Chemicals or No Chemicals?

[Guest guest]

I've noticed that people are becoming more anti-chemical in anything

these days and wants everything completely natural. It's kind of

irking actually because it's like we go from one extreme to the other

and there is no in between. I'm the in-between type person. Some

stuff I like natural and some stuff, I can do chemicals. I believe

some of them are there for a reason and some of them aren't really

necessary.

 

So I was wondering, how many of you use chemical preservatives in

your products or will buy products with chemical preservatives and

such. Have you had problems with people complaining about them?

 

The reason I ask is there is an article in the January 2005 Herb

Companion called " Body by Nature " about choosing safer products with

safer ingredients. They are against anything synthetic or

artificial. Like against using FD & C and D & C colors in soap,

synthetic fragrance, chemicals for thickeners. While I think they

have a point with some of the ingredients they list, I am wondering

if they go a bit too far in listing problems with say fragrance

oils. I'm not completely against them because some of them smell

good and if used sparingly, can be fine. For me, that is, and for

the number of folks who answered on my questionnaire that they don't

care what's in a product as long as it smells good.

 

But they list some of these chemicals having studies about them

causing cancer, birth defects, etc., but they don't list the type of

tests that were performed, for instance, how much of the chemical

they exposed to the animals versus the amount that is actually

contained in the product. What's the point of exposing an animal to

high amounts of the chemical and the animal gets sick - duh, but then

less than 1% or less is used in a cosmetic product and saying - hey

that stuff is dangerous. How do you know if you exposed an animal to

50g of the stuff versus less than 1g in a shampoo? Get my point?

 

For instance they say, " ingredients like sodium lauryl sulfate,

diethanolamine (DEA) and triethanolamine (TEA) can form nitrosamines

are 'among the most potent cancer-causing agents found.' " But they

don't list any tests or how the tests were performed. But I know a

number of people will read the article and because of the anti-

chemical, pro-natural thing that's happening now, people will just

accept it which has been happening. Fluff on another level.

 

My point is this, everyone who is pro-natural only - yeah, they used

products with no chemicals whatsoever a long time ago, but then

people only lived to like 60 and 70 was ancient, given a few old

souls which I swear it was just in their genes to live a long time.

Now I have neighbors who are almost 80 who are as springy as me. And

they are pretty much like myself - sort of half and half. They'll go

and wolf down a burger and fries when the feeling hits them. They

use regular everyday products and as natural as these folks have

gotten is bragging about sipping some green tea. But I have some

friends who are pro-natural products, pro-natural supplements only

and it seems they always have something wrong with them - the

chemicals in food, the planets, the moon, the solar storms, etc.

Despite all the stuff they buy at the health food store, they still

complain about something. No ladies, I'm not talking about

menopausal symptoms, these are men I know too. Not trying to make

anyone feel bad either if you're just sickly. My mom is early 70s

and she looks in her 50s and she eats about as bad as many people.

Junk food, one vitamin a day and fried food. She refers to my food

as " health sh@#@ " . My family has eaten the worst food on the planet

and it's funny, all the ones on my mom's side are fairly healthy

outside of some high blood pressure and some arthritis. My dad's

side of the family, the women are worse for wear with diabetes, heart

problems, rheumatoid arthritis to which, okay, I believe there are

some great natural remedies out there I have referred them to because

what's the point of taking chemical medications if they don't really

help you get better?

 

So if you got this far through my rant, what do you think. Any truth

to this? I ask because I just wonder if we're taking all this too

far, not performing the proper tests, like more into people's DNA and

geneology and finding foods and supplements that that particular make-

up would respond to and what would be bad for them, instead of

generalizing everything for everybody, which I believe to be the

cause for all the misinformation out there in everything.

 

Am I making sense here or just rambling on?

 

Michele Robles