I appreciate the writing style, but this article is shockingly naive to me.
Convenient consumer products tend to sell better than less convenient ones, even if the product is worse. That's the entire story. People have finite time, so when they receive more income they will tend to spend it to reduce the time they spend doing things that they don't care about.
I for one hate spending time doing all the things that the products in the article make more convenient, and happily pay more so I can spend my time on other things.
* I don't like shaving, so I optimize for razors that get the job done faster (more blades, easier to swap a new blade)
* I don't like cleaning pans, so I buy pans I can clean faster and don't have to "season"
* I don't like filling bags with tea, so I buy tea bags that are pre-filled
* (nespresso) I actually enjoy the ritual of making espresso, so I use a real espresso machine
* I bike every day to and from work, so I take it a step further and buy an E-bike with no shifter
* I don't want to fiddle with chromecast or fire stick, so I just use my TV's built in smart features
* (inner city shops don't sell individual pieces of fruit) I live in SF, it's very easy to find individual fruits here
* I don't like going to grocery stores, so I pay to have groceries delivered to me
My time is precious to me, so instead of spending money on luxury items I spend money to save time. Evidently so do most other people.
Modern trackball,flexing, etc. multi-blade razors are expensive, but idiot proof. You can copy one of the Gillette commercials and just mash the thing to your face and make one long stroke through the chemical foam. Bam. Done. If you're happy with this, be happy. Read no further.
What this article isn't telling you is that DE razors can be almost as fast, but there's a learning curve. They don't flex, bend, or rotate to the right angle, so you must hold them at the right angle, even when you're going around curves. There's just one blade, so it's easy to apply too much pressure and give yourself razor burn, so you must learn to use minimal pressure. It takes time to learn these skills.
Is learning how to shave with a DE correctly and quickly worth saving money? If money is no concern for you, then no. However, there are other benefits. One pass of a five bladed razor is, you guessed it, five blades being dragged across your face, and likely with more pressure than is necessary given how much pressure is required just to make the flexing, rotating razor engage with your face. If skin irritation, ingrown hairs, etc. are a problem for you, then learning how to properly shave with a DE razor can dramatically reduce those problems. However, things may be worse at first while you're learning technique. This is all even more true if you're the sort who suffers from irritation and reuses cartridges too long to save a little money. Dull blades make skin irritation worse.
Another thing this article isn't mentioning is shaving soap. Most of us are used to chemical gel's or foams. To be blunt, they all smell awful and feel gross. Again, it takes slightly more time and a little technique must be learned, but traditional shave soap with a badger hair brush, lathered on the face, is something everyone should at least try. There are some awesome smelling soaps out there, and lathering on your face with a good badger brush feels amazing. If you hate shaving, this is a switch that might change your mind.
If you hate something, you can spend less time on it, or you can look for ways to make it more enjoyable.
On soap/shaving foam -- absolutely. I asked an old-timey barber what his product of choice was and he answered "soap after a shower", in awe, as if what I was asking him some obvious question. Sure enough, it worked fantastically and I haven't stopped since. I use a DE and beyond that first month of slice and dice and coagulant markers, it's been smooth sailing since.
My problem was with the fogged up mirror after a shower. I tried some 'solutions' (spraying mirror with a fog proofing liquid, separate showering room etc) but eventually went back to shaving before showering
Antifog coatings from any scuba supply shop help, but one really effective method is just to aim a hair dryer at the spot you need clear. Not only does it get rid of fogging there, it prevents new condensation from forming because of the residual heat.
This. I shave with water and a mach-3. Have used this technique for over 25 years. Can't think of a time when I've had razor burn. I can't recall the last time I cut myself either. I even go against the grain at the end (people who witness this seems to cringe). I hate shaving and do it once every week or two though. I'm blessed to have very slow growing face hair. My blades last a really long time because they're almost never used.
This is just the audiophile’s “tube amplifiers have a warmer sound” of the shaving world.
I mean, no one is telling you to stop, but I wouldn’t chalk up your recommendations to anything more just preferences.
It’s just another hobby. Some people love scotch, others coffee and some people getting the best shave experience.
If I loved scotch and someone said “yuck, I don’t like it” I wouldn’t somehow assume they were living their life incorrectly or missing out, they just don’t like it.
There's a difference. Tube amplifiers are objectively less accurate at reproduction and can be hideously expensive. DE razors take more skill/effort, but produce indistinguishable results (i.e. a smooth face) for a fraction of the price. Cartridge razors are a convenience, but you pay for that convenience.
Much better than these and shaving soap / brush, is Somerset's Shaving Oil[1]. King of Shaves do a shaving oil too, but it's nowhere near as good. Not affiliated, I just love the stuff.
You can use it with shaving soap too, but I just use it on its own.
At one point I was worried the company might go under so I bought a big box of it just in case. It's not a great business model as one little bottle lasts months. You only use 3 drops per shave.
Ok, your comment just convinced me to give my DE another go. For the last few months I've been using cheap plastic 2-blade disposables because they're cheap enough, and easier to use than the nice razor I've been ignoring. Just ordered some oil and balm from that site.
ALSO: That order page is a breath of fresh air. As soon as I added one item to my "cart", I was presented with their full list of SKUs, enough info to know which is which, and a quantity box next to each. So simple. I wish more ecommerce sites did stuff like this.
I am on my second Panasonic (Matsushita) foil razor, and I will never use anything else.
The blades seem to be immortal, and they commonly last 5-10 years until the batteries fail. There are no regular consumables; the blades are never replaced.
I had used Norelco foil razors previous to this, and the foils would break after wear and slash my face, easily drawing blood. Neither of my Panasonic razors has ever done this.
I normally shave right after waking up, no shaving cream, lotion or sundry lubricant. If someone with extremely sensitive skin cannot do this, the shaver is waterproof.
OneBlade type razors are kind of a nice compromise for me. They have a single replaceable blade but also a pivoting style head. The shave if pretty amazing compared to any cartridge razor I've tried and the blade just snaps in and out of place so isn't any more difficult to change out than a cartridge.
I thought this, grew one, and found it more of a pain to maintain than shaving was. Flaky skin, itchy, and a lot of work to stop those things. Plus I still had to shave/buzz around it to make it neat. Shaving is a lot less hassle. I use a DR razor, have for years.
I don't understand how people end up like this. As if it's normal for your skin to just flake off if you let your hair grow naturally.
If your body is falling apart without constant cosmetics, you probably have an issue that needs addressing. Maybe something in your diet or something in your soap or I don't know what, but spontaneous skin issues are not normal at all.
I've just got dry skin mate, I'd hardly categorise it as my body falling apart. I also use zero cosmetics. No issues here.
