that isn't built on exploitation.

00:04:36.600 I've written this book called Consumed.

00:04:38.880 If you are interested in what we talk about today,

00:04:41.320 please get it.

00:04:42.200 You will really, really be shocked

00:04:44.000 by some of the stuff you learned.

00:04:45.260 I kind of think of you as like the OG person talking about sustainability.

00:04:50.660 Like maybe there were people doing it before you, but you were definitely the first voice I heard doing it.

00:04:56.160 So I kind of have to start there.

00:04:58.140 Like, did you just kind of start having these conversations and hope the rest of the world caught up with like what?

00:05:03.680 Like you're like, I'll be here when y'all are ready.

00:05:06.880 Yeah. So that's there was no like turning point.

00:05:11.200 But I'll be honest, I just kind of was like, I think the system might be kind of crappy.

00:05:17.640 I always had a niggling feeling with fast fashion that there was something really crappy going on.

00:05:23.820 I couldn't just shut up and shop.

00:05:26.300 I was kind of a bit like, but how do they get these prices so low?

00:05:31.220 Like just constantly asking myself that, even though like there were times where I couldn't afford anything different.

00:05:38.320 but I still had to ask the question, especially as a curious person and as someone who likes to

00:05:45.880 do crafts and knit and sew. But the other part of it was I found that people really did not like

00:05:54.200 having this conversation. Consumerism, it has its claws in us. And I noticed in some spaces that you

00:06:01.840 and I were in together like people could be as lefty and right on and righteous about every topic

00:06:10.300 under the sun but if I were like hey guys I think maybe we shouldn't be shopping at forever 21

00:06:17.180 because I think they're exploiting people it would be like you you know fart it in the pool everyone

00:06:24.640 would start like throwing like tomatoes at you and get really mad and be super defensive and I was

00:06:31.640 like, oh, okay, consumerism has us in like a death grip. And so I started to just notice that

00:06:40.600 there was a lot of inconsistency within people's behavior in this conversation. Like,

00:06:47.260 yeah, support all women, super feminist, right on women, but also like, let's not buy sweatshop 0.95

00:06:53.880 clothing, boo. And so I kind of just was always in spaces where I would sort of like test the

00:07:00.940 waters for the conversation. And I kind of feel like I've been talking about this for like 10

00:07:07.560 years now. I've been thinking about it for 10 years now. And it's kind of like jumping into

00:07:12.440 a jump rope, like a double Dutch jump rope. Like you're going like this, you're waiting for the

00:07:16.900 moment. So you test the water and you're like, nope, they're not ready. And then there just

00:07:20.820 became a moment where it was like, okay, I think people are ready to have this conversation now.

00:07:25.600 And I don't know if it's a mixture of us realizing that, like, climate change is coming for us all and, like, these systems are aiding in it and no one's going to be safe, or whether it was people actually starting to realize that, like, these systems aren't good for us.

00:07:43.240 All they're doing is creating billionaires and oppression.

00:07:46.060 But it finally feels like folks have come around.

00:07:50.280 From following you and other folks who create content about sustainability, people do have these very strong, sometimes pretty weird defensive reactions when you talk about what you talk about.

00:08:04.860 Like I've seen people say like, oh, this is really classist because some people can only afford to shop fast fashion or this is really fat phobic because maybe this brand is the only size this person can find to fit them.

00:08:18.040 Why do you think that is? And how do we how do you have these conversations in a way where folks can actually hear and like take in what you're saying without jumping to that defensive point?

00:08:28.840 um i just feel like i have been repeating the same thing for a hundred years no i'm just kidding

00:08:39.080 it is just really saying like the same thing and one of the first things i realized that people

00:08:45.340 were deeply hypocritical about is we're having a conversation about poverty but like folks do not

00:08:52.080 want to include the garment workers and the people that make the clothing in that conversation 0.94

00:08:56.160 that is deeply hypocritical. And that is tied to a weird colonialist idea that we think that if

00:09:04.840 somebody lives over there, they should be okay with being poor. That's because you also hear it

00:09:11.020 when people say things like, well, that's a good job in that country. And I always sort of push

00:09:16.200 back a little and go, okay, well, do you want to do that job? And they're like, no. And then I'm

00:09:22.180 like okay why not and they're like well well well and then they start getting backed into a corner

00:09:28.140 and super defensive but what i want people to do is like recognize that like they're playing a part

00:09:35.240 in these colonialist ideas as we're all talking about like decolonize this and that you know what

00:09:40.780 i mean like um there was a time period where everybody was sort of talking about colonialism

00:09:46.400 and how it shows up today but the mere idea that you think someone in the global south

00:09:51.220 wouldn't want to make the same nice wages we do for the same sort of work that we used to do in

00:09:56.820 our country, that's a colonialist idea. The idea that you think that someone should be

00:10:01.760 grateful for a crappy job in an unsafe factory with bad wages, that's a colonialist idea.

00:10:09.420 And then at the end of this system, because it is a linear system, production, usage,

00:10:17.760 end of life, we also have a colonialist idea that somebody in the global South wants our scraps

00:10:24.180 because a lot of the clothing that we buy today isn't the same quality that it was 20 years ago

00:10:30.700 because that's how you push billions of garments on your consumers by like really making sure that

00:10:37.600 the quality is not great. So people are constantly buying, but also people are buying for a lot more

00:10:43.680 reasons than that. But we buy 20 times more clothing than we bought in 1990. And that means

00:10:53.080 that there's a lot more waste and a lot more stuff being donated. And because we're buying

00:10:59.220 such large quantities of clothes, a lot of what is being donated ends up in the global South,

00:11:06.200 usually in parts of Africa being someone else's problem. So for instance, within the book

00:11:14.320 Consumed, I write about Cantamante Market in Accra, Ghana, and they receive 15 million items

