Tag Archives: current events

Beauty & Body: Talc Troubles

14 Sunday Aug 2022

Posted by in Beauty and Body, current events, News, Non-Fiction

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If you’ve been here for a minute, you know that my day job is in Retail. While I never outright name my employer, I will say that I primarily work in the health and beauty area (at least that’s what I tell myself).

So, here is my attempt at connecting my day job to my website/thing I do late at night when I should be sleeping.

Powder Predicament

Over the last several months I’ve come to the realization that my store had practically no baby powder. I came to this conclusion because customers were asking about it, and we had none in the typical location.

Now, this lack of merchandise wasn’t just limited to Johnson’s. The store brand was out of stock for some time as well.

What is Talc or Talcum Powder

Talc or talcum, is a clay mineral, composed of hydrated magnesium silicate. Talc, in powder red form, often combined with corn starch is used in baby powder.

Wikipedia

It is used in about a million applications in several fields. From todays topic, baby powder, cosmetics, food, ceramics, and metal coating, and so much more.

Talcum powder was invented in 1894. It is the powdered form of talc, a mineral with a value of 1 on the Mohs hardness scale. Talc in its natural form, had been be used for many years before that. And of course it was Johnson and Johnson that first started manufacturing and selling Talcum Powder.

J&J Baby Powder with Talc

When The Kid was an infant she had baby acne. Basically just tiny little bumps on her face, that looked almost like pimples, that came from moisture on her sensitive skin during feeding. I’d read that putting baby powder on it can keep it dry so the bumps would clear.

I posted about doing so on Facebook. I had a handful of people telling me that baby powder isn’t good for babies because they can breathe it in. The way I used it was gently brushing a small amount on her cute little cheeks, with minimal dust.

She never had any issues and I never really used it on her much after that. I have used baby powder in myself, since sometimes when it’s hot and you have extra dinner rolls in your basket, well it gets damp. But it was infrequent usage.

So why did Johnson’s Baby Powder with Talc disappear from RETAIL ESTABLISHMENT’s shelves?

The product was discontinued and pulled from shelves this year due to “tens of thousands” of lawsuits alleging that the talc based product was causing cancer.

Talc & Asbestous

Talc, in its natural form is found in close proximity to Asbestos, a naturally occurring but known carcinogen. Talc and Asbestos are both silicate minerals and therefore are often found having formed near each other.

So, mining one mineral, if one isn’t careful, could result and contamination by the other. It’s not the Talc itself that’s said to be causing ovarian cancer in women, it’s talc contaminated by asbestos.

J&J claims that only pharmaceutical grade Talc is used in their baby powder. They have strict standards, which, of course they would. The link above also discusses how talc can be found and many different products we use every day.

There’s a lot of information there, but as it is a website created for and by Johnson & Johnson, believe what you will.

While Johnson’s does push that their talc based products are safe, and that talc itself is not cancer causing, it is believed that product was not as quality controlled as they’d let you believe, and the product was contaminated with asbestos.

Conclusion?

Is talc safe? Well, it has been used for a more than a century and has found its way into products from chewing gum to cosmetics to industrial uses. If it caused cancer, wouldn’t more people have had cancer?

But there’s also the conspiracy theory that I literally just thought of and have not read anything about, that if it causes cancer and we’ve been using it for years, perhaps that’s the leading cause I’d cancer? Is talc the reason we have so much cancer?

But it would all have to have been contaminated by asbestos, right?

In 2020c Johnson’s discontinued the sale of talc based powders, and plan to stop the sale worldwide by 2023. This is said to be purely a business decision, and not proof that the product was ever unsafe.

The talc based powders have been replaced in stores, including mine, with corn starch based baby powder. And it’s not just the Johnson’s brand either. The store brand also contains no talc.

While these products have been removed from markets in the US, there are still countless products containing talc still on shelves. It remains to be seen if other companies will follow suit and preemptively remove their products. But the mass exodus of recalls flooding the market would leave little to no product on shelves.

It’s more likely that perhaps these uncountable companies will quietly work toward replacing talc in their products, before the cancer scare hits their profit margins.

I still find it unlikely.

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You Have Done A Bad Thing

26 Thursday May 2022

Posted by in Fiction, Uncategorized

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His vision began to clear. He remembered everything being black moments ago. But was it moments? Or minutes? Or hours or days? He couldn’t be sure. He looked at his hands, empty. His shirt clean. Then his memories began to clear.

