A word to the wise
Not everything you read online is true, I know shocking right!
It is very common for manufacturers to use fear marketing to sell their products. This is when a seller plays on your fears to promote their product. Free from claims, which were once a useful advertising tool have become synonymous with fear marketing – sharing a list of supposedly toxic ingredients that the manufacturer is saving you from by not including them in their products, while many of the ingredients listed are safe to use or would never have been used in skincare anyway.
Parabens and sulfates have been very successfully vilified in the court of public opinion to the extent that millions of products now needlessly proclaim they are paraben and sulfate free.
Parabens remain one of the safest and most effective preservatives available. There are zero, yup zero, peer validated scientific studies showing parabens cause cancer, https://www.washingtonpost.com/wellness/2022/02/15/paraben-free-unsafe-clean-beauty/ is an informative article outlining the fear mongering of parabens in beauty products and a pub med article reaffirming their safety https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/19101832/
There is plenty to be found about why sodium lauryl sulfate – the most vilified of the sulfates, is actually safe to use, including the following 3 diverse articles, https://www.lushusa.com/stories/article_dont-stress-sls.html, https://www.theecowell.com/blog/sls, https://www.compoundchem.com/2014/04/28/what-makes-shampoo-foam-everyday-compounds-sodium-lauryl-sulfate/
Can sulfates cause skin irritation? Sure, but usually only in such large quantities that you would practically need to bathe neat in them.
All ingredients, including sulfates, parabens as well as all natural ingredients, in skincare are regulated so that they can only be used within scientifically proven safe levels.
Sephora is an influential retailer who have created a long list of banned ingredients from the products they sell Shop the best clean beauty products now at Sephora! Discover high-quality beauty without toxic ingredients (like parabens, sulfates, phthalates + more)! Personally we find it pretty scary that a whole generation of skincare users are being fed this unscientific misinformation from what is commonly viewed as a reputable source.
We are not alone in finding these free from claims frustrating and misleading and most countries have stringent labelling requirements. In the EU it is even illegal to make most of these bogus free from claims in product marketing and packaging. Some interesting reading on the subject: https://formulabotanica.com/2019-changes-to-eu-free-from-claims/
Another widely believed fear based myth is the claim that everything you put onto your skin is quickly absorbed into your bloodstream. This is actually utter tosh as your skin is a wonderful and very effective barrier. There are MANY articles debunking this myth online, Labmuffins views on the subject can be found here: https://labmuffin.com/the-60-of-products-absorb-into-your-bloodstream-myth/
The EWG is an unfortunate example of highly successful online misinformation. The EWGs mission is To empower you with breakthrough research to make informed choices and live a healthy life in a healthy environment. Sounds great right?. Ugh, just ugh because what EWG Unfortunately do, in many cases, is repeat myth, greenwash and share scientifically proven false information. They have a propensity to greenlight ‘natural’ ingredients, even those with known safety concerns such as arnica and blacklist ‘synthetic’ ingredients like sulfates. Many large companies have now bowed to the court of public opinion and now quote themselves as being EWG approved. Yuck. The EWG are improving and have radically revised their statements on ingredients including sulfates in the last few years. They also now have toxicologists and cosmetic chemists on staff, however are still a largely unreliable source of information and have a long way to go before they can be considered to be delivering their mission.
·https://chemistscorner.com/why-the-ewg-skin-deep-database-is-still-a-dubious-source/
Things are rarely black and white and, of course, no one is suggesting you have to use parabens, sulfates or any other ingredient, it is however good to make your own informed decisions about them.
And last but not least, some common sense advice on how to find out more about your ingredients and spotting red flags in marketing material https://www.humblebeeandme.com/research-red-flags-learn-ingredients/
