KILLER THREADS

Belsize Park now has a new piece of merchandise with which to identify. It is a Belsize Ban Bag shopping bag. Is it made of hemp? No. Jute, bamboo, or flax? No, no and no. It is not made of cotton, is it? Unfortunately, yes. The trendy and foolish went and got themselves a piece of the bag war action and now want to parade around in a cotton bag. Bear in mind that a good number of residents here drive 4x4s. This is not an environmentally friendly neighbourhood. It is a good place to buy drugs or run into George Michael, Kate Moss, Pete Doherty or other drug users, and lots of rich people trying to be very cool indeed. But not so affluent that they could afford a real hemp bag, which only cost £10 or less from The Hemp Shop. And for that you get a long-lasting 100% organic hemp bag, the one which the Ecologist picked up on last year and which I used for my protests againt the Anya Hindmarch bag and other cotton atrocities.

So I am not going to make many friends in trendy Belsize Park. Not that I was ever anxious to waste my time with the likes of Moss and Michaels. Better things to do, like draw attention to the coming water crisis. For more information on this and why cotton is a threat to humanity, see related posts on this blog by clicking on the tags below.

In the meantime take a tour of Belsize Park and look for the Real Eco Bags are Made of Hemp bag- if you correctly spot me with it, and email me at hemppaperproject@yahoo.com, I will send you a prize, something made of hemp, or maybe even a copy of Hemp for Victory. Hint: I am very untrendy. Very uncool. That is my image.

NOTES FROM THE

SEPTEMBER o8 ISSUE

OF THE ECOLOGIST

This month the Ecologist hails hemp, and much as I would like to start, and end with that, there are quite a number of other worthy articles that were more than just a good read. The first to catch my eye was a short piece on how the government has actively tried to play down the launch of ground-breaking legislation that could give local communities a direct say in how they are governed. The Sustainable Communities Act of 2007 was not even given a press release on the day it received royal assent. Sometimes the only way to get the government to work is to take it to court, and this is the subject of another short piece on Georgina Downs, who is doing just that. She is famous in the UK for acting against pesticide spraying. It seems that the French, however, are a bit ahead in terms of getting the government to act, as Sarkozy has launched the Mediterranean Solar Power Plan, which will set up mirrors to reflect sunlight into tanks that will heat water to drive turbines. This is a very efficient device, it loses only three percent of its energy in transport every 1,000 km. Even though this might not work for more northern nations, it would help these nations as the demand for other forms of energy would decrease, and we could have cheaper petrol.

Hardly any magazine is without some coverage of the US presidential race, the Ecologist's contribution to this is a piece by Joss Garman who debunks the green claims of McCain. Not that anyone thought he was that green to begin with. Last time this year Mark Anslow interviewed the US Green presidential candidate, Cynthia Mckinney, who needs no fig leaf to be green - she was in fact cooking up hemp porridge when he arrived. Obama seems to be Garman's choice, and I can only roll my eyes thinking about the damage this political neophyte would do in every way to the nation and the world. I do not look forward to an Obamanation or a McCainnation.

Another issue with US overtones is peak oil, which Richard Heinberg, author of Peak Everything, weighs in on. "Reducing oil dependency is seen as a matter of economic survival", he asserts. Tell that to the Obama and McCain.

Pat Thomas, the editor, spills the beans on soya. This plant is a monster, but like cotton, it has a devout following and criticising it is frowned upon. The people who promote it all wear green fig leaves and hang out at vegan fairs and left wing rallies, so they must be really good people, right? No way. They are exploiting a certain image and the good intentions of their fellow vegans to sell them a crop that is for the most part GM modified and full of phytates which block the uptake of essential minerals in the intestines. In addition, it inhibits enzymes, messes with our red blood cells, contains isoflavones which can disrupt homone function and often contains aluminium as the acid wash/alkaline wash processes used takes place in aluminium pots which leech this metal into the soya. Yummie! But try to tell that to the vegan high priests who are turning the temple into a market place. Oh, and one more thing, the soya cultivation is destroying the rain forest. But stopping zealots with facts is just about impossible. I will try on Sunday, 7 September when I talk at the Vegan Fest in Kensington, but I may just get thrown out. The money changers like to keep the show going and inconvenient fact finders are brushed aside.