Your skin naturally flakes as it replenishes itself (I think it's called the skin cycle), it was getting caught in my beard, I'm lazy I can't be bothered with that. Plus when it gets long you have to cut it straight, right pain in the arse. A lot less hassle shaving.
I would pay good money for a way to rid my muzzle and neck of hair. Unfortunately, the results I've seen from laser removal just leave things lighter, not gone.
I get the convenience part but the waste reduction itself is already worth the switch. Yeah your shaving cartridge or flaking teflon pan might be a drop in the ocean (perhaps literally) but when there are billions of humans around we should think about what inconvenience does it worth to keep our environment lovable.
I throw my cartridges in the trash, and they end up in a landfill forever with no environmental harm. I haven't looked into Teflon but I've disposed of ~1 pan in my entire life and still have the rest, so my impact is probably negligible.
I choose to focus my time and energy minimizing environmental impact more effectively. For example, instead of using a DE razor, I use that time to commute by bike instead of car, This results in overall much less waste and a lifestyle that I prefer.
Chemicals can leech out of landfills into water tables and waterways. Landfills can also emit greenhouse gasses. None of these happen as a result of burying shaving cartridges.
It's no different than the sand that's already below ground. It essentially just sits there.
The production and transportation of the cartridge could harm the environment though, but that's a more complicated story.
People don't seem to be aware of this, but most of the dulling of disposable razors are due to it staying wet.
If you dry your disposable razor after use, shaking out the water then drying it on a towel, it can last much much longer. Going down to shaving 2-3 times a week due to WFH, I think I made one disposable razor last about a year. If this pattern keeps up, this pack of razors I bought from Costco is going to last until I retire.
With a safety razor I get way more cuts, bumps, and the occasional slice of my thumb... and I'm still tossing the blade. With multi-blade cartidges, I shave faster and with less pain for only marginally more waste (and much greater cost, though trivial).
I couldn't tell you why, but I have almost never cut myself, and never get nicks, ingrowing hair, razor burn etc with a safety razor.
I maybe over-used the other razors (only 15 shaves!?)... and maybe with an exposed blade Im more careful (I really dont think so)... but i never went back. Far more precision too!
Definitely not the same thing for me
My hair is pretty coarse, so I needed to experiment around for a while before finding something that worked. The main issues that caused nicks and razor burn for me were as follows.
* Overly frequent shaving. If I shave every day, I will get nicks and ingrown hairs, regardless of technique. After I shave, the skin slightly closes up around the follicle. Not enough to be fully ingrown, but enough that there's a bump of skin from about 12 hours post-shave to 72 hours post-shave. If I shave again during that time period, the razor will catch on those bumps and cause nicks. If I wait 3-4 days, the hair pushes out, and can be cut cleanly.
* Clogged razors. This is partly due to the coarse hair, and partly needing to remove 3-4 days of growth at a time. The blades of a cartridge razor are placed far too close to each other, and need to be rinsed out several times over the course of a shave. Sometimes multiple times over a single stroke. If this isn't noticed, I need to go over the same area again, increasing razor burn. While safety razors clog as well, it takes longer for them to do so, and it is easier to rinse out the accumulated hair.
* Over-use of cartridge razors. An 8-pack of cartridge razors is $25, where a 100-pack of safety razor blades is $10. I get about 2-3 smooth shaves from each razor, and it's an easy habit to replace a ten-cent blade every week or so. Even if I accept that cartridge's last longer, I can't believe that they would last the 35 shaves estimated by the marketing's 5-week estimation. Between the higher cost and the claimed lifetime, I would use cartridge razors well past the point of being dull.
So at this point, I have a reasonable routine: Replacing the blade of a safety razor every 7-10 days, shave every 3-4 days. But figuring out that routine requires going against the advertising, choosing an older style of razor, and avoiding the cultural expectation of daily shaving.
The other piece of this is that there are a wide variety of safety razor blades. You should get a variety pack if you make the switch until you find what works best. Some are very sharp (which actually isn't always good), some less so. Some are more flexible than others. You need to find one that fits your skin and hair.
Good point, and I failed to mention that as part of the experimenting. After going through the variety pack, I ended up finding that Astra Stainless were the best for my skin/hair combination, and Astra Platinum was second.
Yep - I never really have an issue with a safety razor. At least, not on my face...the one time I tried to shave my head with it I looked like some shit out of Hellraiser until I showered haha
> I don't like filling bags with tea, so I buy tea bags that are pre-filled
Uh, that's not how loose leaf tea is used...
Usually one would use a strainer or a gaiwan. Your point still stands, tea bags are less hassle, you just won't get to drink fine oolong or puerh. I don't mind cleaning the gaiwan - taking out the leaves takes a couple seconds.
Right - putting my loose leaf into a strainer or a gaiwan, and then emptying either of them, takes nearly no longer than grabbing my tea bag, opening it and dropping it into a cup.
There are additional steps. You need to take a spoon (extra tool), scoop out the loose leaf tea from the container, make sure not to spill it, and then pour it into the strainer.
After steeping, you need to dump the used leaves (assuming you aren't planning to re-steep) with more potential for spillage than when disposing a tea bag, then take the strainer to the sink, add a tiny drop of dish soap, rinse the strainer, and find a place to dry it (e.g. over an empty jar).
It's not difficult, and the extra steps are personally worth it as loose leaf tea generally tastes better. However, for people who aren't concerned about the taste difference, it's nice to have one less task (where spillage is a concern) to pay attention to.
> You need to take a spoon (extra tool), scoop out the loose leaf tea from the container
I tilt the container and use the Earth's gravity to get them leaves out. I'm not afraid to use my fingers when no one's watching! With puerh it's more of a fight, I'm not afraid to use whatever's at my disposal to pry the leaves out the cake.
> you need to dump the used leaves [...] with more potential for spillage than when disposing a tea bag
Yes but it's more ecological - the leaves can be composted while the tea bag can't.
> (assuming you aren't planning to re-steep)
I definitely am planning to re-steep. With puerh, I'm even going as far as disposing of the first two steeps. I'm too fancy to drink them!
> then take the strainer to the sink, add a tiny drop of dish soap, rinse the strainer, and find a place to dry it
The gaiwan goes inside the dishwasher like everything else.
The store-brand tea bags I buy for iced tea recently got redesigned to remove their staple. I assume that was to make them compostable, although I should double check.
Loose leaf for real is just dumping tea in a cup and pouring water over. All but a few leaves will settle, signifying it's ready to drink. You develop skill to not let the few floaters get in the way of drinking it. Whack and rinse cup to get leaves out, don't let it sit long. Easily done on the trail when weight and trash are important to minimize.
I prefer tea bags because it's still easier to clean up, even though taking a dripping wet bag out of the cup is a messier process and is trash. A gaiwan or even teapot is rarely compatible with my normal in-the-moment tea drinking style. I aspire for it to be some day.
