Model Kris Gottschalk is styled by Katie Burnett as "a spartan beauty', in 'Day for Night', lensed by Nagi Sakai for Models.com. / Hair by Roberto Di Cuia; makeup by Erin Parsons
Spartan women were famous in ancient Greece as being far more empowered than their contemporaries in Athens, who had lost far more rights with the rise of patriarchal values and monotheism. In addition to being military fighters, Spartan women had a reputation for controlling their husbands, they legally owned property and inherited it. They were also better educated. Spartan girl babies were known to be as well fed as boys, unlike the fate of girls in Athens.
This Gottschalk-Burnett-Sakai editorial pays homage to the androgynous strength and influence of Spartan women.
South African photographer Bruce Boyd is fascinated by images of known objects distorted in ice blocks. Boyd and his girlfriend artist Tharien Smith have launched a three-part series 0˚C -- Zero Degrees -- involving 3 phases of water, ice, steam as filters, the medium or canvas for the display of objects.
Boyd writes of his and Smith's project: "In 0˚C (Zero Degrees), we use ice as a medium to display the beauty of flowers. I find it fascinating that ice can preserve something and at the same time also enhance or distort the beauty of it. For a few fleeting moments, we are treated to this preserved beauty, the past encapsulated perfectly, before the ice melts and flowers wilt."
Related: Makoto Azuma 'Ice Flowers' Exhibit & The Life Cycles Of Fabulous FlowersAOC Salon
Master photographer Tim Walker produces another of his breathtaking editorials, 'An Artist of the Floating World'. Shooting for the first time on location in Japan, Walker captures models Rianne van Rompaey, Chiharu Okungi, Maaya Yoshiyama, Yukihide Harada, Mari, and Yubi joined by talents Yoshito Ohno, Masaharu Imazu, Yuta Ishiyana, Masashi Nakamura, Barabbas Okuyama and Hiroshi Ishiguro styled by Kate Phelan./Hair by Shon; makeup by Sam Bryant
'An Artist of the Floating World' (1986) is a historical novel by Kazuo Ishiguro set in Japan post WWII. The narrative belongs to Masuji Ono, an aging painter who -- in the buildup to WWII -- broke away from his teacher to pursue nationalistic propagandistic art. Much like the McCarthy era in America's 1950s, where America's artists were regularly rounded up and jailed as Communists, Ono took an active role in Japan's ideological witch hunt.
The timely nature of Walker's creative impulse for 'An Artist of the Floating World' is surely the rise of nationalism worldwide and specifically the rise of Donald Trump and his embrace of nationalistic, alt-right, ideological purity in America. ~ Anne
Related: Hillary Supporters Reel Under Impact of FBI Director Comey's Revelations That Threaten Election Outcome AOC Hillary Clinton
'Resurrection of Angels' is a powerful piece of Los Angeles street art painted by Fin DAC. Gracing the Love Shack in Venice Beach, the dramatic angel figure dressed in black honors Fin Dac muse Nicole Wu, who the artist met seven years ago when she was 15. Wu now studies photography at Parsons in New York, but her extraordinary image is the first of two angels= mural planned for LA.
The fashion world is grieving the death of Franca Sozzani, Editor-in-Chief of Vogue Italia. Sozzani created the most activist and in-your-face political statements in Vogue Italia. Not all fashionistas appreciated her activist voice. Sozzani's infamous Italian Vogue editorial 'Water & Oil', September 2010 photographed by Steven Meisel is among her most controversial. Sozzani was making a political statement about the BP oil spill.
In honor of Franca Sozzani, we republish that editorial featuring Kristen McMenamy in much-expanded image sizes but with the original commentary. In moving AOC from Squarespace V5 to V7 a year ago, none of the comments transferred with the original articles. But I recall that the arguments were fierce! ~ Anne
{Written Aug. 7, 2010}: "Italian Vogue’s Kristen McMenamy oil-spill environmental disaster photos have created a firestorm of controversy about the motives of the magazine and whether or not the fashion shoot is in ‘poor taste’.
I’ve read endless comments from presumably American readers, and they are generally negative about the Italian Vogue Sept 2010 BP oil spill photos.
Comments are that the photos are tasteless, trivialize the events in the gulf to the point of mockery and represent a big-businesses attempt to exploit the tragedy. In the case of Italian Vogue and Kristen McMenamy, the big-business bad guy is Conde Nast, not BP.
From my perspective, I fail to see how these photos glamorize the BP Gulf oil disaster. They are disturbing, provocative and dreadfully ugly.
What we learn in reading the torrent of comment criticism is a fashion reality long known to me: American fashion has no intellectual or political base. In France, Germany and Italy, fashion and style sometimes become political, holistic statements about life and consumption.
The Politics of Fashion
On Thursday I met with a prominent New York PR woman, talking about Anne of Carversville and my consulting philosophy. Luckily she has global clients and was herself raised in Australia.
“They must love you in France,” she laughed.
This is true, not only do ‘they’ love me in France and Italy, ‘they’ say I’m not American, precisely because I don’t separate fashion and style from environmental, or quality of life issues. “You may have an American passport and work for an American company (Victoria’s Secret), but you are not American,” they said for 10 years. (Note: people said the same thing in Asia. )
Humans As Animals
There is no beauty in the Italian Vogue editorial photos. Honestly, I can’t imagine that they will inspire one dress sale. I view the photos as a primarily political statement, one tied into environmental issues but also into the fact that as humans, we are animals.
Modern values, which were born in America, put humans above animals and Mother Nature. We forget that humans are technically apes. We exist in this lineup: bonobo, chimpanzee, human, gorilla, orangutan, and gibbon.
If we regarded ourselves as part of Mother Nature’s lineup, rather than masters over it, we might approach our lordship over the environment differently.
It’s helpful to examine the Italian Vogue oil spill photos against the backdrop of the ongoing Wrangler jeans ‘We Are Animals’ ad campaign in Europe. Can you imagine this campaign being produced in America? No.
Culture Creative Advertising
Americans could be pleasantly surprised to get a first-hand visual documentation of just how intellectual fashion can be in Europe vs America.
Instead we shred the Italian Vogue visual commentary, taking offense at its lack of political correctness. We could explore what we might learn from the European desire to integrate consumption and brand values messages into a cohesive editorial statement. But that requires an intellectual, thoughtful approach to fashion and our consumption patterns.
No dice.
Simply stated, not since the 60s (which is the birth of Cultural Creative values) has America used fashion and style to make political statements in any significant way.
The American response to Italian Vogue’s Gulf Oil spill, Kristen McMenamy photos is one more example of a schism wider than the Atlantic Ocean that separates Europe and America, when the topic is fashion and politics." Anne
The sun rose in Kibera this morning, and it rose in my world, too, with my rapture over these Fredrik Lerneryd images of ballet dancers in the Kibera neighborhood of Nairobi. They are my best Christmas gift.