00:11:20.840 of clothing every week from the global north. Now, obviously, this market is not going to be

00:11:28.000 able to resell 15 million items, which means 60% of what arrives in Ghana is waste. And when it 1.00

00:11:35.960 becomes waste it ends up everywhere it's not supposed to be so the municipal dump has filled

00:11:42.840 up 10 years ahead of schedule uh the dump catches on fire because of all the clothing waste which

00:11:49.780 also like a lot of that stuff we're putting on our body and you should see how it's not decomposing

00:11:56.320 you know um it ends up on the beach the beach there is incredibly polluted from the clothing

00:12:03.040 waste, it ends up in neighborhoods. And so what we've created is a system of waste colonialism,

00:12:09.500 but we have tricked ourselves into saying that like, oh, somebody in Africa is really going to 0.51

00:12:15.600 be really happy with this t-shirt with the twisted seam that I don't want to wear anymore because I 1.00

00:12:21.700 know it's not good, but they're poor so they can have it. You know what I mean? So like from start

00:12:27.180 to finish, this system completely craps on non-white people. Your clothing is either is made 1.00

00:12:35.620 by a non-white person in the global South, usually, and someone who's impoverished. And then at the 0.96

00:12:42.640 end of its life, we just dump it right back in the global South on someone else. And that is why it 0.94

00:12:47.480 is a racist system. And that is why when people say like, oh, it's, it's classist that you should

00:12:53.960 criticize this. I think they're just sort of dodging an actual conversation where we should

00:13:00.200 talk about what our place is in this. Now, there will always be people who can't make different

00:13:07.960 decisions, right? Like the Shein trousers are the ones that they need for work, and those are the

00:13:13.340 trousers they need for work. Fine. That's not the vast majority of us. And when you look at

00:13:19.420 the profit margins that fast fashion is pulling in, if all the poor people on the planet put all

00:13:28.820 of their money together, they couldn't create these profit margins. These massive inflated

00:13:35.120 billion dollar profit margins that the fast fashion industry is pulling in annually is created with

00:13:42.620 money from customers who are over-consuming and buying often. And the people that can do that

00:13:49.600 are middle and upper class people. So let's talk about that because, I mean, by now you probably

00:13:57.060 are sick of thinking about it, talking about it, being asked about it. I will never get sick of

00:14:01.660 asking about it, talking about it until we stick it to these corporations. I just want to get them.

00:14:08.460 So, like, no, I'm not tired of it. I will talk about it until the cows come home because I want these billionaires to pay for what they've done.

00:14:16.800 Don't worry. Aja and I talk all about that disastrous Shein brand trip after a quick break.

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00:16:19.680 To launder the company's unsavory reputation stemming from worker mistreatment and environmental and health harms,

00:16:26.040 Xi'an called in the influencers.

00:16:28.080 Xi'an flew a handful of influencers to Guangzhou, China, to tour one of Xi'an's factories and to visit its innovation center.

00:16:35.400 It's well-lit, clean, and it actually looks like a pretty okay place to work.

00:16:39.480 The influencers speak to workers about rumors of their mistreatment,

00:16:43.100 and the workers say, oh no, we are being well-paid and enjoy easy commutes.

00:16:47.220 It all seems pretty rosy, much like that suspiciously cheap crop top, maybe a little too rosy.

00:16:54.900 And that's because they were probably not actually talking to employees representative of the typical employee experience at Shein, nor were they in a typical representative factory.

00:17:05.280 Garment experts spotted pretty quickly that the facility the influencers were touring couldn't possibly be where Shein makes the clothes they sell.

00:17:12.000 But that didn't keep these influencers from making glowing, positive content about what they saw and Xi'an's practices.

00:17:19.200 One influencer, Danny DMC, their videos were particularly rage-baity, and I'm not even totally sure why.

00:17:27.640 Maybe it's the way Danny refers to themselves as, quote,

00:17:30.400 an investigative journalist and an independent thinker who gets all the facts

00:17:34.200 and doesn't fall for negative Western propaganda about Xi'an like the rest of us sheep.

00:17:38.740 Okay, Danny didn't really say that, but the gist was pretty clear.

00:17:42.720 Though, in subsequent videos, where Danny walks back their partnership with She-En,

00:17:47.620 they say they were paid very well by She-En,

00:17:50.240 and at other times they say no one is paying them to say these positive things about the company.

00:17:54.980 There was just something about Danny's video that was just kind of smug, easy to hate,

00:18:01.040 and oh boy did people online hate.

00:18:03.960 And trust me, I get it.

00:18:06.060 But Aja says She-En and the influencers who got flack for shilling for them are low-hanging fruit,

00:18:12.000 Because Shein is such a big company.

00:18:14.740 But they are not the only ones contributing to the harm here, not by a long shot.

00:18:19.460 They're just the one that's the easiest to get mad about.

00:18:22.520 I do think that we have these ways of making ourselves feel better about something that deep down we know is harmful. 0.99

00:18:30.360 And I think that the Shein influencership is a really good example of that on a completely different scale. 1.00

00:18:35.640 where, you know, it would be nice to think that those influencers were walking around

00:18:42.180 this like clean, safe looking garment factory and that that is actually where Shein produces 0.88

00:18:49.640 their clothing.

00:18:50.500 It would be nice to think that like their workers are treated well, but come on, like

00:18:55.660 we know the truth.

00:18:57.440 Can I also say, do any of these influencers talk about this thing on their grid, talk

00:19:03.280 about this particular topic ever. Why are you all suddenly experts when you never discuss

00:19:10.860 things like fair wages, fair treatment, ethical fascia, that sort of thing? All of a sudden,

00:19:16.760 everyone's an expert because a brand has flown you first class to tour their facilities. Come on.