Depends on the tea. For most Chinese varieties, dumping tea in a cup and pouring water works great. Eg for sencha, esp fukamushi, this wouldn't be a great idea: the leaves are tiny and you need to control the brewing time precisely.
Using a gaiwan is just so joyful: stuff it with leaves, keep an eye on the temperature and steeping time, and you can resteep good leaves many times and get so much more out of them. Each of the steeps is different, you can see how the leaves open, how the taste develops. I have some Chinese greens that go on forever, start with around 75°C and 10 seconds, and gradually increase both over perhaps twenty steeps, ending with boiling water and brewing for however long I forget about it. Thinking about it, I'm off to make some tea :)
Thank you for pointing this out. I don't get why you'd do anything more than add a pinch to your cup and pour hot water on it. Not to mention then you can read your tea leaves and know if you're going to die or not.
I only use bags since strainers leave a bunch of leaves floating in my tea.
Filling a paper tea filter is pretty easy though, just grab one, and shovel in a bit of leaves with a spoon. It's faster to fill a tea bag than it is to boil water for a cup.
That’s the obvious market story but not even the entire story in the post. The lack of available alternatives is a real thing.
Several of the examples in the article feel like real losses to me. Another example: last I looked, I can’t even buy a mouse with the form factor and features I want unless I give up and charge batteries. The thing I want to buy existed under many model names over the last 20 years, apparently now I need to start looking second hand. This is true for lots of wired devices, it’s almost impossible to find many of them or a spiritual successor now. I don’t want all of my secondary devices to be battery powered. I’m clearly a minority in the market, or at least untargeted as one.
I don’t begrudge anyone their preferences or conveniences, but I definitely miss some of the things I used to be able to find which are now just relics.
Same. I was pleased to find a simple wired mouse in my Raspi 400 kit. May buy a couple more of the mice by themselves.
I do not always like wires, but wireless is kind of a mess. Pairing, charging, quality of info transfer problems...
So, I bought a bunch of wired, high quality earbuds, am going to to get some mice too. Those things just work and the quality/consistency of input / output is something I value way more than not having a wire.
Cast iron becomes very low maintenance after the seasoning is started. I don't even usually wash mine. Everything slides right off at the end. Just let it heat up before using it, use a moderately high heat but not too high, and it's a nonstick pan without the carcinogens.
Cast iron is a poor cooking surface because iron (and steel, and stainless steel) has poor thermal conductivity. The consequence is uneven heating (especially on an electric cooktop) and hotspots. The edges are distinctly colder than the center of the pan, and you have to push your food around to ensure even cooking.
Aluminum has much better thermal conductivity, but is a terrible surface to cook on (soft, oxidizes, imparts flavors to acidic foods). The best compromise is a clad pan with aluminum sandwitched between layers of stainless. I switched from cooking on cast iron to cooking on clad and it makes a huge difference.
Strictly speaking, this is false. The seasoning on a cast iron pan is burnt oil. It is without question mildly carcinogenic. Not so much that I've thrown away my cast iron - I still use it occasionally - but I wouldn't tout it as having health benefits (except maybe a tiny increase in iron consumption).
FWIW the newer ceramic nonstick pans are incredible and nearly indestructible. Clad is still my go-to, but I use the henckles granitium pans from costco for anything with egg in it. Two years later they still work like new.
I actually like uneven cooking surfaces and use this to create effects in my stovetop cooking. If I want evenness, it's easy just stir or swirl - but getting unevenness is more work. A wok is a perfect example of using unevenness and motion to control your cooking, and for frying I mostly use a cast iron pan and for serious heat, a wok with a ring adapter and high BTU stove.
Cooking technique on a wok is very, very different from cooking technique in a skillet. You're expected to move the food around! That's why they call it stir-fry. Nobody (at least, of normal human build) picks up a cast iron skillet and tumbles food.
Woks are great, but you wouldn't pan-fry a steak in a wok.
What do you mean by stainless steel? Stainless steel pans are usually clad (3 or more layers with aluminum in the middle for heat transfer), and IMO wonderful to cook on no matter what generates the heat.
If you're talking about pure stainless pans, I've never seen one. I've seen pure stainless steel stock pots (though even then, most have a clad base). The thing about stock pots is that they're full of liquid, which convects and makes thermal conductivity of the hardware pretty much irrelevant. Never buy expensive stock pots.
I'll take that trade, I'm not going to spend my 30s sitting around waiting for pans to heat up because there's some very small probability a pan will harm me.
For some reason I always thought that for most cooking you want the pan to be at the desired final temperature before throwing in the ingredients anyway to get the optimum taste and texture.
Carbon steel pans are my current favorite, after having used primarily cast iron for a long time. They are thin, so they heat up extremely fast. They season as good or better than cast iron. They weigh a lot less, so are easy to maneuver. And they clean up as easy as cast iron.
De Buyers are more expensive than your regular cast iron, but they’ll last a lifetime.
I'm definitely no pan expert, but I think there are now cast iron options that heat up very quickly, so maybe one doesn't have to compromise on that. I've had a Ronneby Bruk "ultra light" cast iron pan for years and it tends to heat up within a few minutes. At this point I don't remember what a regular pan's heat-up time is though, maybe I've just gotten used to the "pain".
Probably carbon steel made from thinner sheets, there is a limit to how thin you can practically make a cast iron pan due to the brittle nature of the material and the casting process. The resulting properties with respect to seasoning are basically the same if the surface finish is consistent.
"The raw material in Ultra Light Original is exactly the same as for our traditional cast iron. The difference is that with the new technique, the pans are less porous. This explains why the pans responds much quicker to changes in the stove’s power effect, and why they heat up and cool down faster than traditional cast iron cookware."
It isn't near-feather-light like some pans I've picked up in the store for sure. It's just light enough to be a noticeable difference from other cast iron pans I've tried, like being much more comfortable to hold one-handed.
Interesting, I'm not sure why you would bother to do that vs. just stamping carbon steel sheet, the resulting product would seem, at least to my guess, be basically interchangeable. I wonder if there is some difference that matters here.
They also cool faster and depending on material, don't transfer heat at the same rate.
Cast iron pans are actually not great at heat transfer, which is why you see pans like all clad where there's aluminum or copper clad in steel. They are really good at holding heat though, so when you put something cool into them they don't immediately get cold.
Most people really don't care about this though. If you're a foodie, you're probably not going to be satisfied with the $5 wal mart nonstick pan, because it's a thing you care about. For everyone else who doesn't care, they either have a completely different definition of what 'good performance' is (and buy accordingly) or they don't cook anyway.
I cook with cast iron constantly, and I don’t recall sitting around and waiting for the pan to heat. I do other related cooking tasks while the pans heat. There’s really never a point where I’m doing nothing waiting on the pan.
