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Is It Unreasonable to Want Products that Don't Secretly Contain Fucktons of Lead?
Hexmage-PA
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Registered User regular
Apparently there was a recent recall at McDonalds on Shrek collectible drinking glasses due to high levels of lead in the colored decorations. The Associated Press commissioned testing of its own on many different collectible glasses, most given-out as promotions at fast food restaurants, and found that they contain over 1000 times the acceptable level of lead in a child's product. This isn't just a recent development, either; apparently collectible glasses have had drastically high lead content for decades.
Source
Really, how could a problem as major as collectible glasses marketed towards children containing 1000 times the safe amount of lead go unnoticed for several decades? How did no one catch this? Were these products not tested? How many other products are not sufficiently tested? Do these companies just put-out a product and use the consuming public as guinea pigs?
There have been countless examples of products that were released for mass consumption without knowing their risks. Leaded gasoline was used for years in developed countries and is still used in developing countries, despite the fact that it fills the air with mind-affecting lead. A certain brand of glow-in-the-dark watches, Undark, was found to be painted with radioactive materials only after a great many of the factory workers began developing cancers.
I once remarked to one of my roommates how products (medicines in that case) should be much more stringently tested before they are released for mass consumption. He replied that such intensive testing would make it take significantly longer for products to be released, which would harm companies that suddenly had to start accounting for lengthy testing periods and a lower amount of revenue being generated by the sale of new products.
Is it really unreasonable for products to be properly tested for possible risks before they are released for mass consumption?
Source
Really, how could a problem as major as collectible glasses marketed towards children containing 1000 times the safe amount of lead go unnoticed for several decades? How did no one catch this? Were these products not tested? How many other products are not sufficiently tested? Do these companies just put-out a product and use the consuming public as guinea pigs?
There have been countless examples of products that were released for mass consumption without knowing their risks. Leaded gasoline was used for years in developed countries and is still used in developing countries, despite the fact that it fills the air with mind-affecting lead. A certain brand of glow-in-the-dark watches, Undark, was found to be painted with radioactive materials only after a great many of the factory workers began developing cancers.
I once remarked to one of my roommates how products (medicines in that case) should be much more stringently tested before they are released for mass consumption. He replied that such intensive testing would make it take significantly longer for products to be released, which would harm companies that suddenly had to start accounting for lengthy testing periods and a lower amount of revenue being generated by the sale of new products.
Is it really unreasonable for products to be properly tested for possible risks before they are released for mass consumption?
Hexmage-PA on
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Do not mock the dread god Freem'Arkhet.
The companies are claiming that its not for kids (despite being sold alongside kids stuff) and that if you use the RIGHT test it comes out just fine.
...yeah, I was trying to play devils advocate here, but no.
Well that explains a few things.....
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It would be a pretty hard sell to say that those weren't designed for kids... in any case, high lead concentrations in paint on any glasses is a bad idea
that's why we call it the struggle, you're supposed to sweat
Sorry, I posted this at like 1:00 AM. I'll edit the OP and make it more Debate-y and Discourse-y.
People have actually drank from these things? Like...ever?
I think folks are misunderstanding what the word "collectible" means. I wouldn't drink out of a collectible cup any more than I would spend a collectible coin or use a collectible stamp to mail a letter to my sweet old grandmother.
Yes, I totally understand that there is a major price difference in the above scenario and that collecting the latter two items may actually net you some impressive cash, but you see what I'm saying. I never drank out of those as a child and never will.
Am I alone in this?
Apparently just touching the decorations absorbs huge amounts of lead into the body.
The cups are "collectible" but they're handed out with every Happy Kid's Meal or whatever and if you try and eBay them a few years later expecting a payout you'll be severely disappointed. In most households they'll sit in the back of the cups cabinet and get used when the other cups are dirty and nobody can be bothered to wash one.
edit: apparently the lead is on the outside paint, though, so drinking out of them is not really the issue.
Ah. Reading comprehension fail on my part.
Collectible is kind of a weird catchall that doesn't mean "too valuable to use", it just means part of a collection. Really its rare stamps you don't send. I have collection of shot glasses. I don't drink, but aside from the really expensive ones they can all be used. Collectible cards get driven. Collector edition video games get played, don't they?
I'm asking because the same lead ban has led to the unavailability of motocross bikes for kids. My neighbor's kid races, that's how I heard about it. Why can't he buy those mini motocross bikes now? Because they contain lead.
Naw, they totally gave a refund that was 10c above the price of the cups! Totally acceptable.
Jesus Christ. How do they even . . . What. If there were a way to combine these icons, I would:
I guess they were expecting people to don rubber gloves before picking them up, or perhaps handle them with tongs.
The WaPo article indicates that two companies may be starting recalls. It also describes the testing process:
25/35 is not high enough, but gives some cause for optimism, if you're worried about past consumption.
I do wonder whether the mentioned federal limit is the 2008 one or earlier. The lack of restrictions on cadmium needs patching, too.
Thing is, even if this story made people avoid China made products they will eventualy come back because the lower price is always better then a lower chance of contracting sickness, especialy if you read the article "years ago".
It's good to see the government and corporations getting on board with my disliking children.
You know what you do to kids you dislike? Feed them food from McDonalds.
What tests should they do? Have a bunch of people/animals drink from cups with lead paint in them to learn what we already know?
Same with that glow in the dark material example. Does it really need to be tested? Can't we just look at the ingredient list and say, hey this product isn't fit to sell to consumers?
A private company (The Associated Press) is warning you of the lead in the collectible cups.
So essentially the private sector is doing the government's job.
A company is required to list ingredients? Isn't that a protected trade secret or something?
There's what we were waiting for.
EDIT: I don't mean 'we' as in China, I mean 'we', as in people on the forum.
umm, am I missing a cultural reference? I really don't get it
So that they can make a load of shit like this
So that a tiny percentage of the country can live like this
Lots of political wonks have been saying for the past couple of years that the extreme wealth inequality in China is getting to the tipping point, and people are getting increasingly restive. How much of that is to fit a particular desired narrative is unknown, but there have been a lot of embarrassing leaks of riots and protests.
If only they were really quiet.
they don't safety test their own products and they buy this shit from the lowest bidder
when you go and say you need something far cheaper than what it should cost don't act surprised when the work gets contracted out to seriously nefarious people
Basically the US need to lose its love of cheap/free shit and start valuing quality
Irrelevant, I choose to feed my kid a greesy meal, I didn't choose to buy him a cheap cup with lead all over it.