Anne of Carversville has a long psychological, emotional and now functional relationship with Kibera. Initially, my lovefest with the largest slum in Africa was triggered by JR's famous 'Women Are Heroes' project, with Kibera being one of the four slums featured in his everyday examination of the beauty and heroic female efforts worldwide. Over time I pieced together collection of intimate and deeply personal connections to Kibera through my muse Dan Eldon. The functional dimension of AOC's connection to Kibera is GLAMTRIBALE's support of The Kibera School for Girls, with 5% of revenues. Another 5% is earmarked for elephant conservation.
The dancers photographed by Fredrik Lerneryd learn dance through a program run by UK-based charity Anno's Africa, which provides alternative arts education to over 800 children in Kenya. Huff Po explains:
"Taught by Mike Wamaya, who previously worked throughout Europe as a dancer, Anno’s ballet classes focus on both the physical and mental well-being of the 40 or so students who take part, promoting the confidence-building necessary to carry these kids into adulthood."
“I came in contact with the dancers while I was working on another story,” Lerneryd explained to The Huffington Post, “and I felt really moved [by] what I saw.”
His ongoing series, filled with images of floating bodies and expressive faces, focuses less on the rigorous craft of ballet and more on the visible determination of the people practicing it. A few of his photos also provide perspective on the realities of informal settlements in Nairobi, a city that is home to more than 2.5 million people in approximately 200 slum areas.
In the same way that Lerneryd observed how the confidence of the dancers grew as they mastered core ballet movements, I was captivated by the young students at The Kibera School for Girls singing ; 'Yes I Can'.
After the initial sequence of images taken in Kibera, Lerneryd shares photos of four of the dancers from Kibra's dance program who recently moved to a boarding school outisde the slum, in order to tain at a ballet studio in Karen. This December, the four aspiring dancers are taking part in 'The Nutcracker' at the National Theatre in Nairobi.
Preparing to launch GLAMTRIBALE online on January 1, 2016, I spent these days last year pulling together all the critical links to AOC content that defined my relationship with Kibera. I will repost those links shortly, along with a personal reachout to Fredrik Lerneryd. You can follow his Instagram page here.
W Magazine greets 2017 with its annual The Movie Issue, photographed by Craig McDean, with styling by Edward Enninful. Writer Lynn Hirchberg is the voice behind the Best Performances issue. Stars of the session are actors Emma Stone, Casey Affleck, Ruth Negga, Natalie Portman, Amy Adams, Matthew McConaughey, Viggo Mortensen, Adam Driver, Michelle Williams, Joel Edgerton, Mahershala Ali, Nicole Kidman, Chris Pine, Taraji P. Henson, Warren Beatty, Felicity Jones, Marion Cotillard, Jeff Bridges, Dev Patel, Hailee Steinfeld, Anya Taylor-Joy, Michael Shannon, Andrew Garfield, Greta Gerwig, Naomie Harris, Lucas Hedges, Dakota Fanning, Alden Ehrenreich, Annette Bening, and Joel Edgerton. Read on at W Magazine.
Netflix's film 'The White Helmets', the story of volunteer rescue workers in Syria, took home the Oscar for Best Documentary Short Sunday. The victory was a wonderful first win for Netflix, distributor of the film.
AOC has tracked in the month of Feb. efforts to bring cinematographer and press officer for the White Helmets Khaled Khatib to the US. The leader of the White Helmets Raed Saleh was also unable to obtain the necessary travel documents. There is no doubt that the two men were originally caught up in the Trump administration's Muslim ban. The situation appeared to be on the verge of resolution but fell apart again days before the Oscars.
Everyone -- including LA-based 'White Helmets' director Orlando von Einsiedel and producer Joanna Natasegara who accepted the Oscar, have taken the high road as claims that the Syrian government eventually became part of the problem -- are ignoring the travel documents controversy and focusing on the Oscar win on behalf of the war-ravaged Syrian people.
Related Feb. 17, 2017
"They are not yet on US soil, and we await their arrival with tense anticipation," said the filmmakers of Raed Saleh and Khaled Khateeb. "In these uncertain times, their story is one of the most moving of our generation. We stand ready to welcome them."
On Wednesday, the outlook was grim that the key figures in the Netflix film 'The White Helmets' would obtain the necessary paperwork to gain US visas in time for the Oscars. In 48 hours since Hollywood Reporter and websites far and wide rallied around the issue, the situation has improved dramatically.
“We are eagerly looking forward to coming to the Oscars," said Saleh in a statement. "It will give us an important platform for the voices of Syrian children and women trapped under the rubble as a result of the airstrikes and artillery shelling, and for the voices of thousands of displaced Syrians who have been forced from their homes.”
“It is so important that people see the film. It is important that people understand that Syria has people who want the same things they want: peace, jobs, family and to live without the fear of bombs," added Khateeb. "If we win this award, it will show people across Syria that people around the world support them. It will give courage to every volunteer who wakes up every morning to run towards bombs."
Related Feb. 15, 2017
There is deep concern in Hollywood that key international talents will not be present for the Academy Awards due to President Trump's executive order banning Syrians and others from seven Muslim-majority countries from entering the United States.
Director Orlando von Einsiedel and producer Joanna Natasegara's Netflix film 'The White Helmets' is nominated for an Academy Award for Best Documentary Short. But it appears that the real heroes of the documentary will not be present at the Oscars.
Every day in Syria, a group of ordinary, unarmed civilian volunteers known as the White Helmets risk their lives to help rescue men, women, and children injured by the incessant air raids destroying the country. Nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2016, the apolitical White Helmets are credited with saving more than 75,000 people since 2012.
Now it appears unlikely that Raed Saleh, the leader of the White Helmets, and Khaled Khateeb, the photographer who filmed all of the documentary's footage inside Aleppo, will get the necessary travel documents to attend the Oscars. Vogueinterviews Einsiedel and Natasegara about their relationship with the White Helmets, and why we must watch their documentary in today's political climate.
2017 Whitney Biennial Co-Curator Responds To 'Open Casket' Controversy
Not in recent memory has a single painting caused such controversy and furor in the contemporary art world as Dana Schutz's 'Open Casket' (2016), part of New York's current Whitney Biennial. The portrait focuses on the disfigured corpse of Emmett Till, murdered in 1955 at age 14 by a Mississippi lynch mob after conflicting stories about whistling -- or 'worse' according to suggestive innuendos in court testimony -- at a white woman.
AOC previously covered the furor around Schutz and her painting; her right to paint it in the first place as a white woman; artist Parker Bright's standing guard over the painting wearing a t-shirt and a scrawled message 'Black Death Spectacle'; the demands of British artist Hannah Black that 'Open Casket' be stripped from the show and destroyed; and a false apology letter and request for removal by Schutz that was widely circulated with no verification of the author's identity.
The two Biennial creators Christopher Lew and Mia Lockshave also become the target of criticism, and Artnet New's editor-in-chief Andrew Goldsteinspoke to Lew about the controversy.