“They shot me.” He said aloud. His voice was there but not. I’d didn’t echo or carry. “They shot me, I remember that.” He remembered it but had no emotion. It was like a fact from the past. His past but not. Just something that happened to some one.

“Where am I?” He stood. He thought he’d be shaky or unsteady but he was not. He looked around the room. It was gray. Floor to ceiling. Not dark, but there was no light fixture to keep it from being dark, but somehow there was light.

“You did a bad thing.” A voice, from no where and everywhere said.

“What? Who is that!? Where are you?” He asked aloud. The voice echoed inside the room but his did not. It sat in the air around him.

“You did a very bad thing.” The voice spoke again. It’s tone was lower now. He sensed he should feel something but could not. “You did a very VERY BAD THING.” The voice seemed to roar those last words. The reverberated against the walls. And now he could feel something. He felt the voice echo in his bones.

He put his hands on his chest and torso, as if he could hold his insides, keep them from shaking. His hands felt wet. He pulled them away and they were bloody now. His shirt was covered in blood. He could feel the sting. It started as a sting.

“YOU HURT THOSE CHILDREN.” The voice shook the room. “INNOCENTS.”

Pain shot through him as his bones and guts vibrate inside him. He felt tears on his face as his eyes blurred and burned. He touched his face with shaky hands to wipe the tears but what he wiped away wasn’t tears but more blood. “I’m bleeding to death!” He screamed. But again his voice seemed to go no where.

“YOU ARE ALREADY DEAD.” The voice tore at him. “AND THAT IS NOT YOUR BLOOD.”

Then the screams started. Children’s screams. They ripped out of his ears, his eyes, his chest. They were coming out of him, tearing him to pieces. The pain he could not feel before received it’s revenge. It ripped its payment from the inside out. He could feel it clawing away at his chest.

“YOU ESCAPED EARTHLY PUNISHMENT. YOU SHALL NOT ESCAPE THE ETERNAL.” The voice boomed.

He fell to the floor. On his hands and knees he tried to squeeze his eyes closed. To not see the bloody gray floor before him. For a brief moment he wanted to beg.

Painful cries of broken hearts began in chorus with children’s screams, a dreadful song of fear and pain and sorrow.

He choked on blood now pouring from his mouth. “God,” he strangled out. “Please—” he began.

“I AM NO GOD.” The voice boomed. “YOU CANNOT REPENT YOUR SINS TO ME AND BE FORGIVEN.”

He gurgled a groan in misery. And then the voice was in his ears a whisper and and yet still so terrible.

“I AWAKEN WHEN INNOCENT VOICES ARE SILENCED WITH VIOLENCE. I RISE WHEN ACTS OF EVIL ARE COMMITTED. WHEN DEBTS MUST BE PAID.” The voice sliced at him like a whip. “I COME FOR THOSE WHO DO BAD THINGS.” The voice said. “AND YOU HAVE DONE A BAD THING.”

He writhed in pain. Wondered when it would stop. Wondered if it would ever stop. At the precipice of blackness, all sound stopped, and he heard nothing for a brief moment but his own struggling breath.

And then the voice spoke again. Quiet this time. “NOW HEAR THE SOUNDS YOU’VE SILENCED. HEAR WHAT YOU’VE TAKEN AWAY FROM THE WORLD. HEAR AND ANGUISH. FOR YOU WILL FOREVER ANGUISH LIKE THOSE WHOSE HEARTS YOU’VE BROKEN.

Then, one of the most beautiful sounds in all the world, the sweetest of sounds. Laughter and happiness, of children, of women, of men. For the innocent souls of those taken too soon suffer no more. In spite of what someone might want.

Uncountable moments or minutes or hours or days later, blackness turned to blur, blur turned to a gray room with light but no light. And a booming a voice from no where and everywhere. “You have done a bad thing.”

There is a conversation that needs to be had. But too many opinions of what needs to be said make peace and compromise impossible. I feign no knowledge or authority on any subject matter. I only know what I feel and believe. At some point I’ll share my options on the subject matter. But for now I’ll keep those lost, those hurt, and those left behind in my thoughts. As always. Thanks for reading.

-c