Be a mensch, don't wear fleece

[big_swede]

http://grist.org/living/2011-12-07-how-microplastics-cause-macro-problems-for-the-ocean/

http://www.scientificamerican.com/p...=oceans-teem-with-tiny-plastic-parti-11-11-20

Both are pretty well referenced. Yes, fleece (the synthetic version, not the one growing on sheep) is cheap, does its job and is fairly light. Turns out it's too good..

Alternatives: wool.

 

[ammo]

That's not good. I wear fleece quite often. Think I'll look at the filtering aspect of my washing machine, before, i bin them. Wool has always been the smart way.

 

[treadlightly]

Another reason to use wool...

 

[John Fenna]

Wool rules!

 

[Ogri the trog]

I gave up wearing fleece about 15 years ago, I found that it always made me feel sweaty and uncomfortable and would smell bad after short periods.

I now wear wool as I find it to be much more comfortable, feels dryer and doesn't smell, I'll be looking deeper into this information, thanks Big Swede.

ATB

Ogri the trog

 

[big_swede]

Yes wool, as we all know, rules. But there is not an uncommon opinion that wool is expensive and fleece will make do. The thing here is that it is not buying a new item that is harmful, but rather washing items you already own. Sometimes you'll see people thinking and saying "Well I bought this environmently damaging product unknowingly and I will use it now until it is broken, that will sort of make up for it", but alas, that is not the case with fleece.

I have a few fleeces I love, mainly because they were designed and sewn by myself with very nische specifications that I won't find in any store. I will probably continue using and washing (sad isn't it) them until I get the time to sew up new ones in wool, if I can find wool within a reasonable budget and within spec. Having said that I have binned the usual plain vanilla fleece jackets that I really can't defend using anymore.

 

[John Fenna]

I have a couple of fleeces... now relegated to workshop wear and as such rarely get washed!

 

[Kerne]

I'm all for wool and it isn't that expensive if you consider how long lasting and hard wearing it is. A bison bushcraft shirt, for example, is the same price as many top end fleeces. An army surplus wool jumper is cheaper that low end fleeces!

i own a few fleeces as well and will probably continue wearing them. Just don't wash them seems to be the answer...

 

[Squidders]

Oddly, the articles linked do not indicate there are any problems with this happening... Fleece material has been around for well over 30 years now and the article author has not attributed their findings to any specific effects... other than asserting "all that plastic ends up stored in cells of sea life" (if that's the case, how did they find any on every beach sampled?).

All creatures get eaten and nearly all creatures eject material they cannot digest - I mean, fish poo in the sea too you know.

Yes, my remarks are flippant. This kind of scary non-information is designed not to inform but to tell us how to think and how to feel. There are no statistics to indicate how the composition of the oceans and beaches is made up. As soon as there is real data to show what the effects are, I'll change my ways completely - I love the environment and intend to save it for future generations.

Yes, wool is great... I love clothes that come from animals who spend most of their lives covered in pesticides as much as the next man but lets all behave like inquisitive educated people before getting our pitch forks out eh?

 

[Andy BB]

Just another scare story. Reminds me of all the kerfuffle about leaking oil tankers/drilling rig,. conveniently omitting the fact that the seabed itself leaks oil into the oceans at a rate millions of times greater than the last BP "disaster". Yet we never see headlines such as "Mother Nature is trying to kill us all"., or "Gaia committing suicide" ........

 

[brambles]

And most fleece is made from recycled plastics

 

[ammo]

Man-made disasters that destroy wildlife, are avoidable. Natural disasters, are not something we can change. I don't get too bothered about things that i can't change. We can all do a little, collectively we can do a lot.

Just another scare story. Reminds me of all the kerfuffle about leaking oil tankers/drilling rig,. conveniently omitting the fact that the seabed itself leaks oil into the oceans at a rate millions of times greater than the last BP "disaster". Yet we never see headlines such as "Mother Nature is trying to kill us all"., or "Gaia committing suicide" ........

 

[big_swede]

And most fleece is made from recycled plastics

Yes, but in this case it does not matter were the polyester came from. And I would like some references to the statement. So far only high-end makers are bragging about recycled plastics.

As for scare-story, well, fish poop is fully biodegradeable. And if you read the second link you will see that there is a reference to: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/pdf/10.1021/es201811s which is a peer-reviewed article in a most trustworthy scientific publication. You might need a university library account to be able to read or order it from your library if you can't see it. Plastic accumulation in the oceans are a well known and dangerous phenomena so it is indeed no scare story. You can read the abstract in the link. And as for the time the material has been around, well, how long did it take before we realised that PCB, asbestos and other chemicals was bad? Fluorocarbons, Bisphenol A etc etc. Usually it takes long time, sometimes generations before effects are seen and/or measureable. If we know that there is a risk, why gamble? The Precautionary principle should be the rule, not exception.

As for seabed oil leaks, well, that isn't really a problem for shore living creatures now is it? The BP leak was in fact just that. It's like comparing apples to a javelin. I.e. different things.

 

[Squidders]

If we know that there is a risk, why gamble?

Because the risk has not been qualified, nor quantified.
Because a knee-jerk reaction driving textiles in another direction is also an unknown gamble.

Wool wool blah blah... the bottom line is that wool cannot put clothing on several billion people. I love wool, I have much wool but it is no solution to the problems caused by our need for the mind-boggling number of petrochemical derived products. When natural materials were the only available building and heating supplies the tiny human population at the time stripped our country of most of its wood, peat and so on. Why on earth would anyone think it's still a good idea?