It's easy to forget that there are 62 other artists in the Whitney Biennial with all the controversy around 'Open Casket'. Referencing the dynamic playing out in the summer of 2016, when final curatorial decisions were being made for the Biennial, Goldstein summarizes America's mindset:
I think it’s useful to remember back to this time, in the summer of 2016, because the furious churn of the news cycle has propelled the national psyche to a different place since then. The country was in a state of extreme trauma. Terrorist attacks in Europe and at home had everyone on edge, police were brutally killing black men in the streets, protests were blazing across America, and specters of the gruesome 20th century were reappearing in headlines in the form of Nazi rallies, white supremacists, and the Ku Klux Klan. Add to this the yawning economic polarization between the classes and it truly felt like society was falling apart—a climate that Donald Trump exploited with his call to a ferocious, nativist populism. Your show seems to specifically address this horrific moment, for instance with another Dana Schutz painting that greets visitors as they reach the fifth floor: a painting of people crammed in an elevator, literally tearing each other limb from limb, evidently out of rage born by pure proximity. Why did you commission that painting specially for the show?
Dana Schutz Elevator (2017). Photo by Henri Neuendorf.
It speaks to the heatedness in the US and the world at large over the last year or two—those issues you point out that are not new to the country but have become recently more visible. Dana had already been working on a series of elevator paintings, so we weren’t asking her to create something completely new, only to think of an elevator painting in the context of the Whitney—to think about the size of our art elevator and to use that as a launching point.
Reality is that most of the people - including AOC -- are talking about the Emmett Till painting without having seen it. We are looking at 'Open Casket' and talking about it based on Internet images -- and not within its context of a large number of painting devoted to America's current social eruptions. Within the Whitney, the painting exists within a larger social dialogue.
Lew explains his real experience of viewing the painting: "For me, whenever I’m standing in front of the painting, it brings about a real sense of loss. It really evokes the feeling of mourning for a real person who has died. It was that feeling, when I saw it for the first time in Dana’s studio, that allowed me to think about the painting in a way that would fit into the Biennial, within a constellation of artworks that could speak to these issues in a deeply meaningful and deeply sad and empathetic way . . . "
Hannah Black Letter & Petition
Addressing Hannah Black's petition (and letter to the museum, which we published in its entirety) calling for the destruction of 'Open Casket', Lew is unyielding in his defense of not responding. "As a museum with a collection, with the role of being custodians for art, we can never condone the destruction of a work. It’s such an extreme demand that it brings things to the point where one can’t have a real conversation."
Marilyn Minter, a leading liberal and feminist voice on the New York arts scene, a person we have followed for years and is now a leading Trump critic, posted on Facebook: “The art world thinks Dana Schutz is the enemy? The left is eating its young again. Censorship from the left really sucks!”
If we do not see the humanity in one another, that’s when we end up with divisions and barriers. In many ways, it goes back to when we could only see 3/5 of a person. That’s what has led us down this path to where we can no longer empathize or even speak to each other. To police these barriers takes us down a dangerous path, moving us away from the very ideals of what this country can be.
Artist Hannah Black. Courtesy of the artist and MOMA PSI
In an equally sober reflection, Lew addresses an issue that we find to be relevant within the controversy:
The other thing about the work—the history that Dana is tapping into with the work, the lynching and murder of Emmett Till—is that this is a history that is an American history. Certainly people of different races have different experiences, but this historic and contemporary violence is something that we all have to grapple with and confront. It is deeply painful and traumatic—more so for some than others, in unequal terms—but it is something that we all have to deal with, and I think if we don’t confront it, if we don’t have these kind of conversations, then we’re not getting anywhere.
Schutz herself speaks to this reality, saying the painting is "not a rendering of the photograph but is more an engagement with the loss." Note that the actual open-casket photographs of Emmett Till are horrific beyond our understanding of human's capacity for torturous violence.
NBC writes that Schutz made the painting in August of 2016 during a time which she calls "a state of emergency" that came about as a result of fatal officer involved shootings of unarmed Blacks. She believes the violence Till experienced coincides with violence and brutality innocent Black men face today.
Why Not Paint Emmett Till From A White Woman's POV?
Art professor Dr. Lisa Whittington, a Black artist who has created two paintings of Emmett Till, takes no issue with a white artist taking on the difficult subject matter, but questions Schutz's perspective in making the painting. This seems like a valid question to us and one worth exploring.
"I would ask her, why she did not paint the Emmett Till Story from a white woman's point of view? Is there nothing that as a white woman that she would want to say? Especially in recently knowing that the woman who accused Emmett Till has admitted that she lied. Where is the artwork that represents her lies?" Whittington said. "The two men who lynched Emmett? Where is the artwork about them? Does she have nothing to say there?"
Whittington continued, "As artists—responsible artists—we are to speak and to document history. We are to tell about life from our point of view from where we stand."
The Duchess of Sussex helps Patsy Wardally at Smart Works on January 10, 2019.
In 2019 Meghan Markle visited one of her patronages Smart Works, the London-based organization devoted to helping long-term unemployed and vulnerable women re-enter the workforce. The project includes help for the women in dressing for their best job interviews.
Smart Works is back in the news, short-listed for the “Charity Of The Year” honor by the U.K.’s Third Sector Awards. Kate Stephens, the CEO of Smart Works, made the announcement as the Meghan-edited, September 2019 issue of British Vogue hit the streets of London on Friday.
Combining her passion for fashion and philanthropy, Meghan Markle has created a capsule workwear collection in aid of charity Smart Works.
Baby Archie’s mom detailed that the project will be launched with Marks and Spencer, John Lewis, Jigsaw and her good friend Misha Nonoo as a 'one-for-one' system: “For each item purchased by a customer, one is donated to charity,” the 37 year-old wrote in the magazine. Nonoo is a close friend of the Duchess of Sussex and currently has a popup-shop open in London.
In her British Vogue article, Meghan explains that Smart Works is about far more than a woman going through her closet and donating unneeded clothes. “It’s about looking at that special item you’re holding on to – the memory of that suit or dress that helped you achieve your dream job – and wanting to pay it forward. Not a hand-me-down, but rather a hand being held.”
Those donated clothes make it to a Smart Works centre, where clients receive an interview outfit as a result of a session with a stylist. Next, volunteer coaches ready women for their upcoming interview. Once they score their dream job, they come back for a second outfit, to see them through until their first pay cheque. It’s the enthusiasm of the volunteers, the earnestness of the staff and, most of all, the blushing, bashful and beautiful smile that crosses a client’s face when she sees herself in the mirror, that I have found so profoundly compelling. Because in that moment, she feels special and emboldened.
Markle acknowledges that it can be difficult for the client women to sort through all the Smart Works clothes and pull together their best looks, even though every woman has an assist from the Smart Works representative. The Duchess’ vision of a Smart Works capsule collection of more classic options for a workwear wardrobe germinated from this challenge.
"Searching for a great purse for a client": The Duchess of Sussex on a private visit to Smart Works. Credit: @SUSSEXROYAL
On Tuesday morning, over 100 models, including Christy Turlington Burns, Edie Campbell, Karen Elson, Milla Jovovich, Doutzen Kroes, and Gemma Ward, signed an open letter addressed directly to Victoria’s Secret. The letter petitioned the lingerie brand to take concrete actions in protecting models against sexual misconduct.
