0:00 the beauty industry markets the most toxic products to women of color these products contain chemicals linked to breast and ovarian cancer uterine fibroids reproductive harm and more studies show that women of color have higher levels of beauty product related environmental chemicals in their bodies [Music] hey girls so in this video I'm just going to talk about 10 ways in which black women are exposed to more toxicity in their daily living than the average woman this is an important video and this is something that I am developing a
0:46 real passion for ever since I became a mom I want to be the healthiest I want to be around the longest time I can for my child and of course I want to create a home that is the healthiest for him and this took me into the rabbit hole of researching you know what we use in our daytoday lives that might actually not be as healthy for us and yeah I'm just going to talk about 10 ways or different 10 different ways in which US as black women are at a higher risk or have a more propensity a higher propensity to develop illness or are exposed to um toxicity so in my search I discovered this website called called safe cosmetics. org so it's a campaign for
1:33 safe Cosmetics okay and there's a portion here that talks about um women of color are Overexposed to toxic beauty products because of racialized racialized sexist and eurocentric beauty standards the beauty industry markets the most toxic products to women of color these products contain chemicals linked to breast and ovarian cancer uterine fibroids reproductive harm and more studies show that women of color have higher levels of beauty product related environmental chemicals in their bodies and even small exposures to toxic um chemicals over time can trigger
2:20 adverse Health consequences this uh toxic exposure is of particular concern for black women who purchase and use more beauty products per capita than any other demographic they also face many Health um disparities including um highest highest breast cancer mortality rate of any USA racial or ethnic group this is serious so you've heard we spend more money than any other woman when it comes to looking out after ourselves our here you know whatever the case and a lot of it is actually marketed to us because
3:05 people know that we are dealing with an identity crisis where we are trying to emulate different beauty standards I don't want to get too deep into it but I think it's high time we started speaking about this topic and educating ourselves to make better choices for ourselves for our children and for the Next Generation you have heard that a lot of African women of African descent African-American women black women they experience fibroids breast cancer hair loss um reproductive issues okay because of the toxic ingredients in the products that we're purchasing let me just say there's a lady here on YouTube that I follow I forgot her name but she's a toxicologist
3:50 and she is brilliant at really educating and you know letting you letting you know um what ingredients to look out for what sort of things to look out for tricks and tips here and there to just help you make better choices overall so check her out now just before I list the things that I think we are exposed to you know that are possibly causing toxicity and making us unwell I just want to say that this video is not to say hey become an extremist and run to the mountains and create a make a hat there and leave there I'm not saying that but I am saying be informed be empowered and make better choices I don't think this is something that you can eliminate because we live in a toxic World literally the air we breathe is not clean the water we drink is not the cleanest our food is contaminated and
4:38 sprayed with pesticides and you name it okay GMO Foods um and also genetically you know things are actually passed down to us from our parents so yes we can make some improvements but I'm not doing this to scare you or to make you just become a really unrealistic person that doesn't enjoy life because you're trying to be clean okay but knowledge is power okay so let's get wiser and learn about these products that are actually possibly harming us the first one as you can imagine is relaxers we need to stop shaming people that are straight Naturals or choose to be wash and go Naturals or you know big chop their Hair Etc because we are
5:24 trying to manage the hair that we have still look beautiful still be able to manage time wisely Etc okay so if there was a relaxer that was chemical free that was very healthy that was not harmful I would say go for it I wouldn't stop you from doing it if it makes your life easier if it makes you feel beautiful if you have accepted your own TR texture in hair and you don't have a problem with it um however if you're going relaxed and straighten your hair because you want to look like someone else that's a problem okay so let's distinguish the two let's embrace our hair and then choose how you want to to wear it okay learn your hair love it and then decide be liberated with how you want to wear it I would discourage relaxers the
6:09 problem with relaxers is that you're doing it on repeat okay so some you do once and then you're done you're doing it a lot every 6 weeks multiple times a year one number two a lot of it goes not a lot all of it goes very close to the scalp and I'm sure some of it touches the scalp the scalp is skin that is more porous than the rest of the skin or your other skin so it's going to absorb more believe it or not the next one is hair extensions I am going to do a video talking about um I it's actually a reaction video where I saw someone talking about how can nickle on hair synthetic hair made of plastic is
6:55 actually toxic actually toxic and how many many times do we rotate this here this right here is a synthetic wig I don't know where it came from I don't know how it was made I don't know what chemicals are in there but a lot of us who sort of put it in put synthetic hair in you know apple cider vinegar and you can see the chemicals a lot of the times kind of swimming on top of the water there um so it's definitely something we need to think about and support brands that are coming out with clean um clean clean hair hair that is actually healthy hair that does not harm you that helps you one that I can think of off the top of my head is I think it's called New Village New
7:40 Village easy braids and rebundle those are three brands that I can think of off the top of my head that you can try out if you're going to do braids the options are limited but it's a start okay we can definitely start there are people coming up with here that is made from collagen protein for example rather than plastic okay um hair that is made from you know non-toxic material so let's support those Brands let's come up with those Brands and let's actually take this if we are spending more than any other woman on our hair it means that if we stopped we're going to close down some businesses we literally hold this community is going to be
