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While highlighting the great achievements made by women is an important aspect of women empowerment, it is also important to bring awareness to major issues faced by women.
The fast fashion industry has become a major women’s issue. Although fashion is a major part of women empowerment, the growing exploitation of women workers and poor working conditions of the fast fashion industry suggests otherwise.
Fast fashion is a term derived by the New York Times in the late 1980s to depict the very short turnaround rate of products in companies such as Zara, H&M, etc. Fast fashion relies on overproduction, overconsumption, and very fast cycles at very cheap prices which leads to large disposals and environmental implications. It feeds on the culture of materialism and consumerism at a rapid assembly line which allows people to disengage from the people who actually made the clothes.
The majority of the fast fashion industry relies on womens’ labor. Around 80% of the people making the clothing are women aged 18-24, and most of them earn less than the universal minimum wage each day.
The tragedy of the collapse of the Rana Plaza garment factory in 2013 shed a light on the horrible working conditions and the reality of the fast fashion industry. According to a journal published by John Hobson, the factory had been warned many times to shut down due to safety hazards and poor conditions prior to the
accident. In the time after the tragedy along with many reports of the flawed side of fast fashion on workers and the environment, it is just starting to be recognized in the public eye.
With the growth of feminism and the popularity of women empowerment, fashion has been recognized as a tool for many women to gain more autonomy and confidence in their everyday lives, as well as providing an outlet to express their unique styles. Many fashion brands have capitalized on feminism by campaigning women empowerment and producing garments with slogans, etc.
However, the unsustainable and unethical treatment of the workers making such clothes, most of whom are women, tells a different story. Garment workers often work 14-16 hours a day but still fail to make a living wage to put food on their table.
In an infographic by Global Fund for Women, 60% of female garment workers revealed that they felt unsafe or threatened at work. The long working hours and harsh conditions at work can have greater impacts on the workers’ daily lives.
According to Ashila Niroshine Mapalagama, a Sri Lankan activist and leader of a garment worker’s educational network called SUM, “Workers are separated from their families and are absent from family matters. They cannot obtain leave to perform many social obligations and become distant from society. So these hidden costs are not covered and the workers are under a lot of stress.”
Fast fashion empowers women and bolsters feminism but also simultaneously exploits millions of women.
Although it is unsustainable to shop fast fashion, we have to understand that the accountability for this issue should be on big fast fashion corporations, not individual consumers. It has recently become a pattern to shame others for buying fast fashion on social media. However, shaming women for their shopping choices also defeats the idea of female empowerment. While many high-income and privileged buyers abuse access to fast fashion, there are still millions of lower-income people who rely on it because it is the most accessible and affordable way of buying clothing.
Although we should recognize that it is more ethical and eco-friendly to shop the alternatives to fast fashion, it is also important to acknowledge that not everyone can.
If you can, make sure to buy clothes from a sustainably-made brand or second-hand, and keep in mind that the cost of empowering you shouldn’t be the exploitation of another woman’s labor.
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