The letter was properly addressed to Victoria’s Secret’s CEO John Mehas and it pulled no punches:
We are writing today to express our concern for the safety and wellbeing of the models and young women who aspire to model for Victoria’s Secret. In the past few weeks, we have heard numerous allegations of sexual assault, alleged rape, and sex trafficking of models and aspiring models. While these allegations may not have been aimed at Victoria's Secret directly, it is clear that your company has a crucial role to play in remedying the situation. From the headlines about L Brands CEO Leslie Wexner’s close friend and associate, Jeffrey Epstein, to the allegations of sexual misconduct by photographers Timur Emek, David Bellemere, and Greg Kadel, it is deeply disturbing that these men appear to have leveraged their working relationships with Victoria’s Secret to lure and abuse vulnerable girls.
L Brands CEO Les Wexner (l) and former CMO Ed Razek (r) in happier times.
The letter then proceeds to invite Victoria’s Secret to join the RESPECT Program —a program of the Model Alliance—is the only existing anti-sexual harassment program designed by and for models.
Signatory companies make a binding commitment to require their employees, agents, vendors, photographers and other contractors to follow a code of conduct that protects everyone’s safety on the job, and reduces models’ vulnerability to mistreatment. Models have access to an independent, confidential complaint mechanism, with swift and fair resolution of complaints and appropriate consequences for abusers. Further, RESPECT includes a robust training program aimed toward prevention, to ensure that everyone understands their rights and responsibilities.
“Corporations tend to treat the discovery of abuses as public-relations crises to be managed rather than human-rights violations to be remedied,” says Sara Ziff, the founder and executive director of the Model Alliance. “The RESPECT Program provides Victoria’s Secret an opportunity not only to right the wrongs of the past but also to work towards prevention.”
Ziff recently penned an essay for the Cut detailing her own encounter with Epstein as a young model. She highlighted just how long an imbalance of power and lack of protections have “plagued” the industry. She wrote: “Now, we need the support of agencies, publishing companies, and fashion brands who want to do better by the talent who they purport to protect.”
In November, the Model Alliance issued a statement following disgraced L Brands Chief Marketing Officer Ed Razek’s infamous Vogue interview in advance of Victoria’s Secret Fashion Show. Razek retired from Victoria’s Secret on Monday.
A woman holds a sign after a silent march to Las Americas Immigrant Advocacy Center for the victims of the Walmart shootings in El Paso August 4, 2019. Image via Michael Chow/The Republic via REUTERS
Hours after a white gunman walked into an El Paso Walmart on Saturday and killed nearly two dozen Hispanic shoppers, Texas Gov. Greg Abbott addressed a room full of reporters in the border city and expressed grief and support for the community.
As high-profile mass shootings continue to erupt across the country — three of which occurred in Texas in the last two years — a reporter asked the governor what he planned on doing to ensure one doesn’t happen again.
Abbott, a Republican, hesitated, then spoke at length about how the state Legislature reacted to the 2018 high school shooting in Santa Fe, eventually focusing on what he said was the most agreed-upon need: addressing mental health issues.
“Bottom line is mental health is a large contributor to any type of violence or shooting violence, and the state of Texas this past session passed a lot of legislation and provided funding for the state to better address that challenge,” he concluded, referring to bills aimed at improving children’s mental health care.
Behind him, U.S. Rep. Veronica Escobar, a Democrat from El Paso, visibly stiffened, shaking her head slightly as Abbott connected mental illness to what appears to be an act of domestic terrorism fueled by a white supremacist ideology.
The next day, before a downtown El Paso vigil for the victims, she put into words what had been apparent on her face.
“I would also call on those who use mental illness as an excuse to please stop. Please stop,” Escobar told reporters, to light applause from those beginning to arrive for the service. “It further stigmatizes those who truly suffer from mental illness, and the fact of the matter is people with mental illness are far more likely to be victims of violent crime, not perpetrators.”
“This tragedy is not in vain if we can finally have a reckoning in this country as to what is really going on,” she added.
Abbott’s focus on mental illness is a common reaction among Republican lawmakers immediately after mass shootings, often mirroring public sentiment. But such focus comes to the dismay of mental health experts and Democrats, who argue that automatically pinning such horrors on mental illness is a way to avoid talking about issues surrounding gun violence and the rising prominence of white supremacy in the United States. In reality, the intersection between mental health and mass shootings is complicated.
In 2013, a Gallup poll found that 48% of Americans blamed the mental health system for failing to identify potential perpetrators of gun violence with that belief trumping other causes such as drug use or easy access to guns. In a similar CBS poll from 2017, 68% thought better mental health screenings could prevent gun violence. And multiple high-profile shootings with ties to mental health issues have further cemented the connection into the minds of lawmakers and Americans — perhaps most notably with the Sandy Hook shooting, where the gunman killed 20 elementary school children and six school employees.
But research on mass killings and serious mental illness doesn’t usually back this notion, though results vary depending on how attacks and mental illness are classified.
A 2015 study of about 230 mass homicides since 1913 found that only 22% of the killers could be considered mentally ill. Examining only the killings from this millennium, however, the author, a forensic psychiatrist, considered 32% of the killers mentally ill. A 2016 study found only 15% had a psychotic disorder and 11% had paranoid schizophrenia. But smaller, more recent government reports indicate higher levels — a U.S. Secret Service report of 27 mass attacks in 2018 found that 44% of attackers had been treated for or diagnosed with a mental illness.
Photo by Heather Mount on Unsplash. A North Texas mother and her son hold protest signs at the March for Our Lives sister rally in Denton, Texas on March 24th, 2018. In the background, volunteers register people to vote.
The rates of mental illness among mass murderers in recent studies do not surprise Greg Hansch, the executive director of Texas’ branch of the National Alliance on Mental Illness. He doesn’t negate that mental illness is sometimes a factor in large-scale attacks, but argues that even then it is not the sole cause and is often quickly used as a scapegoat for gun violence.
“We shouldn’t immediately jump to blaming mental illness, because one, it’s impossible to make that determination without having facts to back that up and, two, there are often other causative/aggravating factors that need to be explored,” he said. “Certainly in the case of El Paso, it seems like it was a hate crime.”
There has been no information released regarding the mental health of the suspected gunman in Saturday’s massacre. The 21-year-old allegedly did, however, publish a racist manifesto before the shooting in which he described the attack as a “response to the Hispanic invasion of Texas.”
Still, Abbott and Republicans nationwide again pointed to mental illness immediately after back-to-back shootings in El Paso and Dayton, Ohio. President Donald Trump told reporters on Sunday “these are people who are very, very seriously mentally ill.” In a White House address the next day, he said the country must reform mental health laws “to better identify mentally disturbed individuals who may commit acts of violence.”
“Mental illness and hatred pulls the trigger, not the gun,” he said.
That hatred motivated the El Paso gunman isn’t being debated in the wake of the shooting. But Texas Democrats say zeroing in on mental illness allows Republicans to ignore gun safety measures and racism.
