What are you supposed to do with old clothes?
theatlantic.com
theatlantic.com
But there is. In fact, the answer is right in the setup of the article.
> For much of American history [...] most of the population considered the endless accumulation of material goods unseemly,
Basically, don't buy so many clothes to begin with. And then you don't have to dispose them.
This happens all the time. Looking for a solution to a problem, when the problem shouldn't really even arise in the first place.
It's a great slogan, `reduce, reuse, recycle`, but we tend to forget the first two are the most important ones.
Still, are you suggesting that clothes should be kept forever?
Because whether you're talking about someone who discards entire wardrobes at the end of every season, or someone who rotates the same very-few items until they no longer fit, at some point people still need to do something with old clothes.
Fair point!
> Because whether you're talking about someone who discards entire wardrobes at the end of every season
I would assume these people buy high-end garments, and you'll find more boutique second hand stores that will take it. I suspect, if somebody is that devoted to fashion, it's more of a hobby or a passion, and I think we're all allowed a few vices, splurges, and wasteful pleasures.
> or someone who rotates the same very-few items until they no longer fit
I think the natural end point for heavily worn clothes would be as a rag?
This used to be a super-common middle class (and under, I suppose) habit, at least in the US.
But synthetics make shitty rags, so that rules out a high percentage of modern cheap clothes of the sort that don't tend to get repaired or sold used, and material costs are so low that more people can easily afford to just buy cotton rags that'll perform better than strips of denim or old cotton t-shirts. Plus I don't think people do things that call for nigh-disposable cloth rags as much anymore (in our house they were mostly used for cleaning up engine grease or motor oil, but folks worked on their own cars and lawnmowers and such a lot more back then, and they were all ICE, not electric)
The lesson that I took from this article is that being a male computer engineer[1], and thus having social approval to look however the hell I want, is a great perk that I do not explicitly value enough. In fact, it is because I don't have to think about what I wear- I literally have a rotation of shirts and pants/shorts and just pick whatever is next in each category- that the perk is so large and I undervalue it so much.
[1]: It helps that I fit into essentially every dominant caste category for my local region, I suspect, but my sample sizes are small enough here that I won't comment about that. My sample sizes on female computer engineers is large enough that I feel comfortable saying that they are held to higher standards of dress than I am.
She’s a geeky engineer at heart just like you and me.
Shed happily cycle through the same few things but even as a scientist and health care provider not working in, say, marketing she gets judged hard on her clothes.
It’s cost her promotions.
It sucks and thank you for recognizing one of our subconscious privileges.
We're not in a time in history where this is considered an acceptable solution for women, as we (species) are all about expressing individuality.
The range of variations in acceptable men's dress may be much narrower, and men may be less likely to be viewed negatively for consistently choosing near-identical points within the range, but there are pretty specific expectations for men which change over time and in different contexts and subcultures, and men are still judged very harshly for not making contextually correct selections.
Uniforms aren't given the respect they deserve.
It's semi-widely understood that fashion norms are purposefully exclusionary, that changing routinely and unpredictably imposes ongoing costs that keep outgroups out.
"Formality" norms are not like this. They don't tend to change particularly quickly (though which norm is preferred in a given "context" can change if the context flip-flops), and they're not normally intended to be hard to "follow". They substitute for formal induction as a way to signal that, yes, while I don't actually know any of you, I share enough basic culture with you that we can reasonably expect to be communicating with other in ways that we both know how to deal with. (This is something you get to feel strongly when you try to work your way into doing business with people with whom you don't share enough basic culture to reasonably expect to be communicating on the same wavelength.)
And yes, some people do get left out that the rigors of the norm, but the alternative to having formality norms isn't that everyone is now willing to deal with everyone else. If people aren't openly advertising what social protocols they're ready to speak, you're still going to have to negotiate them once you get to the meeting, with substantial chance of failure. The alternative looks more like refusing to deal with people who you can't find someone you trust to vouch for, which, well, is indeed what tends to happen when trying to do business cross-culturally.
