As much as clothes can be a required need, they can also turn into a want when you already have clothes available to wear and you just choose to spend your money on new brands or what's been trending lately. You should be satisfied with what you already have because buying more just becomes a process of wasting money on clothes that you will most likely wear once and then leave to rot in your closets. At a point where you have too many clothes that haven't been worn more than once stored in your wardrobe, it becomes more of a want than a need. Wasting money on unnecessary wants affects the amount of carbon footprint a person has, which could increase the amount of greenhouse gases in the environment, leading to pollution in the ecosystem. So maybe instead of wasting money on things you already have available, you could instead focus on saving up money for other stuff that you actually need.

I heavily agree and love the way you’ve worded your statement. With the rise of temporary micro trends, having new, more "fashionable' clothes can become more of a want. Most of these clothes bought are made from companies that use sweatshops or factories (burning petrochemicals, making greenhouse gasses) to produce their low quality items. Some or most of the percentages of clothes today is made from polyester, a plastic fiber. And if not recycled to make something new, which still burns fossil fuels, more plastic goes to waste. Also with the concern about fashion impacting your wallet, a rule I've lived by is that the amount of dollars something is should be equal to the amount of times you wear it. Clothing prices can be high nowadays so visiting a thrift store or investing in one good quality, long lasting item that you enjoy is better than multiple cheap products that follow a trend.

I completely agree with both of your statements. Fast fashion is a huge problem for our environment and online companies like Shein and Romwe are especially bad. Their clothes are very poor quality and are usually made from materials like polyester and nylon which don't decay which means that they will spend a lot more time in the landfill. The manufacturing of these cheap clothes is responsible for 10% of the worlds carbon emissions. Producing them in factories, the transportation and delivery all emit extreme amounts of carbon. The making of clothes also requires a lot of water. Just a single shirt needs as much as 2,720 litres of water, and around 3,781 litres for a pair of jeans. Shopping at a thrift store instead of online is an affordable and sustainable option to find clothes that may last a couple more years.

I agree! One way of being more sustainable with clothes is buying used clothes. Such as thrifting or hand me downs. I understand that some people want new ¨trendy¨ clothes but, You dont have to completly cut it out but a bit!

I fully agree. Fast fashion and quick manufacturing of clothes is a huge contributor of co2 emissions around the world. I really believe that shopping locally for clothes and buying used ones can be a great help to stopping climate change. It can also still be trendy, thrifting is huge in the United States, finding older and vintage clothing is helpful for the environment and is way more fashionable than it used to be. The transportation of clothing is also impactful, that’s why shopping close to you instead of making a trucker drive from florida to maine is critical to release less carbon dioxide.

I agree with all of these points, and if someone is wanting to be ‘trendy’ then you can always go to a thrift store and alter the clothes to fit in more. Thrifting is a much more sustainable way to shop, but if you must buy from fast fashion brands or want something new, consider instead of throwing out your old clothes that you dont want/dont fit, try donating your old clothes to a thrift store or selling them on one of the apps like poshmark which would be sustainable and make you some money.

I completely agree with what you said. With so many forms of social media, people want to fit in and be “cool.” But our climate suffers from that. For example, some influencers on YouTube review “most seen clothes on TikTok” etc. up to millions of people can watch that one video and be affected by it. They could see something they like that comes from Fashion Nova, Shein, etc, which are all fast fashion stores. Stores that I mentioned above make poor quality clothes and use materials that don’t decay. They just end up spending a lot of time in the landfills. Producing the clothing puts greenhouses gasses into our environment which warms up the planet. While fast fashion stores are relatively cheap, they are responsible for 10% of the worlds commissions. There are some alternatives to not buying fast fashion or new trends. For example, you can go to the thrift store and find some amazing pieces of clothing and even “trendy” ones. You might even develop a new style that you like to wear. Another solution is getting hand me downs from friends and family. If you don’t like the hand me downs, you could customize the clothing pieces by sewing or ironing on patches etc. You can make the clothing price your own which is much better than buy a pre-customized piece of fast fashion.

I totally agree. As a teenager I have experienced this a lot, watching my peers, and I am definitely guilty as well. I think that fast fashion especially is something we need to improve on. It is a huge contributor of CO2 emissions, and if we either stick with what we have, or begin to only thrift clothes, it can be very beneficial for our environment. Another thing to consider is the packaging used in many fast fashion brands. Lots of fast fashion companies use plastic bags, individually packaging everything. This is definitely another big contributor as not everyone is in the habit of recycling, and it would be much better if we used more decomposable packaging. I think many of us could also most definitely be more grateful with what we have, rather than constantly buying more clothes that we don’t need. There are more people who could use those clothes, and the money could be better spend on someone who needs it more.

This is a very interesting and attention-grabbing point. In our current society, keeping up with trends, makes you “popular” and “cool.” This is a societal norm we need to eliminate as a whole. The constant purchasing of brand new clothing items and technological devices has a significant impact on the carbon emissions in our community. The fashion industry is responsible for approximately 10% of the globes annual carbon emissions. When people buy garments and only wear them for a short amount of time before they aren’t “in trend” anymore, these garments end up in landfills. There’s also more to this point, as fashion industries demand is becoming higher and higher, and in order to supply people with the production of materials they desire, carbon emissions increase. What we need to do is come together, and eliminate that desire globally to always need the brand new versions, and be on top of the trends, as this is impacting carbon emissions more than anyone realizes. Rather then feeling the constant need to purchase new things, we should savor items and only buy what we TRULY need. It’s important to take into consideration the environmental impact our choices have, and this is a great example of, how we can be so blindsided to the impacts of our choices.