“Let’s use our collective voice to keep the focus where it should be – that’s on the dual problem of lax gun laws and the white nationalist views that have been fueled by President Trump,” wrote the leader of the Texas House Democratic Caucus, state Rep. Chris Turner, in a memo to his colleagues. “We should not allow Republicans to try and change the topic to mental health, video games, prayer in school or anything else.”
Quickly after the Santa Fe shooting, which killed 10 people and left over a dozen wounded, Abbott brought together students, school officials, law enforcement, mental health experts, and advocates on both sides of the gun debate to propose legislation aimed at preventing future school shootings. He also created committees to study the issue while lawmakers were not in session to come up with proposals for the 2019 Legislature.
At the time, mental health experts cautioned Texas policymakers against using mental illness as the end-all-be-all solution to school shootings. The Senate committee sought out the very question of what propels mass shooters. After assembling an army of experts to testify, the committee released a 2018 report that showed mental health professionals had warned the government of a potentially flawed logic.
Dr. Andy Keller, CEO of the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute, told senators that mental illness alone is “not a risk factor for violent acts” and that there is “no reason to believe focusing solely on this population will prevent future events,” according to the report. Another expert, Dr. Jeff Temple, the director of behavioral health and research at the University of Texas Medical Branch, testified that “mental illness is not a driving factor of violence,” adding that those suffering are “more likely to hurt themselves or be hurt by someone else than to harm another individual.”
As the 2019 state legislative session began in January, mental health concerns and school-hardening measures, like increasing police presence and installing metal detectors, were still the top priorities for Republican lawmakers, who hold majorities in both the state House and Senate. By the time lawmakers went home in late May, the Legislature passed sweeping legislation aimed at improving mental health care for students, arming more school employees and "hardening" schools.
Bills tied to gun control efforts went nowhere. Gun restrictions were, in fact, loosened in some ways, including a measure that forbids landlords from requiring tenants or guests not carry firearms.
“Nobody wants to talk about gun violence prevention measures. Nobody wants to talk about the fact that we need to do something … about the increasing racism in this country,” state Sen. José Rodríguez, D-El Paso, said before a Sunday vigil and silent march in El Paso. “On the other hand, I want to tell you that there were a whole slew of bills that were championed by the state leadership … that now allow, for example, guns in your churches, that allow more guns on campuses.”
Abbott told reporters on Saturday after his initial press conference that it was too soon to talk about politics.
In Ohio, just two days after the Dayton mass shooting, the Republican governor proposed a “red flag” law that would allow authorities to remove guns from people a court deems dangerous. President Trump has called for a similar policy at the federal level. Such a proposal fell flat at the feet of Texas Lt. Gov. Dan Patrick after the Santa Fe shooting.
At Sunday’s vigil, El Pasoans showed they are ready for change. People filled the streets the evening after their city was attacked, carrying handmade signs that expressed pain, but also frustration with the politics surrounding such tragedies that were now all too real for them.
Among hundreds of grieving community members marching in silence downtown, one woman held up a sign written in bold, red marker: “Racism is not mental illness.”
Alexa Ura contributed reporting.
Disclosure: The University of Texas Medical Branch and the Meadows Mental Health Policy Institute have been financial supporters of The Texas Tribune, a nonprofit, nonpartisan news organization that is funded in part by donations from members, foundations and corporate sponsors. Financial supporters play no role in the Tribune's journalism. Find a complete list of them here.
This story was published in partnership with The Trace, a nonprofit newsroom covering guns in America.
Burberry joins Prada’s June 2019 similar announcement of launching collections made with Econyl, the sustainable nylon yarn made from regenerated fishing nets, fabric scraps and industrial plastic.
The highlights of Burberry’s Econyl capsule include its heritage trench and lightweight classic car coat silhouettes, as well as what the brand is calling new icons, the logo-print oversized cape, fleece-lined puffer and reversible bomber jacket.
Burberry states that the introduction of the sustainable fashion collection is part of its plan to tackle what it calls an “environmental waste issue while creating a sustainable and versatile material” and is “just one example of the 50 disruptions Burberry is making throughout its supply chain to create a more circular fashion industry”.
Giulio Bonazzi, chief executive at Aquafil added: “We are delighted to collaborate with Burberry for this capsule collection. We believe innovative fibres like Econyl regenerated nylon are the future and are proud to support brands who use our yarns, transforming waste into incredible designs and raising the profile and possibilities of a more circular fashion system.”
Burberry’s Econyl collection is the latest innovative sustainable introduction, recently the fashion house collaborated with company 37.5 to use volcanic sand and waste coconut shell in thermoregulation technology for its quilted jackets, and it introduced Refibra, a new yarn produced by upcycling cotton leftovers from the Burberry Mill in Yorkshire, to make its dust bags for all jewellery and leather goods.
David Chang’s Majordomo in Chinatown. (Wally Skalij / Los Angeles Times)
David Chang’s Majordomo Los Angeles restaurant donated all of its profits last Friday to Planned Parenthood, RAICES Texas, Everytown and Sierra Club. The action came in response to Majordomo investor Stephen Ross’ splashy but controversial Southampton, Long Island fundraiser
Those same charities and the Serge Ibaka Foundation also will receive money from Chang’s Momofuku Noodle Bar, confirmed in a Monday August 12 email. . It was unclear whether other Momofuku restaurants participated and how much was donated, writes the Los Angeles Times about the Chang action in response to the investor Stephen Ross-Trump reelection controversy. Ross is the chairman of RSE Ventures, a private investment firm that is one of the backers of Chang’s restaurant group.
On a side note, Milk Bar is a chain of dessert and bakery restaurants owned by founding chef Christina Tosi and the Manhattan-based Momofuku restaurant group, also associated with Karlie Kloss’ Kookies
In an expletive-laced podcast episode from last week, in which David Chang begged Ross to call off his fundraiser, the chef put his Trump cards on the table.
“I personally am a staunch opponent to President Trump and everything he stands for,” he said on “The Dave Chang Show.” “Anyone that normalizes gun violence, white supremacy, putting kids into cages, his general lack of decency and respect for anyone else. He is destroying our democratic norms.”
Chang said he understood that the business relationship “raises a lot of questions for the people who dine at our restaurants and supported us over the years.”
“I won’t sugarcoat the situation or pander to you with an explanation of the realities of restaurants and modern finances and the complexities of investing and all that,” Chang said. “As a person in general, I just always want to be on the right side of the moral fence.”
Momofuku was founded by Chang in 2004 with the opening of the noodle bar; the company has since grown to more than a dozen restaurants in New York, L.A., Las Vegas and Washington, D.C., as well as international locations. RSE Ventures became an investor in New York-based Momo Holdings three years ago, according to a regulatory filing.
Ross and his wife, jewelry designer Kara Ross, hosted Trump and donors at their home in Southampton, N.Y., on Friday; tickets cost up to $250,000 and the event, along with a second fundraiser that day, raised $12 million for the president’s reelection campaign. Ross is also the founder and chairman of the Related Cos., the parent company of Equinox and SoulCycle.
On his podcast, Chang addressed Ross directly, saying: “I respect and admire you as a businessman. You have been a champion of all the values of Momofuku. You’ve done a great deal for us as a company and I truly appreciate it.” But the fundraiser “contradicts what I hope to accomplish by taking your money in the first place.”