This is what I do, but I read somewhere that old clothes make bad rags due to losing texture over the years of use and washing and especially fabric conditioner making clothes progressively less water absorbent.
Why would they stop fitting?
Also elasticity wears out. Poorly fit shirts that are worn out look pretty sloppy. And I say this as someone who wears poorly fit clothing that is worn out.
And I’ve heard rumors that adults change size quite a bit as well. Sometimes they move from one place to another too.
The boy is the oldest and we would still "hand-me-down" until they became a bit older and didn't want to wear "boys clothes" anymore.
With three kids, costs add up and so we would get the boy things the girls could wear as well (future planning).
Say he needed new t-shirts and one had a large tractor on it, and the other was just a T-Shirt with nothing on it..
The problem as they age becomes "social norms".
To this day, I continue to push both my daughters to try boys jeans. They constantly complain girls pants lack pockets, yet refuse to even try on boys jeans to see if they work?
The other issue is some kids REFUSE hand-me-downs and too many parents take the easy road, and buy new clothes?
Our youngest had hand-me-downs from both her older brother and older sister and simply didn't care that she was wearing "boys clothes". This really helped our budget.
> And I’ve heard rumors that adults change size quite a bit as well.
Tell me about it. But I was able to trade my nicer stuff (suits, shirts) no problem. Not the junk.
People talk about using hand-me-downs but it's become a lot less common to have enough people in your life to get or give things to, outside more formal channels like thrift stores that will only accept certain kinds and qualities of goods (for good reasons).
If I had a kid right now I wouldn't really have anyone in my life who could give me outgrown clothes, nor would I have anyone to give them to. My life just isn't built that way and I don't think that's uncommon.
That seems incredibly wasteful to me, especially since clothing doesn't really take much packing room unless your wardrobe is huge or fragile -- and if you have a huge & fragile wardrobe then we get back down to the idea that one should live a bit more sparingly to reduce the need for recycling in the first place.
So you swap clothing around to other parents who have younger kids, in exchange from clothing from people with older kids?
There's a very solid ecosystem of clothing/shoes/etc moving around our church, and it's quite common to see someone wearing clothes that our kids used to wear, or seeing our kids wearing that was passed down from someone else.
There are certain ages/genders that you find a bit of a gap in (a typical 4 year old boy will destroy their pants before outgrowing them), but... stuff goes around in regular loops. "Kitchen trash bags of good condition clothing" regularly go between cars on Sunday morning or at other gatherings.
I'm sure there are some people who buy new clothing for their kids at ever size and then discard it when it's worn out, but that's just pissing huge amounts of money down the drain for no benefit in the slightest.
Flea markets turned out to be a much better source for fantastic old clothes, but require more time and at least some money.
However, with three children who inherit their older siblings clothes, many pieces don't survive the third iteration of wear and tear.
Wow those cheap synthetics passed down among countless generations at church sure look good then.
When he was born the government gave us a box of clothes, and accessories, and later neighbours gave us their children's old clothes too.
But I find it fascinating that you talk about teaching children about style. Our child, like almost all the others I've seen, would just wear what they were given. When they reach three/four years old suddenly they have preferences, and I'd love to know where they came from.
Our childs preferences aren't so fixed, a favorite t-shirt today might become ignored next week, but there are some consistent comments and behaviours. He told us a few months ago "I don't want to wear that jacket, it is yellow".
Peer pressure, and conformity, probably play a part to some extent. But the rest? Where does that come from, and does it alway start that early?
(e.g. He wanted to wear nail varnish from ~3 years old. And was sad "The children at daycare said boys can't wear nail-varnish" so I told him we both could, and we painted each others nails for a few weeks until he lost interest.)
My son's favorite t-shirt right now has a print of Sonic the hedgehog, because that's what he's playing on my Dreamcast.
