"Fair trade" my entire arse. Turns out that's just another label for hippies to feel smug about.
https://apnews.com/article/plants-health-indonesia-trees-sumatra-2a209d60c42bf0e8fcc6f8ea6daa11c7
This is a rough read. Rape, child slavery, etc.
Palm oil is a generally horrific industry and has been for years. Once the animal rights activists noticed that the old practices were killing off orangutans, they moved to these basically slave plantations, which at least gets animal activists off your back, because they don't care about people.
The worst part? It's in a lot more than cosmetics, soap is another big one. It started because of Palmolive being billed that it didn't dry your hands when you were doing dishes, and it ramped up from there in demand. A lot of DIY soap and lotion companies refuse to carry it because of the ethics violations involved. As far as I know, Palmolive itself stopped using it years ago.
It's also in food, especially chocolate. :(
I had to read this in chunks. I kept getting too heated. This is just the one industry too. Cobalt mines in Congo are pretty much openly exploiting children to death. This underpins much of the electronics and other industries. I am literally holding a device made by children's blood and suffering to express my fury on children's death and suffering. All its empowerment of my personal abilities comes with these stains on my hands, and I do it knowingly. I'm not blithe about it. I hope to use the power for bettering things ultimately, but the ethics of it are nothing short of horrific.