Eunjo “Jo” Park id chef of Momofuki Kawi in Hudson Yards.
With roughly 3,000 people dining at his restaurants every day, Chang said his company must “realize that talk is cheap: We must show it in action.”
Chang’s anti Stephen Ross supports Donald Trump action coincides with other potentially-damaging responses among New York’s progressive community. Select individuals in the fashion industry are also pushing back against Stephen Ross’ investments associated with The Related Companies.
Fashion Industry Backlash
ELLE magazine wrote on Monday that “upon learning that Ross and Related were behind New York City's Hudson Yards, a new $25 billion project where many fashion shows are rumored to be taking place this upcoming New York Fashion Week season, the notoriously liberal fashion industry got involved.”
The Vessel at New York City’s Hudson Yards.
The Vessel at Hudson Yards, houses The Shed, an innovative arts space that opened earlier this year. The space emerged as one of the upcoming NYFW’s September 2019 premiere venues for shows. Fashionista reported that about 10 labels, including Rag & Bone, are scheduled to show there.
Hudson Yards is represented by powerhouse fashion PR firm KCD, which produces seasonal runway shows for Tory Burch, Kate Spade, Prabal Gurung, Brandon Maxwell and more.
Prabel Gurung was among the KCD clients looking at The Shed for his upcoming show, but he cancelled upon hearing news of primary owner and developer Stephen Ross’ Trump support. He is joined by KCD’s other clients — and we give special note to Tory Burch.
In a series of tweets designer Prabal Gurung wrote: “7/10: My goal here is to start a dialogue and maybe, hopefully, change some minds. I was previously in conversation with Hudson Yards’ The Vessel as the venue for my brand’s upcoming 10 year show during NYFW. When I heard about this fundraiser, I chose to pull my participation.”
Designer Prabal Gurung.
Stephen Ross’ wife is jewelry designer Kara Ross, who reportedly had a hand in the planning of this event, and who currently holds a seat on the board of the CFDA (Council of Fashion Designers America)
On Sunday, jewelry company Fallonwithdrew its membership from powerful industry organization the Council of Fashion Designers of America because Ross’ wife, Kara Ross, sits on its board.
The company founded in 2010 by jewelry designer Dana Lorenz — a 2010 CFDA Award nominee for her label, Fallon —released a statement saying that after “many years of participation,” it would “no longer participate if a woman that funds the current [White House] administration sits on the board.”
Lorenz pointedly wrote: “Yesterday, while Mrs. Ross was putting finishing touches on her Trump fundraiser, I was making sure my sobbing housekeeper had her entire family’s documents in order, a woman with 3 years citizenship living in fear. It is not enough to post rainbows on your Instagram feed. Do something.”
The Fallon CEO concluded: "I will no longer be a part of what seems to be allowing a pay for play, money over merit arrangement with someone that clearly wants to advance an agenda that is hurting many businesses large and small with this trade war,” before adding: “"I do not feel her (Kara Ross’) views speak for me as a member and I will not allow her to make decisions on my behalf."
Lorenz told WWD that she had been in contact with multiple designers who are considering similar action but she declined to name names. She did, however, reveal that she had gotten multiple threats from Trump supporters since her letter has been made public.
“I wasn’t looking for any kind of response, I just wanted to remove myself,” she told WWD. "I wish more people would stop worrying if they are on some sort of guest list or red carpet when it comes to doing what’s right. I think it’s time for everyone to draw a line in the sand. I don’t think you can vote for a tax rate but not also racism and the denial of climate change. I’m not going to look back in time at this moment in history and see myself as a coward."
Photographer Tyler Mitchell shares a spectacular piece of news about an image from his September 2018 Beyoncé cover editorial. In an embarrassing acknowledgement of racism in the fashion industry, Mitchell became the first African American photographer to shoot the cover of Vogue in its 125-year history.
Clearly, positive energy infused Mitchell’s editorial from every direction, so much so that one of his Vogue images has been acquired into the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery’s permanent collection in Washington, D.C.
The selected photo sees Beyoncé on location just outside of London, wearing a sequin-covered Valentino dress and exuberant Philip Treacy London headpiece.
“A year ago today we broke the flood gates open,” Mitchell wrote of the news on Instagram. “Since then, it was important to spend the whole year running through them making sure every piece of the gate was knocked down.”
As a concerned photographer, who is socially and politically engaged, Mitchell sees the Beyoncé shoot as an empowerment opportunity
“We’ve been thingified physically, sexually, emotionally. With my work I’m looking to revitalize and elevate the black body.”
We share the entire editorial in celebration of Mitchell’s growing success, Queen Bey herself, and the New Day society global citizens desire.
Beyoncé Taps Tyler Mitchell, 23, As First African American Photographer Of Vogue Cover In History
Mega star Beyoncé covers the September issue of American Vogue,with young (23) photographer Tyler Mitchell behind the lens and plenty of womanly wisdom and goddess energy from Beyoncé creating his support system. Tonne Goodman is in charge of styling, with hair by Sir John and minimal makeup by Neal Farinah
Mitchell in a self-portrait from 2015.
Calling Mitchell "brilliant," the 36-year-old mega star explained to Vogue -- I think we can safely say Anna Wintour -- that she wanted to ensure a new perspective was being shown to Vogue readers, as no other Vogue cover in history had been shot by an African-American photographer.
"Until there is a mosaic of perspectives coming from different ethnicities behind the lens, we will continue to have a narrow approach and view of what the world actually looks like," she said. "It’s important to me that I help open doors for younger artists. There are so many cultural and societal barriers to entry that I like to do what I can to level the playing field, to present a different point of view for people who may feel like their voices don’t matter."
It's worth noting that Beyoncé tells her own story; there is no interview. In one of her more poignant comments, she writes:
I researched my ancestry recently and learned that I come from a slave owner who fell in love with and married a slave. I had to process that revelation over time. I questioned what it meant and tried to put it into perspective. I now believe it’s why God blessed me with my twins. Male and female energy was able to coexist and grow in my blood for the first time. I pray that I am able to break the generational curses in my family and that my children will have less complicated lives.
Stories are the building blocks of relationships, families, communities, dynasties, and eras. This reality is the cornerstone of proverbial storyteller Polo Ralph Lauren Denim’s fall 2019 campaign. The Impression writes a uniquely lucid critique about the Polo Ralph Lauren ‘Wear Your Story’ campaign.
Models include Jegor Venned, Teresa Lourenco, George Okeny, Leila Dee Thomas, Altyn Simpson & Jeenu Mahadevan lensed by Tim Hill & James Finnigan, director Steven Brahms.
Today’s essentials are all present: family, inclusion, diversity, and Polo Ralph Lauren brand values. However, “it is theway Ralph Lauren tells the story that earns our ear. His commitment to the love of story.”
Ralph Lauren has love for the images, the flow, the aspirations, the tonalities, the connections, the movements, and the details. He loves to reflect love. Love of nature, sophistication, good style, good manners, and family. While many may reflect Mr. Lauren’s love for American aristocracy, the underlying element is all of his historic storytelling is family and relationships.