Wool is great but people just don't think about how much room a sheep needs to graze and how expensive it is to grow one in a kind humane way... everyone in cheap woollen clothing? That will be intense and cruel factory farming - everyone ok with that?

If people aren't putting forward a solution, they're doing nothing but flapping their mouth parts. Of course any kind of negative human impact on the environment is a bad thing but are we not part of the eco-system? Do other animals dig holes to take a crap in or do they just let it wash away in the first storm or let the beetles and flies have it? We need to take care of this planet for sure but always the knowledge of the future proves the current thinking to be harmful and wrong.

People in electric cars charging from a socket on the wall? amazing, look, no pollution! Oh... coal power station... well, never mind.

So lets stop using fleece jumpers along with everything else bad... and all just die out. Epic solution.

 

[mr dazzler]

As any one been in a sheep dip?
http://www.pan-uk.org/pestnews/Issue/pn72/pn72p3.pdf

 

[John Fenna]

As any one been in a sheep dip?
http://www.pan-uk.org/pestnews/Issue/pn72/pn72p3.pdf

Problem identified and removed .... old news!

 

[big_swede]

Because the risk has not been qualified, nor quantified.
Because a knee-jerk reaction driving textiles in another direction is also an unknown gamble.

Wool wool blah blah... the bottom line is that wool cannot put clothing on several billion people. I love wool, I have much wool but it is no solution to the problems caused by our need for the mind-boggling number of petrochemical derived products. When natural materials were the only available building and heating supplies the tiny human population at the time stripped our country of most of its wood, peat and so on. Why on earth would anyone think it's still a good idea?

Wool is great but people just don't think about how much room a sheep needs to graze and how expensive it is to grow one in a kind humane way... everyone in cheap woollen clothing? That will be intense and cruel factory farming - everyone ok with that?

If people aren't putting forward a solution, they're doing nothing but flapping their mouth parts. Of course any kind of negative human impact on the environment is a bad thing but are we not part of the eco-system? Do other animals dig holes to take a crap in or do they just let it wash away in the first storm or let the beetles and flies have it? We need to take care of this planet for sure but always the knowledge of the future proves the current thinking to be harmful and wrong.

People in electric cars charging from a socket on the wall? amazing, look, no pollution! Oh... coal power station... well, never mind.

So lets stop using fleece jumpers along with everything else bad... and all just die out. Epic solution.

Knee-jerk reaction? I think you are reacting like a teenager. Fleece does not put clothing on billions on people either, now does it? The risks are now getting known and hence we could react before we face a greater impact. The ostrich strategy you choose won't put forward anything positive either, you are not putting forward any solution either. And it is not the role of the environmental scientists to put forward solution, never has been never will be. The woolen alternative was directed for the people here at this site, not as a global solution. When does the average person in the developed world really need to use specifically a fleece? "Oh it's a wee bit nippy, better put on my fleece". It's not like to stop using fleece garments would turn peoples lives upside down. "You can pull my north face jacket from my dead cold hands"... There might also be easier solutions such as more effective filtration of waste water, advances in needle felting (the production of fleece), maybe even of the fibres used. But for the hopefully environmentally concerned people here it might be a seed of thought, and hopefully that will be spread. Even if you just dismiss it, you have at least heard it and can react. Your reaction is immature IMHO.

And you are deliberately lumping me together with your prejudices of liberal ecologicals, which is a silly thing. You have no idea on what my stances are on those matters. Did I write that I propose we all live in clay yurts warmed by dung and relatives that sicken us? No I didn't. But the plastic accumulation and pollutions of the oceans will have (specially in combination with the depletion of fish population by excessive fishing) an effect on our species.

Yes, all living things effect the ecosystem, that's one of the definitions of life. But if we can limit our impact, that is usually a good thing.

 

[rik_uk3]

Yet another panic article by some goy. I love my fleece jackets so they stay.

 

[wingstoo]

If wool is such a natural material (Which it isn't really "natural") how is it that many true Vegans won't wear it...

Wool is man made in so much as it has come from genetically engineered animals, these animals would have grown fleece, but doubtful it would have produced so much.

Synthetic fleece is good for what it does, it is as someone has already mentioned a recycled product, often made from such things as car seat belts, it is quick and easy to wash and get dried (SWMBO has told me so) so uses less energy to get re-wearable after laundering compared to the other fabrics my work uniform is made from.

Also there are an awful lot more man-made materials that also end up going through the system, whether intentionally or not, and without them our world would be a very different one. If manmade (synthetic) materials were removed from our everyday clothing probably some 99+% of people would be pretty much naked...


If synthetic materials were removed from many a bush-crafters gear then who knows what they would be left with.


Anyone going to be willing to list all the synthetic materials used in their gear?

 

[Toddy]

I'm using less man made fleece these days. It doesn't wear 'clean' it gets grubby, it pills and looks scruffy, (and I don't care how cheap or expensive the fabric is, it all goes 'tired' looking, from Rohan to North Face, Berghaus to Lowe Alpine, from Buffalo to Lidl and Aldi specials) it smells when worn for days on end, it burns into wee holes with sparks, it snags and holes on barbed wire and thorns, and I can't repair it invisibly, it always looks slightly scarred.

It does wash and dry easily though, comes in good colours, fashionable colours even, and it lends itself to modern comfort clothing styles.

I knew of the horrendous build up of micro plastic in the oceans, and in the phytoplankton that forms the basis for much of the foodchains, and think that anyone who decries the notion that the health of the planet will affect us, really needs to do some more reading and research.

One world; sometimes we need to live a little more simply that others might simply live.

atb,
M