Greenwashing and Spin

Good Day Everyone!

It's a glorious one up here in the Cuyamaca Mountains. Fall is upon us, at last.

Today I want to talk about the spin doctors of health and wellness. Yep. Sad to say, but everyone wants on the bandwagon of "green" but few, very few are willing to put their dollars into quality to deserve the credit.

We have to start with definitions, because the definitions are what have been muddied. Sigh.
So. Let's start with the word "natural". Natural by definition means that which exists in nature in its pure state. Man has nothing to do with how it got there. It is created and evolved in nature. Natural plants are the ones that have acclimatized to a region or area. They sprout up. OK. We're clear about natural. It is of , in and pertaining to nature without man's interference.

Now let's tackle "organic". First of all there is a course of study called "organic chemistry." I know because I suffered through one of those courses at Ohio State when I was a premed student. It followed human anatomy (real cadavers) and preceded microbiology. Now organic chemistry is pretty much the study of carbon-containing compounds, humans included. For the purposes of heath and wellness, though, this is not the definition of organic that applies. For in this definition, petroleum is an "organic" compound because it is the result of organic (carbon-containing matter) that has evolved over time from heat and pressure into oil.

Gosh, we're gonna get so smart, it's scary.

For the purposes of health and wellness products or all types and for food, the definition of "organic" is something that has been grown, propagated, raised, harvested and processed for market without any synthetic chemicals at any stage of the cycle. This includes the soils that the plants or animals are "grown" in. No steroids, no pesticides, no artificial fertilizers. I can tell you raising anything organically is bloody hard work, for most of the remedies are mechanical which pretty much translates into labor. So we're clear about the true definition of "organic". Now lots of folks grow organically and are not certified. I pretty much find that these people are true to their word, because growing organically is a life style choice and accompanies true hearts with the full intention of bringing only goodness to you.

Now, let's tackle "certified organic". Certified Organic means that an independent third party certifies that the produce, cow, product, formulation is exactly that. They have stringent guidelines that must be adhered to. They inspect and they promise you, sort of like Verisign, that "this is truly safe."

When something is certified organic, such as a skin care cream, shampoo, etc. It also means it meets other standards. Significantly that 95% of the composition of that product must be "organic matter" excluding the water and salt. Yep. Let me repeat that.....95% of the composition of that product is organic matter, which is alive, potent, nourishing and vital. This translates to good for you, all of it.

Now, what does it mean when you read a label in the health food store on a shampoo that says, "73% organic". This is a greenwashing technique. Here's what they do. They boil a vat of water. they throw in organic tea bags to impart the herbs into the water. Now they consider that the water is included in the organic composition, when really what is true is that it's about 3% organic. Then read the rest of the label to see what "fillers" and other synthetics have been added.

You can get perfectly wonderful organic items without it saying "certified organic", but you'd better be darn good at reading the labels and interpreting them. We'll cover this in my next blog.
For now, just know, that there's a brand new standard out there being set by some wonderfully visionary folks - and it's called "Certified Organic". It's a term that absolutely cannot be messed with, because it's absolute.

Won't it be fun to see how these few visionary people change entire industries? Lives?

I can't wait.

Thanks for reading!

Kath