00:19:22.420 What were your thoughts when you first saw this video blowing up? What were your thoughts just

00:19:26.780 generally i thought well this company has found themselves a useful crop of fools like yay 0.98

00:19:34.760 they've been looking for them and they just walked right in they were like we're here 0.96

00:19:41.120 oh man oh like i there's a okay so i go back and forth right because i obviously there's a part of

00:19:50.820 me that feels like these influencers, while they are full of hubris about their own importance

00:19:58.360 and knowledge, they're indicative of a larger problem. And I do feel like the internet loves

00:20:05.320 a bit of low-hanging fruit. And this is some low-hanging fruit right here, because it's

00:20:11.080 indicative of a larger problem with a system where the vast majority of people that you follow

00:20:17.660 on social media if they are selling clothing or actually selling sweatshop clothes. It's just

00:20:24.060 easier to go after the group that decided to go with Goliath. And Shein is a Goliath in this system,

00:20:32.100 but H&M still can't say that they can guarantee that every person in their supply chain is paid

00:20:38.040 a living wage. How many influencers work with H&M? How many people that everyone follows

00:20:46.600 sells clothing. I don't sell clothing on my grid. I work with one designer who is extremely ethical

00:20:53.540 and we do not sell a lot of pieces because people are still not grasping that it is worth it to

00:20:59.040 actually like buy ethical clothing. It doesn't sell at the same rate. So I'm not going to be

00:21:03.500 a millionaire from that. I do it because when I started my collaboration, there wasn't a lot of

00:21:10.260 ethical fashion that could be made in any size because it was still sort of an up and up thing.

00:21:16.840 Now there's a lot more options, but that was why I wanted to do it. I knew I wasn't going to like

00:21:21.120 be really rich off of it, but I don't really aspire to that anyways. But

00:21:26.340 at the root of it on social media, if somebody is completely monetizing their life through social

00:21:35.620 media and they're selling clothing, a lot of that is going to be unethical clothing because it's

00:21:41.300 very hard to make an entire living off of selling clothing without working with one of the bigger

00:21:52.660 companies that frankly is exploiting people. It's so endemic and we're so used to it and we're so

00:22:00.720 used to looking the other way. But the truth is, I think that people need to maybe spread it around

00:22:06.760 a bit. Like, yeah, obviously. You call yourself an investigative journalist, like that was the

00:22:14.220 wildest part. That was wild. The internet is gonna come for you. But like, at the end of the day,

00:22:21.300 I think a lot of people follow people online that have platforms that are selling you exploitative

00:22:28.160 goods and we're not questioning that enough but maybe we should you know maybe everyone's sponsors

00:22:33.900 should be questioned in that way because the truth is influencers this system of fast fashion

00:22:41.260 wouldn't exist without influencers and if it did it would be a lot smaller and people would not be

00:22:46.480 getting as rich as they're getting but like part of the reason brands can afford to fly influencers

00:22:53.040 around the world on lavish trips is because they're not paying garment workers.

00:22:59.500 If everyone were paid fairly, a lot of these influencer trips, just the budgets for the

00:23:06.000 marketing would not be the same.

00:23:07.800 So I think we need to really get straight with the fact that people in our society,

00:23:15.800 some who are at the top of the charts when it comes to privilege, are trading on other

00:23:22.300 people's lives in these systems like you know i i see a lot of people who have platforms and some

00:23:29.300 of them deep down inside you kind of know this person is like independently wealthy and they

00:23:34.700 don't even have to sell sweatshop goods and then they still do and it's like why why are we

00:23:40.520 supporting this when a celebrity wears like fast fashion everyone's like you're like one with the

00:23:46.120 people and it's like no they're just real they're happy to exploit people yeah you're so you're so

00:23:50.640 real with your sweatshop garments. Like, why are we celebrating this? So I think we haven't been

00:23:56.200 entirely honest with ourselves for a long time in this conversation, but you know, no time like the

00:24:03.180 present. Once upon a time, I was an influencer, or at least kind of trying to be one. I know, right?

00:24:13.300 Hard to believe. But this was back during the time where it seems like if you wanted to have

00:24:18.140 any platform at all, you had to also be an influencer. And I stopped because it just

00:24:24.140 didn't make me feel very good. I quickly started feeling like if I wanted to make any real money

00:24:29.660 doing it, I had to say yes to working with any brand that would have me, whether I wanted to

00:24:34.820 or not. Because influencing is kind of like the new wanting to be a rock star or a professional

00:24:39.980 baseball player. I looked it up and study after study suggests that more and more kids say they

00:24:45.660 want to be influencers when they grow up. So if it's a crowded space that supposedly everybody

00:24:50.500 wants to be in, maybe that's why I felt like I just had to take whatever came to me. But something

00:24:56.060 the Shein brand trip really shows is the consequences with influencers are not choosy

00:25:01.580 and intentional about what brands they lend their platforms to. And maybe that's in part because

00:25:06.280 there are just too many influencers. Now, don't get me wrong. Influencing is very real work and I

00:25:12.920 want folks to be paid for their labor. But the crowded space can create these conditions

00:25:17.900 where influencers are not necessarily thinking critically about the corporations they're

00:25:22.540 shilling for. Instead, they're just worried about booking that brand deal and getting

00:25:27.000 that check. And in a world where all of our oppression is connected, that just doesn't

00:25:31.920 sit right with me.