This is also exactly what I'm pointing out. You enjoy cooking, you have other "cooking related tasks", you gather your ingredients before cooking. You have skill and a plan.
I just want to eat and I want to get that out of the way as quickly as possible. For a nice meal, I'll go to a restaurant. I'm not interested in learning how to prepare my own food better, and all of these comments and the OP seems to forget that.
In any high-dimensional space, most samples are far from the median on at least one axis. You have cooking, I have coffee, programming, and looking at birds.
> You enjoy cooking, you have other "cooking related tasks", you gather your ingredients before cooking.
My cast iron usage most days isn't anything fancy, it's just cooking breakfast for the family. The "other cooking related tasks" means:
* Crack the eggs into the bowl
* Season and beat them
* Start the oatmeal water boiling
* Set the table
By then the cast iron is ready for the eggs. You don't have to be making a fancy meal to have other things you can be doing while the pan heats up, and it doesn't take that long even on our slow glasstop stove.
> I just want to eat and I want to get that out of the way as quickly as possible. For a nice meal, I'll go to a restaurant. I'm not interested in learning how to prepare my own food better, and all of these comments and the OP seems to forget that.
> You have cooking, I have coffee, programming, and looking at birds.
I used to be like this, eat as quickly as I could and whatever was quick enough that filled the hole in my stomach. You will likely pay for this later, and will have discussions with your dr about food freshness, processed foods and how horrible the food at even “heath food” restaurants is for you. Unless you want to live your life with gastrointestinal issues, change your attitude about cooking.
> I'm not going to spend my 30s sitting around waiting for pans to heat up because there's some very small probability a pan will harm me.
This strikes me as particularly ironic in the current context. How much time have you spent so far today arguing about pans on HN? How many times could you have heated up a cast iron skillet during that time?
Is the pan smoking at any point? Carcinogens. Are you using a gas cooker? They release harmful pollutants into the air. You don’t need to go over the top to convince people to like and do as you do when it comes to pans.
I use cast iron pan because everything I cook comes out 10 times better on a cast iron pan. You can properly sear meat on them. Things don't get cooked on the outside and stay raw on the inside.
I thought I was shit at cooking before getting a cast iron pan - I just had the wrong tools.
I'm definitely not a chef and I don't cook for pleasure, I just throw chicken, steaks, eggs on the pan and eat when it's safe to do so.
Most chefs on youtube are using cast iron pans, you won't get the same results following instructions made for another pan.
In regards to heating up, I never noticed the pan taking too long to heat up.
Maintenance takes more time, but it's nothing more than rubbing oil on it and throwing it in the oven. You can also get away with not doing it for a long time (you can wait until food starts sticking to it)
I think it’s the loneliness then. The other thread about why we waste our time on the Internet had that as the top comment.
So you see loneliness makes us waste this part of our time probably in an futile attempt to deal with loneliness, forge a connection, having some kind of reassurance that we have a voice and maybe we matter even though we so don’t.
So this comment isn’t waste of OP’s time if OP likes to do this or wants to do this and gets gratification from it (even if doesn’t last beyond hitting the submit button). OP even mentioned that coffee thing in the similar vein.
So I think you were being snarky. Maybe inadvertently? Or just another knee-jerk comment like most of HN? :)
People would look strange on me if i started shaving while commuting on the train. Here i have ample of time to read.
One could also simply prefer watch junk on the telly to wind down after a long day of work, rather than seasoning my pan again. (Personally, i do have a seasoned skillet, it's a amazing)
Take this thinking too far and one should even give up washing machines and go back to hand laundry?
How much of that have you actually benchmarked, time wise ? I think it’s the point of the article, most of our “benchmarking” is actually marketing. To take an example I’ve been using a cast iron pan for years after having used Teflon all my life, cast iron doesn’t take any more time to use (initial seasoning vs. timely replacement, you can even factor that out)
>so I optimize for razors that get the job done faster (more blades, easier to swap a new blade)
Razors like G. Mach3 or similar are neither really much faster nor better in any way (I compare them against my $25 "classical" metal razor "Timor Solingen 1322"). The fact that so many people think otherwise is a proof that marketing departments of G. or Edgewell (Wilkinson) did a very good job.
I couldn’t avoid cuts even with those gliding-smooth-precision-etc razors so I just use a Philips beard trimmer. As quick as it gets, doesn’t give that weirdly smooth look during the first day after the shave and facial hair remains mostly soft now; during shaving days they would grow to be very hard. No soap, no after whatever splash et al needed. One purchase runs for years literally. I have used them without a mirror. I shaved my head with it once and it was a perfect shave.
On the other extreme, (and due to my personal interest in practicing knife sharpening), I ended up using a pocket knife and a couple quality sharpening stones as my “razor”. Too lazy to calculate whether the long term cost is worth it, but the setup will probably last me a lifetime. If avoiding waste is really the highest priority (over convenience) then I would argue that sharpening your own razor blade is the only rational way to shave.
I wonder what you do with all the 20 minutes total you save a year. Still I don’t blame you but I’m a person who enjoys doing things the “hard” way, that lets you enjoy the results and contemplate things in a different way.
For me, it's about not being late or having to skip tasks (e.g. shaving). I used to also enjoy doing everything the "hard" way (e.g. pourover coffee instead of using a machine, and especially shaving with a double-edged safety razor instead of an electric razor).
However, there were times I had to skip coffee making to start a commute on time. The tipping point was when I was slightly late for a couple of low-stakes meetings because shaving with a safety razor took so long (lather, three passes, rinse), so I had to take an alternative commuting route after missing a train. There were other times when I chose to skip shaving and buy coffee outside to make a meeting on time (taking extra time to walk to the coffee shop, line up, and buy coffee).
I remembered never having these issues of having to skip shaving when using an electric razor. I've now returned to using one for most days, and also usually use a brew machine. It's nicer to have less stress in the morning.
You could say that I could manage my time better in the morning by waking up an extra half hour earlier, but I've found it very nice to make my life a bit easier while other parts of my days are more stressful.
No one ever does or can do “everything” the “hard” way. We all have our own opinionated and preferred lists of easy way and hard way things. e.g for me that’s fountain pens, train journeys instead of flights, paper journals, exclusively reading paper books etc.
Saving time from shaving doesn’t necessarily mean the saved time will be used in something like saving the world. It just means less time was spent on shaving than it would have taken if OP did shaving your so called “hard” way.
Also your 20m shaved annually seems very weird. There are approximately 365 days in a year and one “easy” way shave, imho, definitely saves more than approx 0.055m compared to a hard way shave if one shaves daily without a miss :-P
While I believe that many things stated in this post are correct, this still has that hard 'old man yelling at the internet' odor.
