We have a long, sordid history of enacting environmental legislation and agendas aimed at consumer-behavior whilst entirely letting mega-scale manufacture and industrial entities off the hook. We did this with the “paper or plastic?” false dichotomy in the 1980s, with “don’t litter” campaigns and consumer-shaming after the advent of single-use plastic soda and water bottles and we’re doing it now. Corporate Lobby groups actually PUSH for this type of legislation because it’s massively profitable to toss their wildly destructive exploitation of the planet entirely off the table whilst attacking the folks who are least-empowered to make any changes to the way they do business. And on top of it all, they get to claim tax-deductions for funding their “environmental improvement” arm of the business, claiming that by penning legislation, paying these lobbyists and paying for education (propaganda) materials, they’re doing GOOD.

Here’s a tweet that sums up how consumer behavior is not the problem here:
https://x.com/BontanUK/status/1478712482189524993?s=20

I also really appreciate your perspective on the fear-mongering side of sunscreen ingredients. My sunscreens are all what I’d call “reef safe,” but the focus on sunscreens truly does distract from the bigger picture of coral reef damage.

Thank you for your reply! So much is still unknown. Thank you for your guidelines on how to better help the environment.

That’s a good point! Are there any good resources you’d recommend on practical steps we can take to help with those issues?

“acting based mostly on the preference for emotion, belief and opinion over science and evidence” – That’s a really good way of phrasing it! I’ve gotten into a lot of arguments with people who tell me to stop saying that organic is not everything it’s cracked up to be, because it “discourages people from being more conscious with their consumption”.

I don’t think there’s any data on that yet unfortunately!