I agree 100%.  People send way to much time and money to buy whatever the newest things are.  Lots of people see a photo or video of a famous person wearing new clothes and they will immediately order what they see without even thinking about the effect they have on the earth.  The fashion industry is designed to make costumers buy what every is newest, similar o Apple customers buying the newest phone.  People think that they need it but they truly just want it.  One thing that you can to to lower your emission is to shop at thrift stores or recycle and donate your old clothes rather then throw them away.  We should keep what we have for longer than what we currently do and only buy new clothes wen we truly need to.

I agree that when you buy clothes your motive should be mainly that you need them, not just because you wan’t them. If you want to get new clothes and get rid of your old clothes, there are many ways of giving your old clothes away instead of just throwing them away. You can give them to someone you know, sell them online, give them to a consignment store, or donate them to somewhere like Goodwill. I usually buy my clothing at secondhand stores and I always have to love whatever I want to buy, or I won’t get it. This is a very important rule to have when you are shopping, especially with fast fashion and short lived trends.

Exactly, not only this but there are many ways to get clothing you “need” other than buying it new off a website/in store. Thriving is a great alternate way to find clothing, you might even find some other really cool things. Hand-me-downs are also great. My friends older sister gives her old clothes to my friend and I to go through, and find anything we want. If you ever have clothing you don’t want anymore, don’t just throw it away, donate to local thrift stores, Goodwills, shelters, and ask your friends/family if there’s anything that they want. By buying from certain online stores (Zara, SHEIN, Romwe, H&M, etc), you are not only bring up a carbon impact, but giving money to these companies to continue there horrible environmentally unfriendly businesses. By doing research before buying from a website, find out their impact on the environment, boycotting these companies can help cut their environment impact off. Not only this, but next time you see clothing you “need”, think to yourself, am I really gonna wear this more then once?

I definitely agree with all of these points. Fast fashion is a horrible trend our world needs to put an end to. As vintage clothes are becoming more popular I have found many people find it fun to shop at thrift stores, and it’s definitely a better option. Fashion isn’t always a need but a want. Many people are drawn to new trends and things that would make us appear popular, but I don't think being popular should cost us our world and contribute to horrible working conditions in manufacturing factories. Thrift shopping, shopping locally, or from small businesses is a much better alternative to buying fast fashion. So instead of throwing away your old clothes, and immediately going to buy new ones, think about donating and buying from a second hand store.

I fully agree with the points everyone made in this discussion, with the advent of social media and quicker communication, there have arose things called “micro-trends”. With these micro trends come an increase in the desire to look a certain way which is where fast fashion companies originated from. Due to the fact that people only want to follow these trends for a short period of time, it becomes ideal that companies would be selling clothing that fits the aesthetic they want to achieve and for a low price. The issue is that this low price and quick production time is only because the companies which produce such clothing take advantage of certain countries loose laws on production and worker safety in order to exploit garment workers. This leads to a production process that not only adversely affects the environment, but also the people manufacturing the clothing. After all of the production is done, a significant amount of carbon is expended by transportation all for someone to wear the garment for a few weeks and then throw it away. This cycle of production and consumption continues and people continue to support industries which exploit people and hurt the environment. If you would like to help decrease your impact in relation to clothing, shopping at sustainable stores and second hand stores will ensure that clothing is getting used to its full extent before eventually being recycled or thrown out. You could also avoid fast fashion companies such as: ZARA, Shein. ROMWE, H&M, Gap, Old Navy etc…

I fully agree with the points everyone made in this discussion, with the advent of social media and quicker communication, there have arose things called “micro-trends”. With these micro trends come an increase in the desire to look a certain way which is where fast fashion companies originated from. Due to the fact that people only want to follow these trends for a short period of time, it becomes ideal that companies would be selling clothing that fits the aesthetic they want to achieve and for a low price. The issue is that this low price and quick production time is only because the companies which produce such clothing take advantage of certain countries loose laws on production and worker safety in order to exploit garment workers. This leads to a production process that not only adversely affects the environment, but also the people manufacturing the clothing. After all of the production is done, a significant amount of carbon is expended by transportation all for someone to wear the garment for a few weeks and then throw it away. This cycle of production and consumption continues and people continue to support industries which exploit people and hurt the environment. If you would like to help decrease your impact in relation to clothing, shopping at sustainable stores and second hand stores will ensure that clothing is getting used to its full extent before eventually being recycled or thrown out. You could also avoid fast fashion companies such as: ZARA, Shein. ROMWE, H&M, Gap, Old Navy etc…

I entirely agree with the statements made in this conversation. Speaking as a high school student in an environment where I am surrounded by the constantly changing and developing trends in fashion, it is difficult to avoid following the aforementioned trends and purchasing new clothing regularly. I am definitely guilty of unnecessary consumerism, and this an issue that I am trying to combat myself. One solution, or rather, a better way of doing things, that I try to utilize is buying second hand clothing. This is more affordable and climate efficient method for purchasing clothing and other items. Overall, we need to be more mindful of the way in which we consume.

I 100% agree, and feel that people today have come to this point of wasting money online shopping, for clothing they truly don’t need, and will only wear a few times. I heard somewhere that on average, people only wear 25% of their wardrobe. This is crazy because of how true it is, and it really proves that we don’t need as much as we think we do, and we should be more aware in the moment of how much we will actually wear a piece of clothing. If everyone took a step back every time they made a clothing purchase, and honestly thought about how much they would truly wear it, we would be reducing some of the carbon emissions that are destroying our environment.