A few pages down there is another article on the US, this one about the nation at war, with moths. It seems just like a deja vu; California is spraying tons of harmful pesticides made by a pesticide company that gave lots of money to the powers that be. Schwarzenegger and his team are making money this time. Where is his green fig leaf? Surely not to be found in a hemp field, as he vetoed the state hemp initiatives twice. Since hemp is a crop that does not use a lot of pesticides, maybe it was in the financial interests of these companies. This article, by Clare Robinson, is a must read for anyone in that state. It will go much further than any by the LA Times etc.

Bringing this back to the UK, an excellent piece on Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) which are proving themselves to be cost efficient. Ed Hamer, the author, is himself a farmer in Devon. There is also mention of the certification process, which has been a somewhat of a hoax, or another way to raise money by self appointed green gurus who take lots of cash to fly around the world and stay in luxury hotels. In reality this excludes a lot of very deserving small businesses and favours those who pay thousands for their kosher certificate. Another UKcentric piece takes us to Sussex, where Louise Amos revives the art of 'close shepherding', which has the advantage of reviving eroded heathland.

And then on to hemp...with an essay by Laura Sevier. She begins by telling us how she has the "Real Eco Bags are Made from Hemp" 100% organic hemp bag with her everywhere she goes, so this woman is no mercenary freelancer just trying to fill up pages. She then goes on to give the basic information, on which there is no need to enter at large upon here, and then onto a number f UK based companies. Although the article tends to focus a bit too much on BioRegional, which is not in the hemp business and did not produce much, if at all, from their fields, much due to a lack of having researched the subject, it deserves much credit for having mention of a number of the more productive enterprises in the field of hemp, such as House of Hemp, which produces some really colourful and tactile womens apparel. Too many reporters go for the hemp as sackcloth story and get it all wrong. And another fault of reporters is to shy away from the 'activist' brigade in hemp. Were it not for the 'activists' hemp would not even be legal in the UK, and there would be no story. At present Henry Braham, a wealthy Londoner who drives a large 4x4, is trying to cash in on hemp and has made it known that he only wants a certain mainstream type of blogger and reporter - he has specifically discriminated against those who are 'too political'; or, perhaps, those who know a thing or two about hemp and would ask him inconvenient question like what kind of defoliant he uses on his plants and if the seeds are hot or cold pressed. He is NOT mentioned in the Ecologist article, despite his wealth, or the fact that he has his oil in Tesco (not a fact to be proud of). But one might argue he is green indeed; or at least his 4x4 is, a fact pointed out with comic effect in the 2004 Telegraph.

It's good to see a journalist avoid these flashy wide boys and give credit where credit is due. The people Sevier features have all made real contributions to the industry, including Bobby Pugh of the Hemp Shop, who designed the aforementioned hemp bag (see related posts on this site by clicking on tags for Anya Hindmarch, hemp bag). A number of hemp businesses are featured in a photo essay which includes: The Hemp Trading Co., Green Stationery, The Hemp Store, The Hemp Shop, Braintree, Sativa Bags, Pukka Herbs, Hemp Garden, Innocent Oils, The Natural Store, Howies, Enamore, Inbi-Hemp, Green Fibres, Whitaker Publising, and Green Kickers.

If I might make some small criticism of the article, it would be to note that the assertion "hemp...needs to be laid on the ground to allow the natural fungi and bacteria to loosen and separate the bast fibres from the woody core..." is misleading. Sevier is quoting BioRegional a few lines down, and I assume this comes from them? Hemp is much more suited to other forms of retting, and again, such discussion can be found on this blog. Nice people that they are, hemp is not their field, though they raised some fields of hemp once (which they have not done much with). It all seems to have gone to Katherine Hamnett who made a rather, may I say, uninspired jacket out of it all and has done nothing with it since. Flashy, but not what we need. I say the activists, anoraks and real scientists who spend their time perfecting the hemp movement are what we need, not 4x4 driving media types and cotton loving fashionistas.

We do need real media coverage, and may I say the Ecologist and Laura Sevier get my vote here. Not for nothing are they known as the leading environmental magazine. The Goldsmiths and their crew have worked hard over the years to bring us cutting edge and very accurate articles. They cover ground which others fear to tread. This is real journalism, and we'd all like to see more of it. Thank you Ecologist for all your support over the years, we hope to see more articles on hemp, many of us who have read this present one are hoping that the next one will be on hemp food.

THE REAL THING HEMP

Image left is Helen James of Innocent Oils with her Real Eco Bag - it reads: "REAL ECO BAGS ARE MADE FROM HEMP". It was made from 100% organic Romanian hemp and produced in the UK by The Hemp Shop.

