Look, in a perfect world we would all have an infinite cash stash and be able to purchase every Tarte/Urban Decay/Anastasia Beverly Hills palette in existence, right? But life ain’t like that, and for most of us, saving our hard earned quid to get our hands on the latest Naked shadow collection is practically a year-long bucket list situation.
But some of us aren’t patient. Some of us want to bend the rules. Some of us are DIVING INTO BLOODY BINS to fish out rubbish stock from our fave beauty stores, and then using it. ON OUR FACES.
A whole gang of YouTubers are making ‘dumpster diving for makeup’ a thing when it rly, rly should not in any way be a thing.
Shelbi Lee – whose channel Shelbizleee has 35k subscribers – leads the pack with multiple dumpster dive vids, uploading one every Sunday.
“This is a great way for me to get some things to play with,” she says in one video. She feels dumpster diving is good for the environment. “I hope this gave you some inspiration to go and see what’s in your local dumpsters and stop some more things from going to landfill.”
Others are also on board. Vlogger Hannah Rose shows off a whole fkn pile of shit in this video below, including but not limited to – a Bareminerals powder, an entire range of Smashbox foundations, and the suuuper coveted Grav3yard Girl x Tarte Swamp Queen palette.
You’d be forgiven for considering a dumpster dive at your local Sephora or Mecca yourself after that haul, but let’s get to the glaring truth – THE GERMS.
Experts have found lovely little bacterias like staph, strep, and E.coli in makeup testers from stores.
“Wherever you see E. coli, you should just think ‘E. coli equals faeces’,” biological sciences professor Elizabeth Brooks told the LA Times. “That means someone went to the bathroom, didn’t wash their hands and then stuck their fingers in that moisturiser.”
In fairness, the vloggers are at least attempting to disinfect their loot.
“Alcohol will kill almost every bacteria thing that you can get,” says Shelbi Lee. “So if you find a regular roll-up lipstick that’s been used – super easy. Get some alcohol, wipe off all the parameter of it and it’s sanitised and good to go.”
And she’s not taking any hate for her diving, either.
“If you think this is gross, I could not care less. I think this is awesome, I think what I’m doing is good for the planet, and if you have a different opinion, whatever. Just don’t watch it.”
Yeah nah. Normally we’d be all for that lil spiel of DGAF but like, promoting the fishing of bacteria-laden garbage out of bins to use on your skin? Hard pass.
Source: LA Times.
Image: YouTube / Hannah Rose