If you are to compare stuff, stuff like modern razor cartridges and double-edged razors, you ought to mention the convenience side of the things. I hate being the devil's advocate, but shaving with 4-blade cartridge designed for easy shaving is still 'miles' ahead compared to shaving with double-edged razor. Miiiles ahead. And I use a double-edged razor 9 out of 10 times, so I would know a thing or two about it.
And that's not to say that are overly pricey. They are. Plus, if you account for different prices in different regions, the price difference is even more concerning.
The same is also true for some other appliances/services mentioned - tea bags and coffee machines are not just 'superficially convenient' they are wildly more convenient.
EDIT: As one person said in the comments down below, "What this article completely misses, is that there are more than two options.". That was my whole point, and I'm sorry if it came out the wrong way. Shaving is a personal preference, and you are free to do it however you like; but saying 'Shaving is too expensive and is a demonstrative example of how most consumer products are designed to extract more money from you rather than to improve your life, or the world, or to be in any way remotely good.' is just incorrect and insane.
I wonder if people know that electric razors last like … ten years. I’ve owned, I think, two electric razors in my life, and I’m in my late thirties. I never have to replace any part of it.
My biggest issue with electric razors is that they never gave me as smooth a shave as using a razor-blade (or cartridge). That annoyed me enough to stop using it.
For some reason, my time shaving with cartridges gave me the worst acne of my life by far -- including one zit that somehow festered into a massive welt that continuously refilled with fluid and wouldn't go away for several years. (I still have the scar) I still think there was something wrong with the shaving cream because my dermatologist was just as perplexed as I was and he was clearly out of his element as he seemed to be blindly throwing whatever he could at the problem.
These were the inexpensive mail-order discount razors and the special shave butter they advertised, I forget the name of the company but it was the first one I was aware of that bypassed the Gilette racket by doing everything via mail. (edit- DollarShaveClub?)
Smooth or not, I'm sticking with my electric razor.
Smoothest shave I get from an electric shaver/razor is by shaving in the shower with some face wash as "shaving cream" and using a wet shaver e.g. from the Philips AquaTouch line. Quick, easy, everything is clean after etc.
I'd say it gets very very close to a manual razor in terms of smoothness.
You’re supposed to replace the heads of electric shavers every year or two, they do dull. Whether you need to or not probably depends on your face and whether the blade irritates your face.
I’ve never replaced any heads on my shavers either. I lose them before that.
I'm not particular about keeping a specific look so don't shave every day. Some days I'm clean shaven, other days with shadow+ and sometimes with more.
The most convenient thing was a Gillette Styler that would last for I can't count how many months, but was ultimately disposable. I later found a MINISO brand that was less than half the cost that was rechargeable with only minimal paper packaging. Not as close but good enough. Ultimately it's disposable too but I'm still on my first one.
I don't think the article was attempting to say there are only two choices, just that some choices are pretty shitty compared to some alternatives that exist and that it's gotten harder and harder to access some of those alternatives.
I'm in the electric clippers camp personally. A good model can easily last you 10+ years and keeps my dry skill happier. I'm lucky they are still easy to find. Good luck finding a straight razor in your local shops if that's what you're into though.
Straight edge razors are the best when you've gone a bit too long without shaving, bar none. Nothing to clog up. It's a bit interesting and cathartic to basically watch a wall of itchy hair fall off your face.
While I don't think they require as much skill as people think, they are a bit harsh IMO. Some people probably can shave daily with them, but when I tried it was pretty rough on my skin.
I used a double-edge for years. Then I tried Harry's and was amazed.
However, the real trick is to get the eos brand sensitive shaving cream with shea butter and colloidal oatmeal. It might be marketed for ladies, but it's way better than anything you could waste your life whipping up with a brush.
It's funny that I used to buy 'sensitive' shaving gel, and one day I thought what makes me think I have more than average sensitive skin? I then found out that soap works well enough.
"Ordinary" soap does work but I find it tends to dry out more quickly than I can shave my whole face hence at home I use shaving soap with a brush. But when I travel I'll happily use the hotel's free hand soap at tbe destination to save the hassle of bringing more things through the airport.
I always assumed that the sensitive skin isn’t on your face.
Soap is, indeed, “good enough”. But for a minimal investment you can buy the shaving soap cakes, cup, and a shaving brush. Way cheaper than the stuff in a can, a little more luxurious than hand soap.
>but shaving with 4-blade cartridge designed for easy shaving is still 'miles' ahead compared to shaving with double-edged razor
What is/are the things you prefer with the cartridge? For me, I switched to the double edge a long time ago, and didn't really notice a whole lot of difference in what it does, but a big difference in price. I keep a cartridge for getting under my nose, but doesn't need to be replaced very often. For everything else I really don't notice a difference in shaving. I don't shave every day, so my razor tends to get clogged, and the double edged can be disassembled and cleaned in a couple of seconds while shaving. The cartridges can't really be cleaned out at all which leads to premature replacement and costing a lot more $$. Even when I did shave every day, I found I would try to suck every dime out of the cartridge, so I'd end up using a worse blade anyway.
I actually tried switching to a straight razor. Found it requires a lot more skill than I'm willing to put in to learning. But it appeals to me as the ultimate in reusability.
The double edged safety razor is amazing for thicker facial hair. Even if I’m shaving every day, cartridge razors all get clogged on me. No amount of hot water gets it out, and the stuck hair roughs up my face like sandpaper.
The double edge safety razor is so much easier to clean out.
The thing is it takes skill and time to get there. Look at the reddit groups with everyone having some favorite brush or soap lather. The first few times you do it will probably go terribly too, maybe even ongoing. Meanwhile, 3 blade gillete can do an OK job with only a splash of water and a dozen strokes if you were in a true pinch. the skinguard is even better than old man mach 3. in a world where a pint of beer at a bar is now $15, i don't mind paying the $35 or whatever for a pile of cartriges that will last me a long long time. maybe i wait too long on changing the cartridge though so ymmv but i find you can be sloppy and get away with a dull head for longer with that skinguard too than the stuff i was using a dozen years ago.
Yes, and, as I probably haven't said, I've been doin' it for 'years', and I do have a favorite soap/razor brand/razor handle... you name it... And I rarely ever (1/10 prob) get cuts, and the end result _is_ better, purely quality wise (double-edged razor is just sharper and can access spots, like under your nose, that 4-blade razor, let's say it's 4-blade, just can not).
My point is that after a while, you realize that you can get 80/90% of the quality with less than 20% of time invested. (Un)fortunately enough, the calculation is not that simple. You need to include the money factor, the frequency of shaving factor, the energy/focus factor (you can't just shave using a double-edged razor at 6am with your eyes still half way closed, and also expect no to cut yourself; you just can't, no matter how experienced you are - it is still 'razor' sharp :), with next to no safeguards, depending on your razor handle)... And I get that in many cases, the money factor is more (or the most) important, but you still can't just ignore all other factors.
