Perhaps the most ubiquitous of products, the design and function of a T-shirt is simple. It fits over your body, your arms go through two holes at either side, and your head goes through the hole at the top. They are cheap and readily available, relatively comfortable, and they help to keep you warm and not exposed to the world.
In a big, ugly, pink building in downtown Los Angeles, workers are making an average of 12 to 18 dollars per hour sewing, cutting and manufacturing T-shirts and other simple garments. Somewhere in Asia, in a sweatshop, another company is doing the same thing and paying their employees not much more than pennies a day.
Throughout North America, Europe, Australia and pretty much everywhere that you can receive mail, there are people walking around with T-shirts that have two unicorns fornicating in front of a majestic rainbow, Darth Vader trimming a hedge in the shape of the Death Star, or a clown hunched over a toilet bowl spewing a colourful blast of rainbow.
Special to The Brock Press Gasoline tends to be one of the largest dilemmas in this era, considering what is happening to the fuel industry, not to mention our planet. For example, look at the recent shortage at gas stations, they have been dry for the past week, and have only now been getting small shipments.
Special to The Brock Press Vandana Shiva is a world-renowned environmental thinker and activist who has written extensively on global water issues. In her 2002 book Water Wars: Privatization, Pollution, and Profit, Shiva examines the international water trade and warns readers about the serious consequences of water privatization.
Mass media outlets in Canada and the U.S. have been spending a lot more time lately discussing the global warming crisis than the current political affairs. The success of the recent environmental documentary, An Inconvenient Truth has inspired individuals in North America to learn that they can make an effort to help the planet by changing their current energy-wasting habits.
Dozens of super-revved race cars driving aimlessly around a track in circles with no destination in mind. Each car getting, at best, five miles to the gallon of fuel. A dozen or so tires, from each vehicle, used and discarded to a landfill somewhere. A small armada of trucks, RVs and support vehicles travelling across countries to stay for a few days and then head off again, travelling in an endless loop.
There is a place for all of your unwanted junk, and it does not have to have two handles and be kicked to the curbside at night for collection. With environmental problems like global warming, endangered species and the ozone layer, it may seem that these are crises out of our hands and there is little effort that an individual can make to preserve the environment.
Animal rights activists have long assured that you cannot be an environmentalist and eat meat. It is only recently that the rest of the world is recognizing the validity of that assertion. In Vegan: The New Ethics of Eating, activist, author and researcher Erik Marcus states that the production of animal products uses staggering amount of resources - resources that could easily be used to feed people.
From fur factories to forced labour, the fashion industry has rarely been acknowledged for its progressive behaviour. As early as 2000, however, there has been a widespread development of a trend that looks good on anyone: Environmentally friendly apparel.
T-shirts may seem simple, but they have a long and complex history. Here is a loose time line of some of the important dates in T-shirt history. "T-shirt" didn't become enter the English language until the 1920s and the style didn't enter mainstream fashion until the '60s.
