Smells Like Green Spirit

Did you know that the phrase “mad hatter” comes from the fact that hats used to be made with mercury that caused the hatters to go insane?

Mercury poisoning causes tremors, brain damage, and slurred speech, and is easily absorbed by skin and accumulates in the body.

And yet, it’s legal to have mercury in makeup products. In fact, it commonly appears in mascaras.

Although it seems outrageous that people shampooed with petrol in the 19th century, causing hair to easily light aflame, and it’s horrifying to imagine vermin living in little washed hairdos and wigs styled with lard, the makeup industry seems not to have progressed as far as one might think.

Carbon tetrachloride was also used to wash hair, causing results similar to inhaling chloroform in the 19th century. This seems bizarre, and yet freakin’ formaldehyde is released by several products found in deodorants and makeups under such names as Imidazolidinyl urea and DMDM Hydantoin.

Victorian women suffered massive scalp injuries and health problems by dying their hair with mixtures containing sulphur, lead, ammonia, and gylercine, among other things. Sounds like the ingredients of a bomb!

And yet, chemicals equally as toxic still exist today in not only hair dyes, but products we smear on our mouths and faces every day! Sodium Laurel Sulphate is mixed with sulfur trioxide or chlorosulforic acid and then neutralized with aqueous sodium hydroxide, appearing in most toothpastes, deodorants, and cleansers.

It’s estimated that our bodies absorb around 5 pounds of chemicals per year from makeup and lotions and hair care products…products proven to cause birth defects, neurological damage, even depression and blindness!

Check out:
An interesting look at the wacky history of toxic hair care through the ages.
More on different chemicals in makeup.
Consumer Reports on phthalates.

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