00:25:33.500 You know, you really hit on something that I think is complicated. So I want to choose

00:25:37.780 my words carefully, you know, this is also in part a conversation about influencers and the

00:25:44.200 influencer economy, right? I very briefly tried my hand at being an influencer. And part of why

00:25:49.520 that didn't work out was that you just, you end up feeling crappy because you end up feeling like

00:25:54.600 you can't say no. You have to say yes, especially when you're just starting out or when you're like

00:25:59.180 a black woman or a woman of color or like marginalized in some way, right? And so I know

00:26:04.500 that influencing, it's an easy thing to like make fun of, but it is work. And I want influencers

00:26:10.640 to be paid, but an influencer being paid- Content creation is work. Yeah. You know it more than

00:26:15.940 anybody, but an influencer being paid does not negate the harm that the company paying them is

00:26:21.940 doing. Like the influencer who made that Shein video was like, well, we were paid very well

00:26:26.520 and they flew us. It was really a good experience. And I was like, I don't think people are responding

00:26:31.020 because they were worried that Xi'an wasn't paying their influencers well.

00:26:34.680 It's about the human rights abuses.

00:26:36.620 It's about the ethical responsibilities that this company is skirting.

00:26:42.340 And so I wonder, how do we make sense of wanting influencers to be paid for their labor,

00:26:50.520 but also wanting them to do so in a way that is not contributing to harm?

00:26:56.560 Because I felt like there was no way to square that circle.

00:27:00.500 And I was like, influencing is not for me, because to make any real money, you basically have to chill for things that are not values aligned, which just didn't make any sense. And so I don't even really know what I'm asking, but how can we square that circle?

00:27:13.780 Well, I think, yeah, I get a little bit worried that too many people want to be influencers because people want to be famous, regardless of what they do. And that's the issue. And then it sort of became like, oh, you can only have a platform if you like, speak on, you know, certain topics, or you have like, what's your niche issue that you care about?

00:27:42.500 and then I thought oh god let's get ready for some real like empty dialogue you know what I

00:27:47.940 mean like everybody's got like a everyone's got a cause you know and it's just like a lot of people

00:27:53.520 I'm like you can just admit you just want to be famous you don't have to be like oh yeah and I'm

00:27:59.260 like you know I'm a mental health person or whatever mental health is a big one like it's

00:28:04.060 so annoying where it's like you know just be it's okay to want just want to be famous and have a

00:28:09.080 platform you don't you don't need to opine publicly every everybody wants to have like a

00:28:14.440 cause so that they can be like i'm deep and it's like maybe we don't all need to have this because

00:28:19.900 we're having a lot of shallow conversations now um but at the end of the day i don't think the

00:28:26.160 world needs as many influencers as we have i don't think that it's really an occupation that

00:28:34.440 Like I read some survey and I don't remember where, but it was like one out of seven school children who's like asked about what they want to be when they grow up, says they want to be an influencer.

00:28:45.840 And I'm like, no, yeah, you know, I think this idea of wanting to be famous just for being famous is it's quite weird, to be honest.

00:28:58.900 for me, I've always seen platforms as a way to open doors to things that I've always wanted to

00:29:05.620 do. So like, I have always wanted to write, but like, you know, I told my parents, oh, I want to

00:29:10.760 write. And they were like, yeah, good luck with that. There's so many black women writers out

00:29:14.900 there that are being celebrated in our society. This was like, you know, 20 years ago. So I wasn't

00:29:19.680 encouraged to go into this path. And so I kind of saw having a platform as a way of achieving the

00:29:26.960 things that I wanted to do career wise. And I think we really have to question like, who are

00:29:33.880 we following and why? You know, like, I guess we shouldn't be that surprised that people want

00:29:39.860 platforms just to be famous in a world where like, no one can stop talking about the Kardashians.

00:29:46.880 You know, I think it's really indicative of our society. But at the end of the day, I just think

00:29:52.620 maybe we just need fewer people wanting to like

00:29:57.800 go after this sort of work because at the end of the day we're we're propping up something that I

00:30:06.920 don't necessarily think is great like there could be a lot of great things achieved from online

00:30:12.040 spaces but if people if everybody wants to have a cause and everybody claims to care about

00:30:20.340 the same stuff, like, oh, I don't want to oppress women, then what are we doing in this

00:30:25.240 conversation? You know, how did we get to this place? And I think we also need to understand

00:30:30.120 that like, influencing is a fairly young occupation. It's been, what, around for like 20

00:30:37.460 years or so. So like my generation had the ability to shape this occupation and to something that

00:30:45.740 could be great. And we've just found ourselves in the same capitalist hellscape where the

00:30:51.060 corporations have everyone under their thumb. And so I really think that influencers need to think

00:30:58.180 about like, what is it that we're trying to achieve? And like, maybe if we get with the

00:31:03.400 winning team and all start to maybe organize a little bit, not only can we fight for better

00:31:09.320 for ourselves, but we can transform industries. Fast fashion wouldn't sell without people willing

00:31:15.500 to sell it but we need to really get with the winning team about like what that looks like and

00:31:22.920 what those sorts of sacrifice look like if we want everyone to be paid like at one point in time

00:31:27.860 people were sort of kicking around this idea of an influencer union in the UK and when asked about it

00:31:33.680 I was just like no because I'm the daughter of a union president ex-union president but

00:31:41.480 your union has to recognize other unions. You have to have a code of ethics. And if the majority of

00:31:50.060 the, if the majority of the sponsors of the people within this union are brands that bust

00:32:01.160 unions, then what are we doing? You can't unionize while not recognizing other people's unions.

00:32:08.420 That's not how that works. And so like we're at a crossroads where people really need to like figure out what sits right with their morals.

00:32:18.280 And I'm never going to say that like influencing is easy because it isn't.

00:32:23.000 I think that content creators can be incredibly skilled, but it is still an occupation that is like, you know, you're not cleaning gutters.

00:32:34.820 You know what I mean? Like, you're not you're you're not like, you know, like there's a lot of other occupations you could do. It doesn't have to be the one where like, you know, that the highs are high and the lows are low, you know, and so people people need to get right with their ethics here.