REVIEW OF GREEN IS THE NEW BLACK

This is one of many books published recently which purport to tell us the truth about eco-fashion. The author, Tamsin Blanchard, was fashion editor of the Independent, and with that much information I might have guessed how shallow this thing would be. There are lots of cutesy touches to the layout, but that does not make for substance; the style does not intone much depth either.

The book dwells on cotton, without so much as a single mention of the water needs of cotton, or the fact that organic cotton needs yet more water, thus destroying the livelihoods of more farmers worldwide - or at least in areas that Ms. Blanchard does not reside or visit. She lives in the UK, where cotton has never been farmed, and travels to Paris, NY and other fashion hotspots. No cotton plantations there either, just lots of mad fashionistas destroying the planet with their excess.

So is this book some form of atonement? From the remarks in the introduction, and the foreword by Lily Cole, it does seem that way. If so, it only adds the sins of omission to the sins of comission. The multitude of happy-clappy words here do not go far towards helping the environmental movement at all. And, as some might say is an unforgivable sin, there is no index, and do not expect any source notes. The resource guides serve to promote the businesses of certain parties, such as those who advertise in the Independent or the Telegraph (where the author now works). Katherine Hamnett is praised to high heaven, whilst others are ignored. Again, this might have to do with how much money they spent on papers and their high-flying reviewers.

Hemp is not totally ignored, however, there is mention of it on pp. 16,42,115,155,213,220 & 221. Generally, there is a negative tone towards hemp, which makes it strange that on p. 155 she claims it is her favourite fabric. Is there an editor in the house? She does at least mention The Hemp Shop, but then completely omits this venue in the resource guide - neither does she mention The Hemp Trading Company, Minawear, Sativa, or many other hemp businesses. Enamore, Equa, Patagonia and Howies are given some space, but all of these deal in cotton/silk and other fibres as well.

While Blanchard rather dismisses hemp as a designer fabric, she makes some concession to it as a tough option for luggage, but not much mention of it as bag material, despite the fact that there is a bag war on in London, and that hemp bags have made news upstaging the Anya Hindmach bag - there was even a piece in the Independent in April 2007 about what a disgrace the Anya bag was, but I guess Blanchard does not bother to read what is going on around her.

Ethical silk is mentioned, but again, ignorance is shown here, as she completely omits mention of ethical silk makers other than herself - and does not explain how her farming methods are in any way ethical when she uses artificial mulberry leaves to start with, and then allows the moths to hatch here in the UK where she claims there is not the proper food for them. But the subsequent starvation of the larvae is of no more concern to her than the starvation of the people whose land has been used for cotton, organic or otherwise.

Sad, but not unlike so many other Jane-come-latelies to the eco movement. These new recruits need to go to boot camp and learn some basic facts before they write a book.

HOW GREEN IS THE TIMES?

This Saturday an article in the Times by Anna Shepard starts off with a very good question - How Green is my bag? It then fails completely to give an answer. It talks about cottton bags made by rich people like a certain member of the Bush family, on sale for £35 at Harrods, and the Anya Hindmarch bag - which Anna might know, if she read her own paper, was a disaster made in Chinese sweatshops. Click here for a link.

If she read up on her subject she just might have mentioned hemp - or even jute and ramie, but the world is full of these journalists and only an idiot believes that they know about everything they sound off about in the papers. Especially if that paper is the Times, and happens to be printed on wood pulp paper. It is not that hard to produce hemp paper, individuals do it all the time and the Ecologist used such paper in one of their issues.

Slowly, people are waking up to the fact that cotton is an environmentally destructive plant and that the press, including some of the 'eco-mags' are not telling us the truth. Many in the 'green' circles are just not aware of this at all - including Al Gore and George Monbiot. The former made a fool of himself in London as he barged in and kicked invited guests off the guests list and barred the press from asking questions - especially inconvenient ones; he got paid $100,000 for this charade, and anyone stupid enough to hire him deserves to lose a little money. For one thing, the sight of another green hypocrite dressed up in cotton, after having flown thousands of miles to get his cheque, is enough to start a riot; which almost occured after Monbiot's speech at the US Embassy on 8 December, as a group called We Are Change tried to get him to talk facts about things. I left before they started on him, but not without waving a sign about hemp and showing my hemp bag, the one that says: "Real Eco Bags are made from Hemp". It got knowing looks from a lot of people. Much as I wanted to wear it to the Gore event, they were not letting many people in and probably would have had me tasered, just like the student in Florida who asked an inconvenient question of John Kerry. Brave New World indeed. More like 1984.