But other that he prefer's toned down and restricted color combinations. And I often get compliments for well our children are dressed, although it's purely my wife's work.
It's sad that peer pressure starts as early as three years old. My oldest son used to like wearing light pink and dresses at that age, but only at home. Never at kindergarten.
My youngest son, now 2, says he wants to be a girl. Turns out he's envious of his sister wearing dresses. He also paints his nails when my wife forgets to hide her nail color well enough.
We mostly let them decide themselves as long as it's fit for the weather, and they usually do well.
It's easy to talk about swapping clothes when you have a large community, but if you're new to a place and don't have those connections, you're stuck with goodwill (which has very few toddler clothes where we are) or the big box stores.
But also hanging out in children's playparks in the local neighbourhood would introduce children to each other, and other parents to us. That helped find a group of kids the same age, or slightly older, who we would sometimes offload clothes between.
I guess it depends where you are, if those kind of things happen.
Your comment doesn't seem to address that, and it's pretty fundamental to the question, I think.
I somewhat disagree. You do have to get your clothes, but what is about the disposing of perfectly fine clothes that's necessary? It's only because we have too many of them. Wear the clothes until they're worn. Use the rags.
I'm not saying it'd be easy.
>Use the rags.
... OP said your comment doesn't seem to address the inevitability of disposal. You only responded with another method of reuse, but let's be honest here - rags need to be disposed of at some point, too.
I think the article was more about no place to donate perfectly fine clothes, and the uncertainty what happens to them after donating. Having to throw away 5 items (e.g. because your size changes) will weigh on your conscience a lot less than having to throw away 15.
Generally if they are made of natural stuff they should be bio degradable, so compost?
I didn't mean dispose of perfectly fine ones.
>It's only because we have too many of them.
In my case, it's actually because I'm becoming rather sphere-shaped with age, and some things no longer fit. I try to donate what I can, make others into rags (of which now I just have a giant garbage bag full of rags from the last 15 years of cutting up clothing that is too worn-out to donate -- I guess my children can deal with those when I pass).
For what it's worth, I agree with you that a focus on reducing how much we buy is super important. And, in a bit of a tongue-in-cheek way, I just wanted to highlight that there are plenty of legitimate scenarios where someone has clothes that are in decent shape but are no longer usable. And as the article highlights, I have no idea if the clothes that I drop off for donation actually make it anywhere other than a dump.
The disposal of unworn clothes is probably a result of the fast fashion industry. But other than that clothes still get worn out and need to get replaced.
I wish I could repair and recolor all my clothes to make them look decent again, but I just can't.
* A nice new sweater to wear around town becomes
* a nice sweater to wear around the house in the winter to save heating which becomes
* an old but still warm sweater to wear for yard work which becomes
* a ratty old sweater to wear to repair your bike or car without a care for oil stains.
I'm only one generation away and live in a town with good public transport, central heating which I can't adjust (and is always turned up too high) and will probably not be able to afford a house with a yard in the next 20 years.
[1]https://www.cbsnews.com/news/ghana-fast-fashion-environmenta...
[2]https://www.abc.net.au/news/2021-08-12/fast-fashion-turning-...
Presumably natural fibers (wool, cotton, hemp etc) can be composted (conveniently ignoring buttons etc) and everything synthetic can just be landfilled (what else can we do with plasitcs).
Im a bit of a cynic but it’s acceptable to “dispose of” items. Hopefully we can keep in mind reduce, reuse, and recycle but there’s a functional limit to those things.
It seems likely any “trash handling technology” to arise to settle this has bigger fish to fry than just clothing - if any “plastic eating microbe” was employed commercially it makes more sense to me to stick it on the landfills rather than an old laundry basket
The reason for this is that people don't usually buy paperweights that are indistinguishable from, say, an old and discarded mobile phone.