By Élan Young, Smithsonian.com. Note AOC has provided all video material to amplify the written words.
The recently announced U.S. Poet Laureate melds words and music to resist the myth of Native invisibility
Seeing Joy Harjo perform live is a transformational experience. The internationally acclaimed performer and poet of the Muscogee (Mvskoke)/Creek nation transports you by word and by sound into a womb-like environment, echoing a traditional healing ritual. The golden notes of Harjo’s alto saxophone fill the dark corners of a drab university auditorium as the audience breathes in her music.
Born in Tulsa, Oklahoma, Harjo grew up in a home dominated by her violent white stepfather. She first expressed herself through painting before burying herself in books, art and theater as a means of survival; she was kicked out of the home at age 16. Although she never lived on a reservation nor learned her tribal language, at age 19 she officially enrolled in the Muscogee tribe and remains active today. Though she has mixed ancestry, including Muscogee, Cherokee, Irish and French nationalities, Harjo most closely identifies with her Native American ancestry. On June 19, the Library of Congress named her the United States Poet Laureate, the first Native American to hold that position; she’ll officially take on the role next month.
Although English is the only language Harjo spoke growing up, she has a deeply fraught relationship with it, seeing her own mastery of the language as a remnant of American settler efforts to destroy Native identity. Nevertheless, she has spent her career using English in poetic and musical expression, transforming collective indigenous trauma into healing.
“Poetry uses language despite the confines of language, be it the oppressor’s language or any language,” Harjo says. “It is beyond language in essence.”
In An American Sunrise, Harjo’s 16th book of poetry, released by Norton this week, she continues to bear witness to the violence encountered by Native Americans in the aftermath of Andrew Jackson’s Indian Removal Act. Her words express that the past, present and future are all part of the same continuous strand.
“Everyone’s behavior, or story, affects everyone else,” says Harjo. “I think of each generation in a spiral standing together for healing, and maybe that’s what it comes to. What each of us does makes a wave forward and backwards. We each need to be able to tell our stories and have them honored.”
Kevin Gover, a citizen of the Pawnee Tribe and director of the Smithsonian’s National Museum of the American Indian first saw Harjo perform with her band Poetic Justice in the mid- to late- ’80s. He says that she, like all great poets, writes from the heart, but she has a special way of capturing the Native American perspective.
“She sees things in a way that is very familiar to other Native people,” he says. “Not in terms of opinion or viewpoint, but just a way of seeing the world. A lot of her metaphors have to do with the natural world and seeing those things the way that we do. She also expresses the pain and the historical trauma that Native people are very familiar with.”
The new poems she shares in An American Sunrise are about all that was stolen—from material possessions to religions, language and culture—and their children whose "hair was cut, their toys and handmade clothes ripped from them." She also speaks to her fellow Native people and offers harsh warnings about losing themselves to the false freedoms of substances, as well as an invitation to stand tall and celebrate their heritage: “And no matter what happens in these times of breaking—/ No matter dictators, the heartless, and liars, / No matter—you are born of those / Who kept ceremonial embers burning in their hands / All through the miles of relentless exile….”
During the late 1960s, when a second wave of the Native American renaissance flourished, Harjo and other Native writers and artists found community in awakening more fully into their identities as indigenous survivors of ethnic cleansing. The only way to make sense of the ancestral trauma was to transform the pain into art that reimagined their narratives apart from white culture.
In the titular poem in her latest collection, Harjo contrasts the land against the bars where Natives "drank to remember to forget." Then they would drive “to the edge of the mountain, with a drum. We / made sense of our beautiful crazed lives under the starry stars.” Together they remembered their sense of belonging to tribal culture and to the land: “We knew we were all related in this story, a little Gin / will clarify the dark and make us all feel like dancing.” The poem ends with the yearning for recognition and respect: "Forty years later and we still want justice. We are still America. We."
Long before Harjo was named poet laureate, placing her oeuvre on a national stage, she encountered challenges with finding her audience in the face of Native American invisibility.
While she did find some positive mentorship at the esteemed Iowa Writer’s Workshop, where she graduated with an MFA, Harjo also experienced isolation at the institution. “I was invisible, or, ghettoized,” she says of her time there. At one point, while performing at a reception for potential donors, she overheard the director say that the program was geared more for teaching male writers. Even though she knew it was true, the bluntness was shocking to hear.
Harjo emerged from the program around the same time as contemporaries Sandra Cisneros and Rita Dove, who collectively became three of the most powerful voices in poetry from their generation.
Later in her career, Harjo introduced a major shift in her performance. At age 40, heavily influenced by the musical sensations of jazz, she learned to play the saxophone as a method of deepening the impact of her spoken word poetry. She also plays Native American flute, ukulele and drums, and she alternates between them for different emotional resonance. “Music is central to poetry and to my experience of poetry,” says Harjo.
Amanda Cobb-Greetham, a scholar of Chickasaw heritage, chair of the University of Oklahoma’s Native American Studies program, and director of the Native Nations Center has read, studied and taught Joy Harjo’s work for more than 20 years. She says that for Harjo, a poem goes beyond the page. “It is sound, rhythm and spirit moving in the world,” she says. “Maybe it is moving the world.”
With five musical albums released between 1997 and 2010, and a thriving performance schedule to this day, Harjo looks back on her earlier, pre-music, works as incomplete. “My performances have gained from musical experiences,” she says. “I’ve listened back to early poetry performances, before my musical experiences with poetry, and I sound flat, almost monotone.”
Harjo’s stage presence carries with it an act of rebellion. She not only holds space for healing the mutilated histories of Native Americans, but also for other indigenous peoples around the world.
“I have seen stories released into conscious memory that have been held previously by ancestors,” she says. “Once I found myself on the battlefield at the Battle of Horseshoe Bend, the definitive battle, or massacre, essentially a last stand against the illegal move. My great-grandfather of seven generations stood with his people against Andrew Jackson. I felt myself as my grandfather. I felt what he felt, smelled and tasted gunpowder and blood. Those memories live literally within us.”
Gover emphasizes that Harjo’s appointment as U.S. Poet Laureate both validates her talent as a poet as well as the Native American experience and worldview. “Those of us who read Native American literature know that there are a number of very fine authors and more coming online all the time. So to see one of them honored as Poet Laureate is very satisfying to those of us who know the quality of Native American literature.”
Ten years ago, Harjo wrote in her tribe’s newspaper, Muscogee Nation : “It’s difficult enough to be human and hard being Indian within a world in which you are viewed either as history, entertainment, or victims….” When asked if she felt the narrative about Native Americans has shifted at all since, she points to the absence of significant political representation: “Indigenous peoples still do not have a place at the table. We are rarely present in national conversations.” Today, cultural appropriation remains rampant in everything from fashion to non-Native people casually calling something their spirit animal.
While she is excited by projects like Reclaiming Native Truth, which aims to empower Natives to counter discrimination and dispel America’s myths and misconceptions about American Indians through education and policy change, Harjo says that under the Trump administration, Native Americans are at a similar crisis point as during the Andrew Jackson era.
