For the past six-ish months, I've been toying around with the idea of talking about cruelty free beauty products. I've always been an animal advocate and really don't like the fact that some poor little bunny had to have his eyes burned off just because I wanted some damn mascara. I'm sorry for the visual, but it's true. But we don't see it. It's the "out of sight out of mind" principal that we as a society choose to enact. Just like we have an idea of how out food is processed, but we choose to not think about it due to the fact that we would all throw up. *I watched videos on YouTube, and was sick to my stomach for almost a week. I don't recommend following my lead on that one.
But today I am not here to talk about the issues that society has, I am here to enlighten about cruelty free beauty products that are available.
The visual, that I gave you above, happened to me. I had read a blog post about some companies that test on animals, and my favorite brand of mascara at the time, Benefit, was on the list. The next day, I was putting on my Benefit BadGal, and all of a sudden, I burst into tears. I looked at my mascara wand, thought of the poor little white bunnies with swollen, blood shot, and burned eyes, and seriously ugly cried. I then threw my mascara in the garbage, and promised to find myself and anti-cruelty replacement.
Through my promise of finding an alternative mascara, I learned that researching cruelty free products is a pain in the ass. Sure you can look the PETA website or the Leaping Bunny website, but half the time, the legends are hard to read. Why? Because there are like four types of products: vegan; products that are not tested on animals; products that aren't tested, but their parent company test; and ones that do. AND there is something about products not using animal by-products and then not testing, or something. AND then sometimes the information between Leaping Bunny and PETA never matches up. It's kind of like being a vegetarian- there are like four sub categories: people who eat only vegetables and use no animal by-products, people who don't eat eggs, etc.
But back to cruelty free product research. I mentioned that there is a category of products that don't test, but their product company does. So you are probably wondering what a parent company is and why would a parent company test?
According to Wikipedia, "A parent company (owners) is a company that owns enough voting stock in another firm to control management and operation by doing and influencing or electing its board of directors; the second company being deemed as a subsidiary of the parent company."source So in example, my FAVORITE brand BareMinerals, themselves, do not test on animals, but they are owned by Shiseido, and unfortunately, they do test on animals. You may be asking why would a company test on animals... One reason: to sell in China. China requires that all of the beauty products sold in the country go through animal testing. It's sad, but true. And according to PETA, if a parent company tests, but the product itself is not tested, is the product still considered cruelty free? According to PETA, yes. Leaping Bunny, on the other hand, feels differently. See, no consistency.
So instead of looking at all the information online, and just regurgitating all the cruelty free companies out there, I decided to go through all of my favorite beauty products and determine if they do or do not test. And then make up a little info-graphic to help decipher the information.
This is what I found:
After my little research endeavor, I was amazed & surprised to see which of my beauty products were, in fact, cruelty-free. But on the other hand, I really wasn't surprised at the fact that some of my beloved products, ie. Boscia, are tested on animals. I mean, they are considered "Korean Beauty". But truthfully, after my research, I have been more careful on how frequently I use those products. And believe it or not, but I have not purged all of the other "we test on animals" products. Shocking, I know. The reason: I paid good money for some of the stuff I use, and even though I may ugly cry sometimes, I don't really have the money to go out and spend money on an Ulta/Sephora haul (and I'm a borderline sample hoarder, so I'm good). The one thing that the research has done for me though, is opened up my eyes to what is going on. If I go to the store or need to grab a "refill", I am able to make a more informed, educated decision as to which brand I am going to get. Quite simply, I am more aware of which products I should be gravitating to.
Some products will tell you on their packaging that the product does not contain any animal derived ingredients, but that does not mean that they do not animal test. If you want to do your research on your favorite products, you can find links here:
And here's an article about macara and animal testing from The Humane Society... read at your own risk. It's not graphic, it's meant to educate, but it does talk about bunny eyes, and may make you cry.
What do you think of animal testing?
Do you use any cruelty-free products?
*Photo Credit: Turquoise & Palm
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