They do, on the other hand, often buy things like hand towels or dish rags that are indistinguishable from home-made ones that are just old clothes torn up.
Edit for clarity
It's also this fallacy[1]. The topic is disposing of old clothes in a Earth-friendly, hassle-free, and socially good way. Putting up barriers to consumerism further upstream is an entirely different topic.
[1]https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/095679762210753...
The challenge I have though is that I don’t know what I will end up wearing loads. If I buy multiples the I risk over buying and creating waste. If I buy one I risk it being discontinued. I try to buy quality so that the chance of resale (not landfill) is higher.
(I do actually have some a few collars and shirts which take detachable collars, before someone points out that's the classic, perhaps bygone solution, but I'm not sure anyone can manage to do that every modern day without drawing attention to it. Nor whether I could be bothered anyway to be honest - not like I have 'a man' to help with it!)
In fact I noticed the shirt I'm wearing today has a too-worn collar, so it's 'reuse' for it now - trouble is the rags pile grows faster than it's used.
I bought barely any clothes in years, but how are you going to follow fashion like that? /s
And yet, every few years, I'll still have a few garbage bags filled with clothes that I need to dispose of. It may no longer fit me, in which case it might be suitable for donation, or it may have been damaged in some way that isn't feasible to repair.
Reducing use is great, but the only way to never need to dispose of clothes is to never buy any clothes.
I still have shirts from over 15 years ago. I buy new clothes maybe once or twice a year at most. When it becomes too swiss-cheesed to wear in public anymore, I just use it as a rag/drying towel. I just recently bought all new socks and retired all the old ones to rags. When the rags are so oil stained, torn up, and useless, then I'll finally retire them to the trash.
I keep old ruined pants for patch material, too, since my pants are pretty much all the same few colours. Sewing is easy, you don't have to be good at it, if you can manage to get the thread through the needle eye and tie a secure knot, you've already done the hardest part of sewing. The rest is just pushing the needle back and forth through the material. Doesn't matter how sloppy the stitching looks, if it holds, it's good. Nobody is going to lean over, inspect it, and say, "You, sir, sew like an idiot." It really requires zero skill, just buy a cheap sewing kit that comes with thread and needles, and give it a go. Nylon thread is the best, IMO, because you can use a lighter to melt the thread into the fabric and then not have to worry about having a secure start and end knot that won't come loose.
Responsible journalism. +1
Currently trying out some "guaranteed for life" hiking socks made in Vermont. No doubt some HN readers will guess the brand. Feeling like maybe I will come to regret it later as they are so densely woven that they neither stretch nor breathe as much as non-guaranteed socks and they take a longer time to dry. But imagine a sock company (hosiery) that sells socks as a "lifetime subscription" that can be fully paid-up at time of purchase and recycles old socks that people send them. This is far better than "fast fashion". Honestly I have no idea if this company recycles old socks, if that is even possible, or if it truly honours the "lifetime guarantee", but their popularity has gotten me thinking.
Super robust, proper pockets, good fit, triple stitched, enough flex to squat in, etc. Twice what I normally would pay for jeans but ended up being totally worth it. But you do have to get used to the heavy denim feel and they'll never be as breathable as disintegrate-in-two-years jeans.
Everything else is just a sweat sponge. Even the fanciest plastic tech materials don't work as well as merino.
I'm actually quite excited by the implications of the changing economic outlook for the world. Companies are finally catching up with the reality that infinite growth and unending production are not sustainable business models (and a great way to kill your brand via diminishing returns). We might actually get to see a return to quality thinking (in the Juran/Deming sense) where things are actually made to last, not just be discarded and replaced with something new every X days/months/years.
Imagine a world/environment where people weren't hopped up on perpetual growth, could actually focus and iterate on an idea for a long(er) time, and a chart going sideways for a quarter or two wasn't coupled with an ulcer. Not only would living conditions improve for a lot of people, quality of life would skyrocket (both material and psychological/emotional).