00:32:53.480 And what that's really going to look like is folks sitting stuff out.

00:32:58.080 Like we're all looking at the, the writer's guild strike and I'm like right on like union

00:33:03.520 strong, you know, just like power to the workers, you know, like we're all watching this go

00:33:08.780 down, but like people don't realize what solidarity should look like across the board, you know?

00:33:15.320 So if you are like an influencer and you don't want to like oppress people and sell things

00:33:23.000 that oppress people, then you need to actually figure out what that's going to look like for

00:33:27.220 you. If the only thing you can think of is, oh, I got to take money from like these horrible brands,

00:33:33.280 then like maybe this isn't the thing that you should be going for. The reality is I knew that

00:33:38.880 I couldn't do that. And so I diversified and I, you know, started doing Patreon long before

00:33:47.160 the lockdown, which served me well. I wanted to write books. I wanted to do a lot of different

00:33:52.400 things, but I did not ever want to take money to say on my grid that like some big box brand

00:34:00.100 was not oppressing people when I know the majority of them are.

00:34:05.860 More after a quick break.

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00:34:58.380 If your bookshelf and your For You page are equally important to your personality, welcome home.

00:35:04.340 This is Prose Society, the weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for thought daughters,

00:35:10.740 pop culture obsessives, and anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.

00:35:16.780 I'm Eli Rallo, and every week we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and the conversations everyone can't stop having.

00:35:23.900 I'm going to have to look up this story. I'm obsessed. I'm obsessed.

00:35:27.420 From best-selling authors and your favorite book talk creators to the latest pop culture moments, nothing is off the table.

00:35:33.440 It's like if you can hide some real messages inside compelling characters, then that is a Trojan horse.

00:35:40.900 Whether you're looking for literary deep dives, smart pop culture conversations, or a community of readers who love to think a little too much, you're in the right place.

00:35:50.500 Listen to Pro Society on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:35:56.540 See you between the pages.

00:36:04.300 Let's get right back into it.

00:36:05.700 you have pledged that you will never take a dime from fast fashion how did that how did that pledge

00:36:12.760 come to be so i pledged that i would never sponsor my grid with fast fashion to be honest like i would

00:36:21.500 love to get in a room with some of these ceos and then have them pay me to just yell at them like

00:36:27.800 fandom style. Like, oh my God. Oh my God. Oh my goodness. That would be like the dream to like 0.95

00:36:41.460 take their money to like, not just yell at them, but also like hold them to account and get paid

00:36:48.840 to do it. I would love to do that. So I, you know, in the beginning I was like, I'll never

00:36:53.460 take a dollar from fast fashion but i will never ever sit on my platform and say well actually

00:36:59.640 they're not so bad they're trying everyone look they used like organic cotton in one t-shirt last

00:37:05.520 year because that's basically what's happening now if i were to be in a position where i'm paid

00:37:11.540 to like hold these brands to account or drag them publicly like i was thinking about what that would

00:37:17.680 look like recently. I was like, how do I get to a point where like, I'm using this platform to

00:37:23.920 really, really like get in CEO's heads. But yeah, I basically when I started talking about

00:37:31.120 sustainability, I had just moved to the UK and me and my partner had gotten married and had to do

00:37:37.080 the visa process and my God, we were broke. And so I had this platform and my partner was like,

00:37:43.760 hey you need to start making some money because now you have your working papers and I was like

00:37:49.760 I know but I can't and he was just like we'll do something and so like we went back and forth

00:37:56.140 because like at some point in time I was gonna have to like start working and I basically

00:38:02.960 loved writing every day about sustainability and I found that there wasn't a um

00:38:09.660 there was a real lack of actual honest information about sustainability on instagram at the time

00:38:17.500 and people really wanted that people were seeking that they wanted someone who would say like this

00:38:24.200 brand sucks and here's why and i couldn't do that and then also be like by the way today's ad is

00:38:31.280 sponsored by zara you know what i mean so i sort of like talked to my community that was slowly 0.98

00:38:38.520 building. And I said, look, I love sharing information with you all, but like, I got to

00:38:43.340 get paid somehow, but I don't want to do it that way. So I'm going to start a Patreon. And if a

00:38:48.660 certain amount of you sign up, I will continue Monday through Friday to post here. I will keep

00:38:53.760 the ads to a minimum. If I ever work with a sponsor, you better believe that they're going

00:38:59.160 to be ethical and be core to this day. The only sponsors that I've had on my grid have been like,

00:39:05.280 you know resale sites like ebay festeer collective which is very very like that that is like the

00:39:13.000 perfect partnership for me because that's how i buy the majority of my clothing and i love helping

00:39:18.100 people to like realize that like actually you don't have to buy anything new because this entire

00:39:25.120 system runs off of overproduction which means that if there's something you want it'll pop up

00:39:30.180 on resale eventually. There have been very few things that I have never seen that has caught

00:39:37.000 my eye in a store that hasn't popped up on eBay or Bestia or Collective. Very few. And so I basically

00:39:43.240 told my readership, I really, really, really want to keep this space ad-free because we know what

00:39:49.420 advertising looks like in this space. And people were actually really jazzed about that. And it

00:39:56.200 was great because it was 2018. And by 2020, starting a newsletter, which is something I do

00:40:02.780 or starting a Patreon or starting a sub stack was like, it was like the great migration of like,

00:40:09.180 you know, if you joined at that point, you were like a trout swimming upstream with everyone else.

00:40:16.060 But I felt like I had already sort of cemented myself there because I was like, I can't do this.

