Stand up for Beauty? How about SAFE COSMETICS!?

The following post was written by Stacy Malkan,Co-Founder of the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics and author of the award-winning book, Not Just a Pretty Face: The Ugly Side of the Beauty Industry.


Did you know that beauty needs to be defended? Yes beauty is under attack, apparently from the likes of us.

This is according to the new Cover Girl “Dare to be Beautiful” ad campaign, a rather patronizing marketing blitz that features a $50,000 cash prize for best video and a host of celebrities, led by Drew Barrymore (see my Love Letter to Drew), who have signed up to “defend beauty’s honor.”

“Some people have tried to make beauty an ugly word. They say it’s cold, false, intimidating. We say: stand up to that! Stand up for beauty that makes you LAUGH, that makes you THINK, that makes you get out there and create some beauty of your own!” states the Cover Girl “Declaration Cloud.” (via Virginia’s awesome beauty-schooled blog.)

How about: stand up for beauty that ISN’T TOXIC to our bodies and our souls; for beauty that is HONEST about what people really look like, and contains SAFE INGREDIENTS that won’t damage our health and our children.

Yes Drew looks great in that lipstick, but tests conducted by Campaign for Safe Cosmetics found Girl lipsticks to be contaminated with lead, a substance that is highly toxic to the brain, builds up in the body over time, and can pass through the placenta to a developing child.

Drew’s (probably airbrushed) eyes do look fabulous in those eye shadows (and without them), so it’s unfortunate that many Cover Girl make-ups have high toxicity scores on Skin Deep because they contain multiple carcinogens, allergens and hormone disrupting chemicals.

The fact is, Cover Girl by Procter & Gamble can do a lot better to support the beauty they claim to defend.

So for all of you true beauty lovers out there – those who believe that beauty is about health, and heart and true power for women – please use your votes, your voices and your dollars to support companies that are making products that are healthy and free of toxic chemicals. Please visit www.safecosmetics.org for tips on finding safer products.

And to Drew and friends: We’d love to see you use your considerable clout and celebrity to insist that Cover Girl and other cosmetics companies remove toxic chemicals from their products – and then you are really going to ROCK it!