I've tried to convince my wife to take up quilting, but she has zero interest, and I don't have the time.
I've got trashbags full of old sheets and t-shirts, and they're so useful for random straining, cleanup, covering tools, degreasing, painting, etc.
Nothing beats a t-shirt for cleaning a bicycle chain, though (and they make perfectly good handkerchiefs too).
For example, this fact plays an important part in Alice Walkers's short story, "Everyday Use"
https://www.lonestar.edu/13778.htm
=-=-=
These quilts were “pieced by Grandma Dee and then Big Dee “(76), both figures in family history who, unlike the present Dee, took charge in teaching their culture and heritage to their offspring. The quilts themselves are made up of fragments of history, of scraps of dresses, shirts, and uniforms, each of which represents those people who forged the family’s culture, its heritage, and its values. Most importantly, however, these fragments of the past are not simply representations in the sense of art objects; they are not removed from daily life. What is most crucial about these quilts—and what Dee does not understand—is that they are made up of daily life, from materials that were lived in.
So I just convert them into rags or toss them in the trash once they have too many tears.
they're still doing it:
https://nowlinens.com/collections/tshirt-rags/products/pro-c...
> I ordered white tee shirt rags and that was probably the only thing that wasn't in the bag. It had sweatshirts shirts with collars just mostly trash I could have picked up at a yard sale for a couple bucks .
The claim gets made that exporting the clothes to developing nations is bad, but it’s usually products made for developing nations that can be low quality from the factory gate.
Claims are often made that 2nd hand clothing disrupts a local clothing industry, but in reality, it’s going to be difficult to compete with global manufacturing. Clothing isn’t a strategic industry imo.
And cotton is a plant product, nothing wrong with burning or composting it.
Clothing probably ranks as one of the most re-used consumer “products”, both by the initial buyer and subsequent buyers.
A real issue is crude oil based fabrics and blends and their recyclability and/or emissions when incinerated.
For me, old stuff becomes rags, which I’d otherwise have to buy “new”.
I also find theatlantic.com long-winded and pointless.
If items are sufficient quality to be resellable to remote US buyers on Depop but mailing them out individually is too much work, you really, really don't have to worry that if donated in bulk to a network of charity shops they're all going straight to African landfill...
Interestingly, H&M has collected 140,000 tonnes of textiles through an in-store recycling program so far, and they upcycle but also work with a company called Renewcell to generate new fibers from cotton waste. I'm not sure what they do with the rest of the bulk textile but I presume it's burned or maybe just goes to landfill.
Since I've found this in every country I've lived, I thought this was ubiquitous in the modern world. Am I maybe blinded by my experience here?
Of course there are negative effects as well, like the eventual dumping of items on poor countries and the effects on domestic markets for clothing in those places... but at the scale the West buys and discards clothes, there's really no perfect answers.
I mean, what did you expect? Honest question: what romantic views did you have about donating used clothes (or anything) to Goodwill? Did you think they handed them out for free at the local soup kitchen for the homeless?
Q1: To which people?
Q2: As a 'donor', how is one supposed to be able to determine what actually happens after your throw your clothes in the box?
Most of the big name donation centers (GoodWill) will have this setup for their waste product.
In best cases, to domestic thrift stores, which are hoping to create retail jobs for people (often a bridge job to get training, a work history) with customers including homeless, thrift treasure seekers, costume shoppers, college students, near poverty, in poverty, makers, reusers and more.
Middle case, they get shredded into insulation or dollar bills.
Worse case, they flood Africa as finished textiles obliterating the local market.
Homeless People have literally DIED trying to get things out of the bins.
If the goal is to get the clothing to those who need it, why build the bins in such a way that removal is impossible?
https://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/kitchener-waterloo/cambridge-...
"At least seven Canadians have died after getting stuck in clothing donation bins, and the latest fatality has prompted an advocate to call for the "death traps" to be immediately fixed or removed."