00:40:22.140 I don't want to sell you stuff. And, you know, I don't want to, I don't ever want to have to like

00:40:27.740 worry about paying a light bill and then saying something that isn't true. And I know probably

00:40:35.240 isn't that, or not even like, you know, having to look the other way in order to like really

00:40:41.340 take the money. And sometimes it is hard. Like recently I did a panel and I found out the day

00:40:48.000 before that one of the brands on the panel had been like caught up in like um something where

00:40:55.240 they hadn't been using a good factory basically and that was very awkward sometimes things like

00:41:00.420 that are really unavoidable but I try my darndest to not be in those situations because I don't know

00:41:08.200 I want to like like who I am when I look in the mirror and I know that if I had financed my life

00:41:16.000 through taking money from people that were oppressing women of color. I wouldn't like that.

00:41:23.060 And I think it's time for everyone to sort of view a lot of these companies as that way. And

00:41:28.400 if we can actually start to get to a point where we're actually towing a party line as content

00:41:33.940 creators together, we can actually transform these industries because a lot of these brands

00:41:39.500 need us. But the problem is people are so thirsty that they're just like,

00:41:44.000 i'll take a dollar from anyone i'll do it for a hundred dollars and it's like no if we actually

00:41:49.800 like organize for ourselves not only could we get these brands paying better fair rates for like

00:41:57.940 the advertisement because they get so much from influencers they really do but we could also toe

00:42:03.700 the party line and be like guess what if you're not paying your garment workers you don't get to

00:42:09.440 work with any influencers that would be the power of organizing in the space but unfortunately it's

00:42:15.920 not going to happen until people realize that our liberation is intrinsically tied to the person in

00:42:22.800 the global south who is bearing the brunt of the system and that's the problem we think that like

00:42:29.140 we're we think we're disconnected from it but like no a company that exploits that person over there

00:42:35.760 is more than happy to exploit you.

00:42:39.360 All of that sounds pretty bleak,

00:42:41.420 but it doesn't have to be.

00:42:43.120 Creating a better relationship with consuming

00:42:45.260 and what and how we buy

00:42:46.760 can actually be transformative.

00:42:49.160 It can change our relationship to our space,

00:42:51.300 our bodies, the way we feel about ourselves.

00:42:53.840 It can be an opportunity, not a punishment.

00:42:56.780 This all sounds very doom and gloomy,

00:42:59.800 but I will say the experience of reading your book was,

00:43:02.480 there's a there's a bright side to it I guess is what I'm saying like like everything that you

00:43:08.100 just said is correct and scary and seems really big but the reality is is that we can make small

00:43:14.240 changes like we don't have to wait for corporations to be better we don't have like we can make small

00:43:20.240 changes like in the pandemic I've talked about this on the show I got a little bit like addicted

00:43:24.880 to buying cheap crap I didn't need just for like a boost because I was feeling a lot of people did

00:43:30.000 Yeah. And I had to take a step back and be like, what am I doing here? Like the amount of boxes outside of my apartment was like embarrassing to me. And when I started really thinking about my consumption habits and how social media was part of it and really undoing and unpacking some of that, it really changed my relationship to my home because I didn't have my closets were not filled to the brim with crap I didn't need.

00:43:53.980 my physical presentation because so much of those clothes were garbage. Like, I found this tie-dye

00:44:02.520 fucking two-piece sweatsuit that I bought on Amazon, and I was like, why did I buy this? 0.99

00:44:08.240 This looks ridiculous, and it looks ridiculous on me. When you stop consuming and then you 1.00

00:44:13.980 actually focus on acquiring things that you like, that feel good, that are designed, that are like

00:44:20.140 made well I not the company made well but made space well uh make me clear about that like my

00:44:28.660 dad gave me this leather jacket that he used to wear in the 70s that I've now been like oiling

00:44:34.440 and taking very good care of and it's like I have a new sense of pride and love for the things that

00:44:39.680 I that I really value and then when I put them on my body I I feel better it's really it's this

00:44:46.580 sounds hippy-dippy and all of that, and it sounds like it sounds, but it really has been

00:44:50.500 transformative. You're completely right about that. The truth of the matter is, I think we view

00:44:56.040 slowing down our consumption cycles as like, oh, it's going to be so boring, and I'm going to hate

00:45:02.600 it, and it's going to be terrible. And I can say my wardrobe is 400% better than it was when I was

00:45:09.300 buying fast fashion because I really think about the things I bring into my closet. Not only do I

00:45:17.340 think about it, but getting away from fast fashion forces you to actually figure out your style,

00:45:23.540 your personal style, because we all think that we're being freed by fast fashion. But if anything,

00:45:29.820 you're just getting a ton of trends pushed at you. You think you have free will in this,

00:45:34.800 But in actuality, the things that are being sold to you have been picked out for you by

00:45:40.020 experts months in advance.

00:45:42.140 So you're like, oh, look at me with this, like my style's really developed.

00:45:46.720 But really, you look like a lot of other people in the global north who shopped at the same

00:45:51.680 store.

00:45:52.520 And so, you know, when you start to really not want to engage with this stuff anymore,

00:45:59.720 you find that you really start to actually find what your style is.

00:46:03.620 you start investing in things, you know, because you're not shopping every month anymore. So like,

00:46:09.680 I used to say I was that person in my 20s that would be like, well, I do like that brand. It's

00:46:15.540 great if you can afford it. And like, there were time periods where I was not making a lot of money

00:46:22.820 and I was moving in and out of my parents' basement. And I would argue that I was probably

00:46:27.300 buying a lot of fast fashion to like, soothe those feelings of inadequacy that I had, right?

00:46:32.920 So I'm looking at like an ethical brand and sizing it up and talking about how I can't

00:46:38.880 really afford that thing, but I'm literally handing $200 a month to like fast fashion

00:46:46.520 companies and not even realizing I'm doing it literally, you know, and just not even

00:46:51.880 quantifying what I'm doing.

