Another Surprise

So here I am sitting down chomping on a well earned packet of prigles hot and spicy and while I’m relaxing and munching away I casually look at the list of ingredients to see what crap there is in them. Well I was a little surprised. I didn’t even get round to looking at the ingredients because I was distracted by the manufacturer, Procter and gamble, Belgium.

I know that animal testing by P&G is still going on and I don’t buy any detergents or washing powers made by them. I was shocked. Sure I am a little out of touch with the world, living here who wouldn’t be, but P&G, crisps? What else don’t I know? So I got onto Wikipedia and typed in P&G product list and gobsmacked isn’t the word. If you have a conscience Iife really is getting tough. You can’t buy Nestlé because of its formula milk practices in developing countries, can’t buy P&G because of its animals testing record, can’t buy l’Oreal for the same reason (not that I ever would). So, anyway, out of curiosity I checked out the list of companies which still employ animal testing. Yikes. I’m going to die dirty and hungry. There are dozens of them. Dozens. Half the products in the supermarkets (which you can’t buy from anyway because of their own malpractices) are produced by companies either testing on animals, polluting, violating human rights or selling arms. It’s a nightmare! What is one to do (rhet)?. Usually I am presumptuous enough to have a solution to everything. But this? - this is beyond me. Solutions on a postcard please to…..

I also discovered yesterday that Bodyshop has been bought by L’Oreal. (added later: wake up Woozle!!) Where is the sense in that? I never liked Bodyshop because I have never trusted it, it just seemed too good to be true but now?! Who in their right minds would buy bodyshop now? Might as well just buy max factor and have done with it!!

I spent a shamefully brief time in my inspired youth as an Animal Liberation Front activist and even got a raid under my belt but only one I’m afraid as I was so shocked at the level of violence (by the company employees not the ALF activists) and not being anywhere near as strong as I am now or as aggressive I chickened out of future raids (and the shame is still with me) in favour of the softer option of hunt sabotage. The place that we raided was supplying animals for testing to L’oreal (if my memory serves me well). This was back in the 70s… and they are still testing now!!! It defies belief!!!

Note: I’ve just read Wikipedia which says that l’Oreal have not been testing since 1989 and usually Wikipedia is reasonably accurate but I’m sorry I don’t believe a bloody word of it. Looks like I’m going to have to lift my ban on giving a damn about the world and start reading up again.

This morning: Spent a good while last night trying to find out about Body Shop’s testing practices, and failed. A good few animal rights sites are still advocating boycotting them.

The situation doesn’t seem to be very transparent anyway.