Everyone dreams of a utopia, right? One where no one starves or doesn’t have adequate housing. The dream of affordable healthcare or a quality education. These ideas of a better world inspire us to be passionate about causes. One of my passions lie in the creation and existence of garments. Clothing. Our armor for our lives. It has the ability to make you feel confident or horribly self conscious. It’s my preferred medium of art- because it holds so much power.

My utopia- my dream- is that we as a world-wide interlinked society, stop sweatshops, the carbon emissions, and the endless consumerism. We begin using secondhand fabrics and clothing to make updated items instead of churning out new inventory every few weeks. Instead of bales of donated clothing being sent overseas and taking over landfills or being burned, we use every single scrap for something.

Everyone knows of the sweatshop problem. It’s been plaguing us for over a hundred years now. We’ve seen disasters like the Triangle Shirtwaist Fire in New York City, or the Dhaka Garment Factory Collapse in 2013. We see what dangerous conditions can do. We read about children being maimed in factories during the industrial revolution. We know that a five dollar tee is a five dollar tee because someone elsewhere is working for pennies.

But we still consume. We walk into H&M, Zara, Supreme, Louis Vuitton- wherever, and essentially say with our money, “I don’t care.” We don’t care about the conditions other people we will never meet go through, nor do we care about the very real and urgent issue of climate change. We don’t think about what leatherworking can do to a water system nor do we think of the water that is used to grow cotton. We don’t think of the people who, after being hunched over a sewing machine for 12 or more hours, somehow do not receive overtime pay.

We’re too focused on ourselves.

A lot of these issues would be fixed if we adopted the idea of humanity back into our lives. To think beyond ourselves, beyond our community, country, continent. Think about the world as a whole and our role in it. Perhaps then, companies would begin to value their employees more, choose to use better ethics, and choose sustainability.

I believe with my whole self that the issue of capitalism creating these hellscapes stems from the lack of humanity that we begin to feel when we are so far removed from others. We’re removed from those who create the items we wear and use, yes, but we also are removed from our neighbors more and more. As we isolate ourselves into small groups of friends and family, we lose the ability to learn of other’s lives, and how our choices can influence them.

Are you, human reading this, directly contributing to slave labor somewhere?

Most likely not.

But you may be indirectly.

The main problem is the companies out there who are looking to exploit workers and our environment to make money. They do the vast majority of damage. They have little regulations and can easily sway our lawmakers to protect them. It’s depressing, the reality we live in where we cannot trust a company to do what’s right. The idea of greenwashing exists because these entities want to decieve the general public.

So what can we do to move the industry towards this utopia?

Put your money where your mouth is. Buy secondhand, only support sustainable brands, and participate in clothing swaps. Learn to mend your clothing or take clothing to a tailor to be fixed up. Don’t overconsume clothing- there is no reason to buy a new item of clothing every month. Don’t “haul” clothing.

Advocate for companies to be held responsible. Push your government to regulate companies carbon emissions and production chains. Push your government to make sure that these companies are paying real taxes, too.

Support unions. Support the unionization of factory workers everywhere and anywhere. When workers band together to fight for more money and working conditions, it works. They deserve your support as someone who consumes their product.

Be kind. Look beyond yourself and your community and get to know someone new. Read up about world events. Break out of the American/western media bubble. Become a person of the world who cares about someone you will never meet who lives in a different hemisphere than you.

It starts with us, and ends with companies drastically changing their ways of production.