The Student News Site of Lowell High School

The Lowell

The Student News Site of Lowell High School

The Lowell

The Student News Site of Lowell High School

The Lowell

Junior exposes dark side of fast fashion

Letter to the Editor

Dear Students of Lowell,

If you checked the tag on the back of your clothes, where would they say they were made? China? Indonesia? Bangladesh? To us, where our clothing comes from may not be a big concern. In fact, we may not think about fashion much at all, besides the outfits we pick out in the mornings or when we want to go on our next shopping trip. But in fact, the global apparel market is valued at $1.2 trillion, and the average American buys over 60 items of clothing per year, according to a report issued by the United States Congress in 2015. The fashion industry controls much more about us than we think, and is laden with problems.

The fashion industry controls much more about us than we think, and is laden with problems.

One of the largest issues is the sweatshops and child labor that most companies use. A few years ago, in Bangladesh, a big clothing factory collapsed and over 1,000 people died, according to The New York Times. The collapse could have been avoided, but the owner ignored the building codes, like fixing obvious cracks in the walls. These types of accidents are more common than you might think, but they are rarely covered by the media. If we found out that our favorite shirts were stitched by someone who later burnt to death in a factory fire, would we buy from that company again? Probably not.

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Many poor people in third world countries usually have no other options for work, and have to choose between terrible work or no work at all. Workers are paid terrible wages and are forced to work long shifts with no breaks. Women who become pregnant are often fired. A study done by Forbes shows that generally, if you take the cost of an item and divide it by 5, that’s the amount of money that went into making that item, including materials and labor. So if you paid $5 for that shirt from Forever 21, the worker that made it for you got less than $1.

So I’m here to inform you, and to ask you to take a look at where you buy your clothes. Think about who made your pants. What costs you $20 could have costed someone else their childhood. So what can you do? For a start, do some research on the company you are buying from. Buy less. Buy smarter. But the only way we will be able to make real change is if we stand up and say “no more.”

Thank you,

Scout Mucher, Class of 2018

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Junior exposes dark side of fast fashion