Shein reportedly seeks $90B valuation in IPO | Hacker News Reader

Shein reportedly seeks $90B valuation in IPO

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24 pointsthunderbong48 comments

Shein is an environmental and humanitarian disaster. They are a major driver of ‘fast fashion’ which produces incredible volumes of trash and pollution under unsafe labor conditions. Consider watching this short video on the basics to learn more about fast fashion.

https://youtu.be/fR7bXsoNwwE?si=k5qnDRrUtRUXvOi_

Yes what I think is fascinating is that the younger generation is usually the one to virtue signal about the environment, equity, labor conditions, capitalism etc., but none of that matters when you can get "cheap stuff for cheap".

It fully exposes the hypocrisy of it all.

Maybe it's possible that X% of the "younger generation" cares (rather than your dog whistle "virtue signals") about the environment, equity, labor conditions, capitalism etc. while another X% likes buying cheap stuff. There's no hypocrisy at all when you understand that the "younger generation" consists of more than one person.

Any annoyance I might have had at the "dog whistle" that is the term "dog whistle" goes right out the window when I see the group logic fallacy pointed out.

My entire life is "well sure, some boomers..." and "who specifically believes that?".

True, I really didn't need to use the term "dog whistle" there as the GP was pretty much outing themselves with the entire post. To decide that one entire group holds exactly the same opinion requires either a pre-existing distaste for that group or a complete lack of critical reasoning.

People who complain about "virtue signaling" are nearly always ridiculous. They try to deflect criticism of their own moral failings with vague insinuations of hypocrisy. They mock children for actually holding the values our society claims to teach them. They virtue signal about how much they hate virtue signaling, yet ignore that the most spectacular virtue signaling comes from their "side". Like this:

https://www.npr.org/2020/06/01/867532070/trumps-unannounced-...

That doesn't make it a dog whistle. Everyone knows that accusing someone of virtue signaling is accusing them of being a champagne socialist. The meaning is not hidden.

This is a dog whistle:

https://www.dhs.gov/news/2018/02/15/we-must-secure-border-an...

Most people won't recognize the riff on the Fourteen Words, but those who do will recognize the call for genocide.

> the younger generation is usually the one to virtue signal about the environment, equity, labor conditions, capitalism etc., but none of that matters when you can get "cheap stuff for cheap".

I really doubt these are the same group...

I disagree with your analysis. The younger generation is genuinely concerned with those issues. However we live in a culture which has so long suppressed any discussion of where our products come from that no discussion of this is part of our normal lives. If younger people buy fast fashion it’s because they are young and they haven’t learned how the world fully works yet. But also young people are not a monolith and I’m sure a good percentage of the youth do understand the harms from fast fashion.

The desire to get things for cheap is deeply rooted in American and western culture and simple claims of hypocrisy don’t do justice to the pervasiveness of these ideas.

Young people also aren't rich, and live amongst the awful rent seeking economy built by those who came before. So it's not hypocritical to want to buy cheap, it's an unfortunate necessity. Also, the whole point of the push to make sustainability a mainstream concern is so that 'all those awful young people' can afford to buy sustainably produced products. Right now, unsustainable enterprises get to externalize the environmental costs on everyone else, and thus make sustainable & quality goods extremely pricey. It's a tax on morality - so let's eliminate that first and then point fingers about hypocrisy.

>However we live in a culture which has so long suppressed any discussion of where our products come from that no discussion of this is part of our normal lives.

It's also not our jobs. If something is so destructive that I have an obligation to boycott it, it should be illegal. It's the government's job to create and enforce sensible policies to protect the innocent. That's why they take a third of my paycheck.

But they've largely abrogated that responsibility, with a lot of help from corrupt businesses. Now it's my job to ensure not too many child slaves were harmed in the making of my T-shirt.

> It's also not our jobs.

> Now it's my job

I think the reality is, it has always been up to us. Collective action is important but we need to understand when the status quo is insufficient and act accordingly. Certainly I agree government action would be very helpful here, requiring accountability and living wages, but these structures are always vulnerable to abuse by the powers that be.

People should do the right thing no matter what. "Not my job" is not a valid excuse for supporting slavery. But not everyone is equally culpable. The people who shirked their duties are worse than those who failed to pick them up.