That said, I strongly believe that modern 4-blade cartridges can/should be less expensive.
Also, I have next to no experience with electric razors, so take that into consideration. (Also, if anyone knows some electric razor model/brand that is well worth the money, I will really appreciate the suggestion)
Although I've used a few electric razors over the years (and much prefer using them to buying and keeping track of disposables), it's probably worth referring to a more detailed analysis of the options out there, so here's Wirecutter's writeup of recommended brands and models as of Dec 2021:
I think people who buy DE/SE razors often just like to partake in the accessories because they're selected from people who care enough in the first place to move beyond the cartridge razor. You certainly don't need brushes and nice lathers to use a DE. No more than you need them with a cartridge razor.
I have sensitive skin and a fresh DE blade cuts better with just water than a cartridge razor because it's sharper.
But before I got a DE razor, as an outsider, I also assumed you needed to take shaving seriously and be an accessories guy to use one, and thankfully it's just not true.
"The thing is it takes skill and time to get there."
This is what I fretted over to no end before I actually tried shaving with a double-edged razor.
Turns out I needn't have worried, as shaving with a double-edged razor turned out to be exactly the same as shaving with a cartridge razor.
No special techniques needed.
"Look at the reddit groups with everyone having some favorite brush or soap lather."
All that stuff is completely unnecessary.
I just lather up some ordinary soap with my hands and smear it on my face before shaving with my double-edged razor and it works great. No need for any fancy equipment, creams, brushes, pre/after-shave, etc.
Look at the reddit groups with everyone having some favorite brush or soap lather.
Better yet, don’t look. Just because dweebs want to spend their time fluffing their feathers in front of other shaving dweebs doesn’t mean that any of that is required. (And if shaving accessories is your schtick, go with my blessing as I tend to my own dweebery.)
And the first few times I shaved with a DE safety razor, it went fine. It’s a safety razor, not a straight razor, what are people expecting to happen?
> The thing is it takes skill and time to get there.
This is interesting too, because it worked for me on the first / second try. Didn't have any learning curve at all. And I didn't use any fancy foam or anything. Just a regular cheap ~$2 foam / gel from the supermarket
> If you are to compare stuff, stuff like modern razor cartridges and double-edged razors, you ought to mention the convenience side of the things. I hate being the devil's advocate, but shaving with 4-blade cartridge designed for easy shaving is still 'miles' ahead compared to shaving with double-edged razor. Miiiles ahead. And I use a double-edged razor 9 out of 10 times, so I would know a thing or two about it.
For 4-5 months of the year (summer) I shave my head 2x or 3x a week, and I don't understand this comment. How are cartridge razors more convenient than safety razors?
Safety razors are just hands down better, IMO. It's a more comfortable shave (depending on the blade), the blades can be bought in bulk for $0.05 cents each, they take less than 30 seconds to change out, they last longer than cartridges, and there's no plastic waste.
Well, first, I don't shave my head (I understood that as shaving the top of your head), so I will have to take you on that. Secondly, I believe that most people don't shave their head but their facial hair (correct me if I'm wrong). Thirdly, not all double-edged razors are paired with handles with safety guards - there are open blade handles; but even if you amount for safety razors, you still get more accidents compared to a 4-blade cartridge (they are designed precisely to prevent cuts).
Also, I fully agree with the price factor - they are less expensive, and as a bonus there is no plastic waste (at least in most cases, depending on the packaging of your razor blades). But that was not my point.
That said, I don't work for Gillette (or any related company), and don't get commission for saying any of this (this is all just 'IMO' type of comment), and apart from anecdotal evidence (I've had multiple conversations with people with 20+ years of shaving experience, using both 4-blade razors and double-edged razors, and they all, more or less, share my opinion) I can't really provide any data (maybe I could try to find some, but I don't care about this topic 'that' much).
If you shave with a sharp double edge safety you are at 95% of whatever the "4 blade megarazors" do. The only ones I might like a little better are the bendy heads that conform to the face a bit better. But it's not worth destroying the environment or paying 20X as much for the blades.
They make em bendy now? Hmm... back in DE land, the state of the art is holding the blade extremely rigidly with the clamp much closer to the edge. Think a woodworking planer rather than someone holding a floppy knife. Henson Shaving. Very good reviews on the site even in comparison to other DE razors, similar from people I know. https://hensonshaving.com/
I don’t have the same experience. I bought a DE razor from AliExpress 5 years ago for $7 and it shaves just as comfortably and quickly as any multi-blade razor I’ve used.
Everything adds up, but I can't really sum up everything in one comment (or maybe I could, but I haven't), and you are not reading all the other comments (at least I don't expect you to). There are factors other than convenience and price, and lately those factors add up so that a double-edged razor is my choice. There are times I use cartridges and there are times I don't. My main critique is that saying "Shaving is too expensive and is a demonstrative example of how most consumer products are designed to extract more money from you rather than to improve your life, or the world, or to be in any way remotely good." is _just_ incorrect.
>Other examples of products that seem to exhibit a similar trend, where purported convenience leads to higher prices
>Cooking equipment: essentially indestructible Cast Iron skillets transition into teflon pans. The newer pans perform worse, and must be replaced on a shockingly regular basis. They also seem to be poisonous.
They have their uses. I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil). Also, claiming that they "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
>Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands, replace many styles of coffee brewing. Provide much worse coffee, at a higher price but are superficially convenient.
Why are they only superficially convenient? They seem pretty convenient to me.
>Televisions moving from being screens which accept input, to self contained 'smart' devices that require software updates and thus have a shortened useful lifespan.
I thought it was the other way around? ie. smart TVs are cheaper than dumb TVs because they're subsidized by ad revenue. Also, the claim itself doesn't really make any sense. Even if you stop getting software updates, that doesn't prevent you from using it as a dumb display.
> Also, claiming that they "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
1. The manufacturing process results in those precursor chemicals entering urban water supplies where they are nearly impossible to filter out (only RO is effective and it's not even 100% effective), and once in the bloodstream of people are powerful endrocrine disruptors which circulate and are filtered slowly by the kidneys... and when peed out go right back into the water supply due to not being able to be removed during treatment. These "forever chemicals" are some of the most health damaging pollutants in the West.
2. Teflon is extremely hazardous when consumed and it flakes off of the pans over time (which is why they must be replaced often) or when incorrect utensils are used (common among unsophisticated users).
3. Teflon can overheat on a standard consumer stove using standard cooking techniques. You actually need different techniques to prevent overheating a Teflon pan.
4. Cast Iron is effectively non-stick after enough use, and you can absolutely fry an egg in it without sticking if you have a smooth-bottom pan (either a vintage cast iron, new vintage-style, or a new style that you've sanded down and seasoned yourself).
