Standing up against un-ethical fashion

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Standing up against un-ethical fashion

By Alana Watson

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under a Creative Commons Licence

I’m Alana, I’m 21-years-old, and I’m a part of The Fashion Revolution.

If we live in a Western country, it’s easy to forget about the disasters, the violence, and the abuse all the time all over the planet. And it’s easy to forget that we are all supporting the system that kills people and doesn’t support human rights.

This is exactly what has been happening for a long time in the fashion industry. Now, with campaigns like The Fashion Revolution, the younger generation have the power to make this industry better.

It started with the collapse of Rana Plaza in Bangladesh on the 24 April 2013. 1,134 workers were killed and 2,500 injured. Many people forget this. But on that day, the fashion revolution started. Now it is changing the industry, to protect workers’ rights and jobs, and to make fashion help the world.

Fashion affects all of our lives. Because of modern technology, we can now buy clothes with one click. But the people who make the clothes are very distant from the people who buy them. Fashion is a global industry, from many different countries. We ‘need’ a dress here, but people can suffer on the other side of the world.

We see the beautiful side of fashion: fashion shows and the magazines tell us what we need to buy. It’s hard to avoid this. But the young generation have to get real and see that we pay for all this with our planet’s natural resources and human lives.

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Adults die to make the clothes we wear. We think child labour is bad, but we buy clothes made by children in other countries. Our generation has the responsibility to protect the next generation in the world. We must demand that big companies join the fashion revolution.

We must tell the companies what is acceptable and what is not. Our power is in our voices and in what we choose to buy.

If we only buy ethical fashion or second-hand clothing, we stop supporting the fashion industry that kills.

If un-ethical clothes shops and companies see how important this is to us, they will have to change. We have the power. They try to make us buy their clothes, but if we don’t, they can’t win.

Alana Watson is a 21-year-old studying Politics at the University of Edinburgh.

NOW READ THE ORIGINAL: http://newint.org/blog/2016/04/22/standing-up-against-un-ethical-fashion/ (This article has been simplified so the words, text structure and quotes may have been changed).