A quick Google search shows that there are 2.3 billion people between ages 20-39 years. Even if we make a generous assumption that Shein has 100 million users within that group, that's still around 4% of the total population. So, your thought is not really as "insightful" as you wished it to be.

Most people are hypocrites. That's one reason we choose to bind ourselves with laws. The fact that everyone is individually inclined to go against their values is an argument for collective action.

"virtue signal" is incredibly hand wavy

There needs to be a better descriptor than the euphemism "fast fashion" that is always used

How about "trashion"?

What's wrong with fast fashion?

To it captures the two important ideas: it's unhealthy (like fast food) and it's unhealthy because the items are designed to come and go and be quickly replaced with a new destructive production.

Isn’t pretty much all clothing made that way now? No matter what brands you are buying, it’s almost all made in the cheapest third world countries with the worst environmental and labor laws.

I’d like to see some comparison brands that are better, and how much more they cost. Who are we talking about here?

It is indeed a widespread problem, but there is a sort of continuum of accountability, responsibility, and sustainability. Shein is one of the worst offenders, and certainly the largest of the worst. They seek out zero accountability and push prices down despite the consequences.

An example of a company doing it right is Patagonia. Of course they have high prices, but this is more an effect of an economy so dependent on cheap goods that making anything of quality is expensive. Wages of the typical worker in the western world have been pushed lower and lower relative to productivity, and the only reason we haven’t revolted is the stream of cheap goods from overseas that allow us to survive even with low wages. If workers all over the world, both in garment factories overseas and at home in the western world, got paid fair wages, the cost of quality clothing would be bearable even by normal workers.

In much the same way that a janitor could afford to buy a home in the 1960’s, a more just economy today or in the future would allow regular people to afford quality clothing.

I say this about the economy because people will say “well you can’t expect regular people to afford $200 per outfit.” Well you can if the outfit lasts 10+ years and the person is getting paid a wage commensurate with productivity.

That said, living wage advocates note that paying garment workers a living wage need only raise garment prices by 50 cents or so. Patagonia goes the extra mile and that is ultimately a great thing, but it’s not even necessary to at least tackle the poor wages of garment workers.

I believe it, my girlfriend gets stuff from SHEIN every 2-3 months. The quality of clothing isn't great but the prices are really cheap so you could get an entire "haul" for the price of a single piece of clothing at a higher end clothing retailer. They do a really good job of copying trends in clothing really quickly so she often will see a manufacturer come out with some new piece of clothing and buy the SHEIN version for 1/3 or 1/4 of the cost. Obviously the quality isn't there and the clothes won't fit like the expensive version that pioneered the certain trend but for the price they get close enough. If I extrapolate my girlfriends behavior to the broader demographic of shoppers I totally believe their valuation.

There’s a reason it’s so much cheaper, and those reasons are horrifying.

What an absolute disgrace this is, true evil people. If it weren't for the environmental cost, remains the exploitive practices, and how it brainwashes millions of people into thinking that a piece of clothing barely has a value.

Shorting this one as soon as possible.

Shein and Temu are scams. Go right now and check prices - same Chinese crap is on Amazon, usually same price or only a couple dollars more, except with next day shipping rather than 2 weeks. They have paid for a lot of PR in NYT and WSJ, but these are frauds.

What is the scam? Selling crap for a slightly lower price and longer delivery times doesn't sound like fraud to me.

I ordered from Shein once, mostly as an experiment, but I got what I paid for - some Chinese crap which I threw away some month later.

I don't think this is exactly a scam but my understanding is that these businesses exploit a loophole in de minimis trade rules that were meant for consumers bringing in negligible amounts of goods they purchased overseas without tariffs, rather than massive businesses selling products all over the U.S. Once that loophole is closed the business model might collapse (or they might try to move production to Mexico, cheap U.S. states, etc.)

https://www.reuters.com/business/retail-consumer/key-trade-l...

The Shein search/filter/discovery experience is dramatically better than Amazon's.

"Selling stuff for slightly cheaper" is not a scam

Unfortunately in German. Use the auto translated subs: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2Go4Npf1hYU

Never heard of the company, thank you for this very enlightening video. Depressing how this is even possible nowadays. People do not really care for our planet.

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