> Cast Iron is effectively non-stick after enough use, and you can absolutely fry an egg in it without sticking if you have a smooth-bottom pan (either a vintage cast iron, new vintage-style, or a new style that you've sanded down and seasoned yourself).
I replied to the GP, but I fry eggs in a bog-standard Lodge which is neither vintage nor sanded down. It still has a distinct ”pebbly” appearance to it, though perhaps less than when I first got it.
Works like a charm, and a shake of the pan is usually all that’s needed to release eggs.
Yeah, I get that for some people going the extra mile is worth it, but it's important to point out that you don't need to do anything extra to get a perfectly functional pan. My modern Lodge skillet is more non-stick than any non-stick pan I've ever owned, and I've never even formally seasoned it. I just cooked with a little oil for the first month or so.
>1. The manufacturing process results in those precursor chemicals entering urban water supplies where they are nearly impossible to filter out (only RO is effective and it's not even 100% effective), and once in the bloodstream of people are powerful endrocrine disruptors which circulate and are filtered slowly by the kidneys... and when peed out go right back into the water supply due to not being able to be removed during treatment. These "forever chemicals" are some of the most health damaging pollutants in the West.
That's why I said it was "a little misleading" rather that outright false. "poisonous" sort of implies that the object itself is poisonous or is bad for you. I'm sure manufacturing a smartphone causes a bunch of environmental damage, but you wouldn't call it poisonous (outside of putting in in your mouth).
>2. Teflon is extremely hazardous when consumed and it flakes off of the pans over time (which is why they must be replaced often) or when incorrect utensils are used (common among unsophisticated users).
>3. Teflon can overheat on a standard consumer stove using standard cooking techniques. You actually need different techniques to prevent overheating a Teflon pan.
Like I said in my initial comment, teflon has its uses. I'm not saying it's the best tool for every job. Given that, I highly doubt this applies if I'm just cooking my eggs.
>4. Cast Iron is effectively non-stick after enough use, and you can absolutely fry an egg in it without sticking if you have a smooth-bottom pan (either a vintage cast iron, new vintage-style, or a new style that you've sanded down and seasoned yourself).
Sounds like a lot of work to me. In other words, the teflon pan is actually more convenient.
> Sounds like a lot of work to me. In other words, the teflon pan is actually more convenient.
It’s actually zero work, despite the recent uptick in people who think you need to coddle a cast iron pan. Most of the tips people give for dealing with cast iron are pointless extra work or actively make it perform worse.
I wash mine with soap and water and it takes about a minute, or about as long as washing a Teflon pan. Frequently I don’t even bother with this, and just wipe it out with a paper towel.
There was no need to jump through hoops to specially season the thing. Just use it, and its non-stick properties increase over time. It’s zero maintenance and I’ve had the damn thing for over a decade now.
Cast iron does have a couple rules that are exceptions in the modern kitchen. You can’t leave them soaking in the sink or run them through the dishwasher without creating a bunch of maintenance work to remove the rust you just created but this is usually less work, just different. Instead of soaking in the sink I tend to just boil a cup of water in the pan and it loosens up anything stuck. You also shouldn’t cook high acid foods like a slow simmering pasta sauce in cast iron since it can have unwanted taste effects. But otherwise, anything you read about seasoning with flaxseed oil and building up layers is a waste of your time, just use it.
I can also sympathize with anyone who is of below average strength (children, injured or disabled, advanced age) not choosing cast iron, they are heavy compared to a Teflon pan.
It's not a waste of time. Sometimes the pan will get sticky. Coating it with oil and putting it in the oven at high temperature will make it as good as new.
It's just not as common as people think when they hear about it.
The pan getting sticky is with overwhelming probability because people have a weird belief that you shouldn’t wash with soap or use the scrubby side of the sponge. This causes a buildup of half-polymerized oils which are sticky and/or rough. The reason reseasoning “works” is simply because you’re finishing the polymerization process. But it’s completely unnecessary.
The real solution isn’t to reseason. It’s to just wash the damn thing. Soap, water, and whatever scrub brush does the job. Nothing you do short of steel wool is going to make a dent in the seasoning.
Not washing with soap is one of those widespread myths that actively makes your cast iron perform worse. I struggled with this problem constantly until I stopped babying my cast iron and I’ve never had a problem since.
What totally changed my perspective was trying to get the black stuff off an aluminum sheet pan. It’s a slightly different bond than the seasoning on a cast iron pan but functionally they’re both the same thing. Getting that off a sheet pan required meticulously scrubbing with steel wool and a lot of elbow grease. It clicked for me that if it’s that hard to get it off a sheet pan, it’s not coming off my cast iron because I used a little Dawn.
You should mention that you really have to wipe them out at the very least after washing or they WILL rust without a doubt. Also cooking pasta (tomato based) sauce in them for a while WILL remove your seasoning, no matter how you accrued it. Deliberate seasoning does help but it doesn't have to be an ordeal nor treated like your fine crystal, but some people like to baby their cast iron. Even the cheapest cast iron will season and work. My lodge pans are great. There is no need to buy $150 cast iron pans from artisanal makers unless you're just a collector of such things.
I do dry mine out over a burner while I’m doing other tasks in the kitchen but I’ve definitely let it soak overnight by accident on occasion and never really noticed rust. YMMV
You may like blue carbon steel pans. I tried lodge cast iron and while I like them, I thought they were too much work - mostly the weight (female who doesn't shy away from lifting real weights at the gym, but cast iron is not user friendly in that way). The blue steel pans are lighter than cast iron (heaver than teflon), cleans easier, heat faster, the handle stays cooler longer, and still has all the positives of cast iron without the cheap teflon. The only work/inconvenience is most are not pre-seasoned, which I preferred after learning to season my first new pan. It can be a simple 1-2 hour process after buying or can be thought of as an art.
I personally dont like cooking, and I avoid anything requiring more than 3 items - my steel pans remove the annoying factors (equipment handling, maintenance & care) make me dread cooking a little less. Had the pans for 4-5 years now and they are an absolute joy to use
> Sounds like a lot of work to me. In other words, the teflon pan is actually more convenient.
I'm probably being a little nitpicky/contrarian when I say this, but for my cooking style, teflon is actually more.
I cook with large amounts of fat (generally beef fat - tallow and/or suet) every meal, which on Teflon causes a nightmare of a mess to clean. With my cast iron pan, I just wipe off a bit of the excess and let the rest say in the pan, forming a non-stick coating. I've not cooked any eggs in a while, but I reckon (granted, possibly falsely, since I've not tested this) that I would fry one without any special precautions due the amount of grease I cook with in normal times.
So for some people, the cast iron cooking style is actually easier because there is less cleaning.