It seems the true goal is to accept donations (free) and then turn around and sell the clothing?
So you build bins in a way that they are "one-way" doors, and only those with keys can remove the goods?
I thought the "goal" of the bin was go put used clothing in the hands of those who need it?
If the charity leaves it unlocked they have no control over whether donations go to somebody who needs charity.
Even so, I live in a 1st world nation and both the wife and I buy sturdy functional clothing and, guess what?, it lasts for many years. We use it till it's fit for rags. Then we use the rags.
If/when we outgrow it but it's still serviceable it goes to rummage sale or goodwill. Plenty of folks will definitely buy good shoes, jeans, etc. at goodwill - if serviceable these are not going to pollute 3rd world countries and it really helps people. Hell, we shop for good jeans at goodwill, etc. too.
If you are having the ethical dilemma about where to donate your worn-once, too cheap, dry-clean-only but super-chic outfits when your closet is overflowing, you are definitely doing it wrong in at least 6 ways. Spoiler alert: the problem is not the goodwill company, the media, or the fashion industry.
I wear clothes until I get a hole in it. Classically this would be when I would throw it out. I thought this was a waste of money and I have learned to darn (from an HN post no less) - I do not buy clothes until there I a serious gap in my collection, and even then it's usually because my wife has dragged me to the store.
Could you possibly provide a pointer? I've been meaning to learn exactly this.
Hence, I guess the demand for repair work is probably very low, and they might not have good processes in place to do it.
From a pure transactional perspective, it’s nice that they are essentially selling a clothing service for which you pay only once per item. But from an environmental angle, it sucks that they might not really be fulfilling their promise.
To be clear I don't fault them for making an assembly process where repair is not the highest priority. But it took me a while to appreciate why that little zipper repair was difficult enough to offer a replacement instead.
In many ways I suppose repairs always will be more expensive. The staff who know how to make the item may no longer work there, you cannot set up stations and a process, and every repair will likely be different. And without additional shipping, the employees doing the repair will be paid more than the original workers.
An acquaintance who owns an outdoor apparel company told me he doesn't want to make pants because the warranty and repair expectations are much harder to deal with than upper body items.
Buy Uniqlo and save 80% of your budget.
Clothes to go out -> Clothes to use only at home -> Sleepwear -> Kitchen cloth
https://www.tiktok.com/@celessalas/video/6951157711803354373...
People also use old clothes to make rugs https://www.craftpassion.com/recycle-tutorial-woven-rag-rug-... https://mypoppet.com.au/makes/7-ways-to-make-a-rag-rug-from-...
Check out “Clothing Poverty” about the horrible problem the clothing donation industry has been.
https://www.thriftbooks.com/w/clothing-poverty-the-hidden-wo...
Also great episode of Tiny Spark on clothing donation waste.
https://nonprofitquarterly.org/clothing-poverty-andrew-brook...
What's wrong with this? Seems like perfect recycling.
Based on a report from CouponBirds, sales in the used market are expected to reach $54 billion in 2022, up more than 50% from $35 billion in 2021. The US second-hand market is set to double to $82 billion by 2026, 16 times faster than the overall fashion retail market.
Selling to second-hand dealers and donating, this is the best way I can think of to dispose of old clothes.
I currently own 3 merino T-shirts, one merino hoodie, a few pairs of bamboo and merino underwear, two identical pairs of jeans and a bunch of identical socks.
The hoodie is a bit over 5 years old and still in daily use. The jeans are about the same age and I wear them on alternate weeks and don't wash them unless it's necessary.
The socks I throw away as soon as they wear through (just single socks, they're all the same). When I run out of socks for my regular wash cycle, I throw them all away and buy a 7-12 pack of new identical ones.
For garments you can't sell like underwear you could also look into recycling them through places like https://knickey.com/pages/recycle
It's an abomination the fashion industry doesn't get any blame.