8:26 shaken if every woman decided I'm not going to buy any toxic hair anymore the next one as you can imagine hair dyes there's a lot of chemicals in hair dyes I know there's options for dyeing your hair naturally haah is one of them and I know there's other options out there a lot of it is not 100% toxic free but if you can make a choice for something healthier do so don't just paint your hair pink and yellow without thinking about what exactly is going on your hair okay products that go on our scalp I'm I'm talking about the oils I spoke about relaxers already but it's the Pomade it's the petrolum that we're putting on the scalp that we really don't know how well refined it was um and other ingredients that go on the
9:13 scalp we put a lot of things on our scalp massage our scalps a lot so we're using a lot of product on our scalp so of course we're more disposed predisposed to the toxins if the products are toxic once again go natural just use plain oils um essential oils are good in my opinion but again I'm not a professional on this it's just from my own you know humble research so yeah scalp care products as you can imagine hair care products it's the conditioners the deep conditioners the you know what is it gels there is a lot of products that will put edge control name it we use so many products we like to layer products it's the butters shampoo m girl let me tell you protein
10:00 treatments Bond Builders there's so much that we're doing that predisposes us to illness so I say think again before you really zero down on your um routine and this is why I I think that straight Naturals might actually have a little bit a little bit of an advantage when it comes to this toxicity because they're not REM moisturizing with living conditioners all the time they're not washing their hair all the time you know putting chemicals on their hair all the time and I know there's advantages to washing your hair but you're also putting chemicals on your hair very regularly so unless you're using something very pure you know it could actually be an issue so straight Naturals once you blow your hair or silk
10:46 press it that's it all you're dealing with is your own natural sebum or just adding pure natural organic oils to the hair I love it I love it okay wash and gold Naturals I think might be the worst when it comes to layering cuz actually no wash and go Naturals are at par with just normal Naturals because they put gels Foams leave-ins layering lots of products washing with multiple products deep conditioning you know like yeah multiple times a week sometimes yeah you feel clean but how many toxins have you just smothered on yourself off the top of my head I know rawa in a sense uh
11:32 melanin Hair Care are great I'm going to do a separate video about this guys so uh look out for that so the next one is skin care we love good skin don't we we love silky skin I know I love to look after my skin girl we we buy skin products as black women we do that let's support blackowned businesses guys blackowned brands that are coming out with you know these products that are cleaner for us I'm not just I'm not saying just buy black owned of course if people are pro black or they want to care for curly hair even if they're not black themselves or if they're just a clean brand of course definitely try them out um but of course my first choice would
12:19 be to try someone that is black cuz I want to support my own people right um but either way guys just go clean uh try try to choose a cleaner product of course they're more expensive there's not many options for example yeah I in Australia like a lot of the stuff that you have to buy that's clean is going to be online so we do have challenges there makeup girl not only do have a challenge here but we we love makeup we wear makeup and then yeah you try a clean brand and then they don't have your shade right cuz people are racist non-inclusive right but fit glow is one that I'm looking to try when it comes to makeup your lip stuff and
13:05 whatever let me know if there's other clean brands that you know I'm still researching this particular issue but makeup is another way that black women are exposed to toxins Nails Nails it's funny cuz I'm speaking here with painted nails there's a lot of toxic ingredient ingredients in nails and there is two brands that I have worked with that are non-toxic okay so 21 free so they're called this they label themselves as 21 free so they eliminate 21 of the most toxic ingredients found in nail polish I can't believe there is 21 toxic ingredients in nail polish anyway if you're going to paint your nails this is not something
13:52 that I do every day I was actually just doing this for you know um to try out to try out the brand and also to you know it's a partnership I had to do it um but Madam Glam is one that claims to be non-toxic and nail reserve okay nail reserve Los Angeles yeah so these two are off the top of my head some that I know you know seem to be better at least if you're going to go to the nail palette go with your own polishes and let them use your polishes um or just do yours at home I mean there's ways around this but Nails is one way that we're exposing ourselves to toxins self-care I'm talking
14:37 candles you know creams that we wear hand creams um perfumes glitter um you know Beauty enhancements in general it's nice it smells good but apparently the the week in the candle is usually a metal and as it burns it actually releases toxins into the atmosphere I was listening somewhere to to look for candles obviously that are not toxic that do not have funny smells in them or funny ingredients in them if you're just going to buy a fragrance cuz when when something is labeled fragrance even on any ingredient
15:23 list right in your conditioner whatever in whatever product if there's fragrance written on there apparently fragrance is just an umbrella term for thousands of ingredients so a lot of toxic ingredients could be hiding in fragrance so a perfume for example can actually be very toxic to you you guys know I've spoken about I've done a video on dosier this is a non-toxic brand for your fragrances they smell so good this is a luxury brand so I would recommend if you're looking for a perfume to try so those were my 10 products or 10 ways that black women I exposed to toxic ingredients on this
16:08 website the campaign for safe Cosmetics there is skin lighteners okay that has been left out this one I I hope N I hope none of us are doing this but bleaching your skin is another way we're exposing ourselves to toxicity ladies I hope this video was helpful let me know if you have any other ideas any other ways that you think black women are exposed to toxic ingredients campaign for safe Cosmetics is a great website it actually lists a whole has a all sorts of list for chemicals of concern quick tips you know apps that you can join you know think dirty or uh clear y clear clear yay I
16:55 think it's called clear yeah I don't how to say it but there's apps that you can join that you can sort of type in a name of a product or an ingredient and it tells you if it's safe or if it's toxic Etc so yeah let's help each other to stay healthier to not get sick to be here as long as we can to be here for our friends our families our kids our partners Etc I hope this video is helpful comment below if this is something that you're interested in and let's share ideas okay guys I hope you enjoyed it bye [Music]