00:46:54.300 And then it turns out that like, actually, maybe I could have afforded that very nice

00:47:01.680 dress.

00:47:02.180 I just didn't need to buy five dresses from H&M last summer funny that you know and so when you

00:47:10.140 really stop to like you know be present but also just like get off of this trend cycle you find

00:47:18.660 yourself really leaning into like the core and the essence of what it is that you love and then

00:47:24.460 you know your your style doesn't change with you know you'll obviously there'll be some times where

00:47:32.460 you'll experiment with this and that but like the core of what your style is and the essence of what

00:47:37.540 your style is isn't going to change as fast as the system of micro trends so like for me if i find a

00:47:43.700 dress that i love on ebay i'm still gonna love it three years from now because i love it which is

00:47:51.040 why it's great because now I shop that way you know and I always I always have used eBay for

00:47:56.300 buying clothes I just um didn't share it with my peers because it wasn't very cool until recently

00:48:02.080 um but now I find that like there are brands I love to go back and buy things that I didn't have

00:48:11.320 money for like years ago but like maybe like a luxury item that like I really really love but

00:48:17.860 could never afford. And then I go and find it on eBay and it's like, you know, 70% off of like the

00:48:25.240 retail price. You know what I mean? So once you start to really like dive into your style and get

00:48:31.480 away from trends, it can not only be super fulfilling, but you're going to find that like

00:48:37.220 you have a wardrobe that brings you so much joy. And when you have that, you're not chasing the

00:48:43.040 trends anyways. But additionally, I always say that fast fashion is kind of a bit like sugar.

00:48:50.640 So in the US, we put sugar in everything, like everything. And I live in the UK now,

00:48:57.660 and they do not put sugar in everything. And it is very noticeable when you first get here.

00:49:02.780 I crave sugar, like I'm a sugar fiend. And it's the last thing for me that I need to like,

00:49:07.820 tap down on like I barely drink I have a mostly vegetarian diet but sugar is my vice so when I

00:49:15.380 get to the UK I'm always like craving the sugar like oh give it to me and then after like a few

00:49:22.180 weeks sort of like tampers off and then when I go back to the states I might go out to like a

00:49:27.860 restaurant that I really rate and get like a dessert that I used to love and when I'm eating

00:49:33.960 it I'm like was this always so sweet you know like you you can really tell when you've been 0.98

00:49:40.880 away from it and fast fashion is the same except I find myself saying was this always so crap

00:49:47.500 you know like when I first took time and basically said like moving to the UK really helped me

00:49:55.720 because I had no money and I had also had to like really lighten my possessions so I wasn't in a

00:50:02.360 massive rush to like go and acquire new things. And so I really took some time from all the

00:50:08.000 stores. I unsubscribed from all the email lists, no apps, yada, yada, yada. And I would say the

00:50:15.100 next time I went into an H&M after taking like six months to just really clear my head and start to

00:50:21.380 get away from fast fashion, all I could think about was how everything was plastic. And the

00:50:27.860 stores they smell weird smell weird smell they smell weird and that's because there are a bunch

00:50:35.860 of things that they spray the clothing with in transit to keep it from wrinkling so you start

00:50:42.440 to notice things like that when you take time away with slow fashion the quality i just it's

00:50:50.520 incomparable i i do some like personal shopping and personal styling virtually through my patreon

00:50:57.140 and one of the things that I always I never get sick of is the person who gets their first like

00:51:05.640 slow fashion purchase and they're just like the quality they just can't keep they just they're

00:51:11.320 like this is unbelievable because we really haven't noticed like while being in the fast fashion

00:51:18.520 cycle that things have gotten pretty bad but then when you compare it to something that's a lot

00:51:25.740 better quality, you're like, oh, we just think that like, it's going to be terrible because

00:51:32.780 consumerism has trained us to believe that like, this is how we participate in society. This is

00:51:38.440 how you show the world your personal style. This is how you, this is the hobby you do on your

00:51:44.040 downtime. This is how you reward yourself when you're feeling bad. This is what you do when you

00:51:48.580 need a new outfit for a job interview, which you absolutely don't need a new outfit for a job

00:51:54.340 interview, that person's never met you before. They will not know if it's an old outfit,

00:51:58.300 you know? So like we, we trick ourselves into thinking that consumerism is like our best friend,

00:52:04.040 but in actuality it's killing the planet and thus killing us. And we need to think about it

00:52:11.300 differently, basically. When you think about what's on the horizon, it does seem like people

00:52:18.500 are kind of catching up. Secondhand clothing is kind of having a moment. Thrifting is having a

00:52:25.380 moment. People are having conversations about consumption. Are you hopeful that we will sort

00:52:31.760 of get ourselves out of this? Do you see that happening? Well, I am hopeful, but not to get

00:52:41.240 depressing, but all this is going to come to a screeching halt because Mother Nature is about to

00:52:46.940 clamped down on us really hard. So what you need to understand with these systems is we're all

00:52:52.880 over-consuming. The consumer, the brands are obviously over-producing, pushing us to over-consume.

00:52:59.860 If we don't change this ship around, we won't have the raw materials for a lot of these brands to

00:53:05.900 keep going. But we can't keep going like this forever. All of these systems are playing such a

00:53:13.300 crucial part on the natural resources that our lovely planet provides for us for free.