BOUND AND BAGGED

Carrying around the hemp bag has proven to be an interesting habit. Today a woman at a shop in Camden was carrying her own cloth bag, made, as is usually the case, of environmentally destructive cotton. When she saw the logo - "Real Eco Bags are made from Hemp", she got moody.

I watched with a grin as she paid at the till - and then almost laughed as she had the groceries put in a plastic bag, which she then put into her 'eco' bag.

Lots of these green posers are the same. They all want money and attention but cannot grasp the facts.

8 December I will be at the climate change parade (pray for rain) outside the US Embassy (Grosvenor Square) with a poster pointing out that Monbiot and his crowd are wearing cotton and destroying the forests by using wood pulp paper to print their propaganda.

ETHICAL FASHION CONTEST

Today on the hippy shopper site a contest for ethical fashionistas was announced. Contestants must be between 18-30 years of age. Submission starts today until 31 January, 2008. There will be a panel of 9 judges, including Jenny Ambrose of Enamore and the Lawson Brothers of The Hemp Trading Co.

So I'm thinking about lying about my age and entering my ugly hemp bag, which we just love wearing aroung posh spots just to raise awareness of hemp. But would that be ethical? And would the ugly hemp bag win? Could I bribe the judges?

By the way, I am refusing to sell the bag to people I don't like, especially stupid celebrities. Now that's ethics.

FLYING LOW

Just got back from the Vegan Fair, where I found some new hemp products. Hempower of Leicester was there, with a new label on their hemp bar, I am natural of Brighton displayed a handmade hemp cream, and Earth & Wear of Denbighshire was selling No Sweat hemp trainers (made in the US).

Sagar Shah and Chris Sanders showed up and took some pictures, will put up when ready. We walked around with the "Real Eco" hemp bags, and ran into someone from Chiswick who had just bought one of the limited edition bags, she in fact got 007.

Sadly, a number of vegans were wearing cotton, the cultivation of which kills people all over the world. Cotton is a thief, it takes all the water and leaves the land dry. Some promoters have the nerve to sell 'organic cotton' as if it were cool to steal people's water for this weed. It is an upstart at that, historical figures such as Christ did not wear it - since Europeans did not discover it until the 1500s. Now it is grown all over, the monocrop that destroys the environment. I left a few fliers about to draw attention to this.

But that is not picked up on in the press much, perhaps because they are adverising cotton on their environmentally destructive pages - made of wood pulp. Recently Medialens pointed out the hypocrisy of the journalists, especially those who work at the Guardian and The Independent, as they scream about climate change on one page whilst selling their readers trips all over the world. Sounds like Medialens was reading this blog, check out all the times I pointed this out, why did it take Medialens so long to pick up on this?I'll give them an email and see if they are as aware as they think they are. Good job though they made George Monbiot uncomfortable, and Johann Hari as well. The latter is out at Heathrow as the only invited journalist! A dubious honour indeed. The two of them and the hundreds of brat protesters, some of them calling themselves 'Plane Stupid' are a liability to an honest cause. I much support the right of the local people to limit Heathrow to its four terminals, but somehow this undignified mess that is calling itself democratic protest is an own goal. Public support is for the police, not loudmouth journalists and anarchists. These kinds have hijacked the issue, and we await their crash. More details will be found here from our undercover agents carrying Real Eco bags made of hemp and will be posted at this site and at schmoontherun.

DRESS CODE

The Big Green Gathering this year was better than ever, and lots of us were wearing outfits made from hemp, bamboo, and other natural fibres. After my talk a botanist told me about his interest in nettles, ouch!, but yes, they too can produce fine threads. Someone else there makes living silk, having gone to India to train silkworms to make threads without being killed.

I was able to wear all green, with a tie-dye from Minawear, trousers from Braintree UK, a shirt from THTC and a backpack from Sativa. The Hemp Shop's 100% organic eco bag, as featured in the Ecologist and Positive News, was also in hand.

Hemp and other fibres such as jute and ramie are gaining ground, though sadly, most people still wear mass produced cotton which is killing people in India, China, Uzbekistan, Egypt, the US, etc. A new website dedicated to information on all of these has just started in London and is well worth taking a look at - http://www.hempandnaturalfibres.ning.com/

We love to publish images of anyone's sartorial choiced in natural fibres, send in any to me at cotingas@hotmail.com and we will gladly publish them on the site, with a link to the manufacturer if you wish.