Joy Harjo speaking with attendees at an event titled "Legacies: A Conversation with Sandra Cisneros, Rita Dove and Joy Harjo" hosted by archiTEXTS and the Virginia G. Piper Center for Creative Writing at the Beus Center for Law and Society at the Sandra Day O'Connor College of Law at Arizona State University in Phoenix, Arizona. via Gage Skidmore.
Additionally, the separation of children from their families at the border mirrors the long history separation of Native children from their families. “What is going on at the border is reminiscent of what happened to Natives during the Removal Era,” says Harjo. Until 1978, when Congress passed the Indian Child Welfare Act (ICWA), state officials, religious organizations, and adoption agencies routinely practiced child-family separation as part of assimilation efforts, which tore apart and deeply traumatized Native communities
Harjo says that her generation has always been told by elders that one day, those who have stolen from them and ruled over them by gun power, population, and laws will one day come to them to remember who they are for survival. “I do believe these teachings are within indigenous arts, poetry, and performances, but they must be accessed with respect.”
Cobb-Greetham adds, “I know that through her appointment as U.S. Poet Laureate, many others will come to understand her poetry as the gift it is—a gift to be shared, given, and received.”
Harjo’s wisdom teaches that poetry and music are inseparable, and she acknowledges poetry and activism also have a strong kinship. “A poem, a real poem, will stir the heart, break through to make an opening for justice.”
By Cynthia Curl, Assistant Professor, Boise State University. First published on The Conversation
“Organic” is more than just a passing fad. Organic food sales totaled a record US$45.2 billion in 2017, making it one of the fastest-growing segments of American agriculture. While a small number of studies have shown associations between organic food consumption and decreased incidence of disease, no studies to date have been designed to answer the question of whether organic food consumption causes an improvement in health.
I’m an environmental health scientist who has spent over 20 years studying pesticide exposures in human populations. Last month, my research group published a small study that I believe suggests a path forward to answering the question of whether eating organic food actually improves health.
What we don’t know
According to the USDA, the organic label does not imply anything about health. In 2015, Miles McEvoy, then chief of the National Organic Program for USDA, refused to speculate about any health benefits of organic food, saying the question wasn’t “relevant” to the National Organic Program. Instead, the USDA’s definition of organic is intended to indicate production methods that “foster cycling of resources, promote ecological balance, and conserve biodiversity.”
While some organic consumers may base their purchasing decisions on factors like resource cycling and biodiversity, most report choosing organic because they think it’s healthier.
Sixteen years ago, I was part of the first study to look at the potential for an organic diet to reduce pesticide exposure. This study focused on a group of pesticides called organophosphates, which have consistently been associated with negative effects on children’s brain development. We found that children who ate conventional diets had nine times higher exposure to these pesticides than children who ate organic diets.
Our study got a lot of attention. But while our results were novel, they didn’t answer the big question. As I told The New York Times in 2003, “People want to know, what does this really mean in terms of the safety of my kid? But we don’t know. Nobody does.” Maybe not my most elegant quote, but it was true then, and it’s still true now.
Health-conscious people want to buy organic for its health benefits, but it’s not yet clear whether such benefits exist. Goran Bogicevic/Shutterstock.com
Since 2003, several researchers have looked at whether a short-term switch from a conventional to an organic diet affects pesticide exposure. These studies have lasted one to two weeks and have repeatedly shown that “going organic” can quickly lead to dramatic reductions in exposure to several different classes of pesticides.
Still, scientists can’t directly translate these lower exposures to meaningful conclusions about health. The dose makes the poison, and organic diet intervention studies to date have not looked at health outcomes. The same is true for the other purported benefits of organic food. Organic milk has higher levels of healthy omega fatty acids and organic crops have higher antioxidant activity than conventional crops. But are these differences substantial enough to meaningfully impact health? We don’t know. Nobody does.
Some epidemiologic research has been directed at this question. Epidemiology is the study of the causes of health and disease in human populations, as opposed to in specific people. Most epidemiologic studies are observational, meaning that researchers look at a group of people with a certain characteristic or behavior, and compare their health to that of a group without that characteristic or behavior. In the case of organic food, that means comparing the health of people who choose to eat organic to those who do not.
Several observational studies have shown that people who eat organic food are healthier than those who eat conventional diets. A recent French study followed 70,000 adults for five years and found that those who frequently ate organic developed 25% fewer cancers than those who never ate organic. Other observational studies have shown organic food consumption to be associated with lower risk of diabetes, metabolic syndrome, pre-eclampsia and genital birth defects.
The problem with drawing firm conclusions from these studies is something epidemiologists call “uncontrolled confounding.” This is the idea that there may be differences between groups that researchers cannot account for. In this case, people who eat organic food are more highly educated, less likely to be overweight or obese, and eat overall healthier diets than conventional consumers. While good observational studies take into account things like education and diet quality, there remains the possibility that some other uncaptured difference between the two groups – beyond the decision to consume organic food – may be responsible for any health differences observed.
Often, new medical and health knowledge comes from carefully designed clinical trials, but no such trial has been conducted for organic food.
When clinical researchers want to figure out whether a drug works, they don’t do observational studies. They conduct randomized trials, where they randomly assign some people to take the drug and others to receive placebos or standard care. By randomly assigning people to groups, there’s less potential for uncontrolled confounding.
My research group’s recently published study shows how we could feasibly use randomized trial methods to investigate the potential for organic food consumption to affect health.
We recruited a small group of pregnant women during their first trimesters. We randomly assigned them to receive weekly deliveries of either organic or conventional produce throughout their second and third trimesters. We then collected a series of urine samples to assess pesticide exposure. We found that those women who received organic produce had significantly lower exposure to certain pesticides (specifically, pyrethroid insecticides) than those who received conventional produce.
On the surface, this seems like old news but this study was different in three important ways. First, to our knowledge, it was the longest organic diet intervention to date – by far. It was also the first to occur in pregnant women. Fetal development is potentially the most sensitive period for exposures to neurotoxic agents like pesticides. Finally, in previous organic diet intervention studies, researchers typically changed participants’ entire diets – swapping a fully conventional diet for a fully organic one. In our study, we asked participants to supplement their existing diets with either organic or conventional produce. This is more consistent with the actual dietary habits of most people who eat organic food – occasionally, but not always.
Even with just a partial dietary change, we observed a significant difference in pesticide exposure between the two groups. We believe that this study shows that a long-term organic diet intervention can be executed in a way that is effective, realistic and feasible.
The next step is to do this same study but in a larger population. We would then want to assess whether there were any resulting differences in the health of the children as they grew older, by measuring neurological outcomes like IQ, memory and incidence of attention-deficit disorders. By randomly assigning women to the organic and conventional groups, we could be sure any differences observed in their children’s health really were due to diet, rather than other factors common among people who consume organic food.
The public is sufficiently interested in this question, the organic market is large enough, and the observational studies suggestive enough to justify such a study. Right now, we don’t know if an organic diet improves health, but based on our recent research, I believe we can find out.