00:53:20.880 And these brands are taking way more than their fair share. I'm kind of hopeful, though, that

00:53:26.440 people start to see these systems for what it is before it comes to that. Because like I said,

00:53:32.320 this is sort of like the last hurrah. And it seems like the fashion industry just thinks that it's

00:53:38.080 just going to ride the car until the wheels fall off. But if the wheels fall off, things are going

00:53:43.040 to look really, really bad. So people think that ethical fashion is expensive now. You just wait

00:53:49.440 until cotton costs $100 a yard. You know what I mean? But if we keep depending on this system

00:53:56.940 of overproduction and overconsumption somewhat pushed by influencers, by all means,

00:54:03.180 the companies are totally at fault. The billionaires are at fault. But the person

00:54:07.860 who has a platform who thinks none of this has anything to do with them and I'm just trying to

00:54:12.520 get a paycheck, you're at fault too. Because if you have like the same following count as me on

00:54:17.680 Instagram, and you're selling people something daily, you are selling thousands of products a

00:54:23.480 year, hundreds and thousands of products a year, and probably getting a really nice affiliate

00:54:27.700 linking check. So you're also like richer than everyone else, but then also going,

00:54:32.440 oh, I can't afford to change. This is how I make a living. No, maybe it is you that needs to change

00:54:38.240 because the system won't go on forever.

00:54:40.700 And then like, then what?

00:54:42.360 We now have a system where like people truly can't afford clothing.

00:54:47.280 I don't want to live like that.

00:54:49.180 So I really hope that people wake up and realize that like these corporations are harming our

00:54:57.160 planet and these systems of consumption are hurting and harming us.

00:55:02.280 And I don't think that this is an impossible thing for us to do.

00:55:06.700 I think we really need to be honest with ourselves and look at where we are in this system and look

00:55:15.000 at who we are in this system. You know, if you're the person who really, really just needs that

00:55:21.120 pair of work trousers from Primark, I am never going to show up and like slap your wallet out

00:55:26.700 of your hand because I'm not a bad person. But that's not how Primark turns loads and loads of

00:55:33.680 profit they turn loads and loads of profit by people going on holes there you know so like

00:55:38.600 realizing who you are in the system and what you can like afford to do honestly it's going to be

00:55:46.800 a crucial part and like asking yourself do I even want to participate this way because I remember

00:55:52.620 when I was buying fast fashion feeling really like I don't know a bit sort of like pushed to

00:56:02.380 do it in a way where I wasn't comfortable, like taking out my summer clothing from the year

00:56:07.180 before and then being like, oh, all these dresses are really nice. They're still good. I don't know

00:56:14.420 why I feel compelled to buy new dresses. So ask yourself, do you even like being in the system?

00:56:19.760 And if you don't like, what are you going to do differently? But rest assured when people say

00:56:24.520 that like, oh, it's not on the individual, it's on the corporation. The corporation does require

00:56:30.300 you it requires a lot of us buying into it it requires people over consuming and if you don't

00:56:36.780 think in corporations don't feel threatened by like sustainability in many ways they do there's

00:56:43.220 a reason why like every trash bag company is now sort of starting to do like secondhand resale

00:56:50.460 because they see that us as citizens are actually caring about this stuff and they want a piece of

00:56:57.340 the pie so we get to say that oh we care about sustainability and also like we can profit twice

00:57:04.200 from like the same crap except some of that stuff doesn't hold up long enough for it to have two

00:57:09.420 owners but that's another story i do think that corporations realize that like the writing is on 0.84

00:57:15.900 the wall and the more we become informed citizens and the more we start to really take action and

00:57:22.880 change how we interact with this system, the more we can actually change this system for the better.

00:57:30.100 Okay, so what did you think of that Shein brand trip? And what are your thoughts on fast fashion

00:57:35.120 retailers like Shein? You can let me know on email at hello at tangody.com, on my Instagram at

00:57:40.700 BridgetMarieDC, on Twitter at BridgetMarie, or you can always subscribe to our Patreon at

00:57:45.420 patreon.com slash tangody, because I kind of can't stop talking about it and I would love to hear your thoughts.

00:57:52.880 Got a story about an interesting thing in tech or just want to say hi?

00:57:58.420 You can reach us at hello at tangody.com.

00:58:00.680 You can also find transcripts for today's episode at tangody.com.

00:58:04.120 There Are No Girls on the Internet was created by me, Bridget Todd.

00:58:06.860 It's a production of iHeartRadio and Unbossed Creative.

00:58:09.580 Jonathan Strickland is our executive producer.

00:58:11.640 Tari Harrison is our producer and sound engineer.

00:58:14.260 Michael Amato is our contributing producer.

00:58:16.260 I'm your host, Bridget Todd.

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00:58:21.680 For more podcasts from iHeartRadio, check out the iHeartRadio app,

00:58:24.840 Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

00:58:51.140 I survived nine months in captivity, and I've spent my life exploring how other people survive

00:59:16.540 of what should have destroyed them.

00:59:18.620 I'm Elizabeth Smart, and these are The Survivor Files.

00:59:22.240 Every week, I'm with survivors who live through the unthinkable,

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00:59:43.520 are equally important to your personality, welcome home.

00:59:46.540 Pro Society is a weekly podcast that's part book club, part group chat for anyone who thinks Pride and Prejudice and Love Island deserve the same level of discourse.

00:59:55.260 Each week, we're connecting the dots between books, the internet, and pop culture with your favorite writers, book talk creators, and plenty of overthought opinions.

01:00:03.860 Yeah, I'm obsessed. I'm obsessed.

01:00:05.620 Listen to Pro Society on the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts, or wherever you get your podcasts.

01:00:13.440 Hey, this is Hayes Davenport.

01:00:15.320 And Sean Clements.

01:00:16.540 We host the podcast Hollywood Handbook.

01:00:18.720 Every episode, we're trying to help our guests improve their careers

01:00:21.080 by mainly focusing on how they can help us improve our careers.

01:00:24.620 The show's famously super accessible,

01:00:26.100 so you can easily jump into any of our 650 episodes

01:00:29.180 and understand what's going on.

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There Are No Girls on the Internet - July 05, 2024

Shein is hurting all of us and influencers are helping them do it — BEST OF TANGOTI

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