Teflon flaking off isn't hazardous--the whole point of Teflon is that the chemicals are polymerized into a very inert form. That's why food doesn't stick. They only become dangerous if they depolymerize--which is where the issue with overheating comes from. Heating an empty pan can reach depolymerizing temperature.
In fact, there's even a (mildly insane) proposal to intentionally add Teflon to food, because the extra mass makes you feel full even though the Teflon just passes right through you.
The whole "Teflon flakes are hazardous when consumed" thing is totally BS - it's the chemicals produced when it gets too hot that aerosolize which you breathe in during cooking that are so bad for you (and the other stuff you mentioned about it's production process)
> 2. Teflon is extremely hazardous when consumed and it flakes off of the pans over time (which is why they must be replaced often) or when incorrect utensils are used (common among unsophisticated users).
It's very common to use incorrect utensils (metal) because the correct ones (wood, plastic) are are harder to clean and don't last as long, and few people would choose to use such utensils if all else were equal.
cast iron is still not a viable alternative for every day cooking due to leeching of the iron into food - some iron is good, but usually this occurs at extraordinary levels
My wife and I got rid of our TV last year when we moved. It was a nice break, but we want at least one in the house, so we're currently shopping around for a nice 4K 70+ inch. I've come to realize the market is headed toward a TV without any ports. You'll plug it in and immediately prompted to link with wifi so you can log into your streaming services. Fuck that.
I'm hell-bent on getting something with zero smart function- just ports. TVs like that will become gold in the future, when smart tvs will have ad banners that you can't turn off. The cost of media has come full circle. My prediction is:
1. All TVs have smart functions and no input ports
2. TV manufactures will be cutting deals with advertisers to display banner ads. Maybe you'll be lucky enough to pay for ad free.
3. Aggregate streaming services will provide access to multiple services for a flat fee. Welcome back to cable!
4. Total cost of consuming TV media will be eat average income budgets away
I made the switch to a projector a couple years ago and advocate highly for them. The screen can disappear when not in use, and they're "dumb by default". New LED projectors have bulbs rated to last 10k hours or more.
I use a projector as well instead of a TV but they're definitely not standard replacement for a normal TV in all situations. You need a dark room (so if you like to have the TV on while do you chores or other tasks, it won't work well with a projector), the fans can be a bit loud depending on your noise tolerance, the contrast, color and brightness/blacks won't be as good as a decent OLED TV unless you go for a very high end projector and screen, which is going to be very expensive.
It's definitely worth considering but there are pros and cons to consider, it's not an acceptable replacement in all situations.
The other thing I've noticed, is that you can't casually watch something in the company of some visitors, it's going full movie night or nothing. That's a real use case I'm missing with a TV.
And you can't even make the picture on the wall smaller if you want, it always dominates completely.
When my mother is visiting we just want to half watch some game show and chit chat, we don't want to have a movie night, and we don't want to focus entirely on each other/conversation for a whole evening either, it's kind of exhausting.
I’m pretty happy with my Spectre that I bought from Walmart.com. I think it is only 75 inches but 4K with 4 hdmi ports and I think it was $5-600 or so.
It seems up on the latest hdmi standards and it turns on and off with the appletv plugged in.
My favorite shopping aggregator found 840 TVs from 70 to 85 inches. 503 of them has 4 HDMI inputs. Seems like it is most popular number of inputs for TV of that size. PC, Xbox, Playstation, media player. Do you need more?
I'm not having trouble finding one. All I said is that I'm currently shopping around, and my prediction for the future is that kind of TV will become scarce.
Will a pro signage monitor have HDR? Will it support more than 60hz? Will it have multiple inputs? Looking at the specs for LG (just first up on the search) they have none of these features. I’d be concerned about viewing angles with a gaming monitor. I looked at all this stuff when I was TV shopping a few years ago.
Sorry to break this, Roku is about as bad for ad data sharing / tracking: https://advertising.roku.com/advertiser-solutions/oneview - any time you hear things like ‘full funnel attribution’, there is a good amount of adtech in the background.
As far as I know, Apple TV doesn’t do this, and Kodi + Raspberry Pi seems clear of it too.
For my part, I don't much care about the data sharing. My issue is that our smart tv has ads and the default software is terrible. I can't believe I spent so much money only to have a measurably worse experience. I ended up buying a Roku just because the software is easier to use than the junk that LG shipped. I use 2 other HDMI ports for different games consoles, so the "smart" tv is just a source of aggravation, and I feel insulted whenever it ends up in the default software and they show me a goddamn ad.
If one of those ports is an antenna input then it is a TV. Otherwise it is a monitor. That's the "tele" in "television".
Apparently this is enforced by the regulators. If it has a tuner it will say "television" on the box. Otherwise it says something like "monitor" or "display".
For a long time I found the single biggest difference between them to be:
Even the best TVs had atrocious latency compared to cheap monitors. I don’t really know why this is, but it likely has something to expensive transformations to the video signal to “improve” quality. I have very pricy 1080p Samsung TV from 2013. Even in “Game Mode” I has latency of over 100ms. This enough to be noticeable in just moving a mouse around, let alone gaming.
That has been mostly rectified nowadays. I have an LG C1 (42”) and use it for gaming and work. It has <1ms average latency and just enough pixel density for computer use. It does need a good desk though.
The biggest remaining differences would be:
- TVs tend to have a “smart interface”. This can generally be avoided if you are just switching between inputs.
- TVs tend not to support DisplayPort input.
- TVs tend require large desk stands and are not VESA compatible. You need a large desk to use one as a monitor.
- Very few TVs with high quality panels are available in smaller more pixel dense sizes. I’m imagining this will become less of a problem with a move to 8k.
- TVs tend to have almost unusable colour calibration out of the box. Rtings reviews tends to note how close the displays get to a standard colour profile after calibration. Many can be calibrated to a reasonable level though.
- OLED panels are much more common in TVs.
Hunch: burn in resistance could be a reason. TVs usually have something moving at all times, whereas a many folks have menu bars and applications that are more static and could burn at element in.
I guess that the consumer home TV panels aren't meant for extended hours of usage. Their overall lifespan would be a lot lesser than commercial display panels and monitors.
A 4k monitor of 32" and a 4k tv of 32" have same pixel density. But their price difference can be several fold. Pixel density is not the differentiator.
AFAIK the problem with those is that they're overpriced and have inferior picture quality. I guess if you want to make a statement or something they're worth buying, but for now I still think your best choice is to buy a "smart tv" and don't connect it to wifi.
I have somewhat smart TV, though bought couple of years back. It is not getting on the internet, it's only job is to receive signal over HDMI. I don't ever interact with its menus or other buttons expect power and volume, it stays on HDMI and is quite nice dumb TV.
Look for a used signage panel. No commercial smart functions and quality that's barely available in consumer TVs but sometime can be had really cheap if you find the right place, look on govdeals, if your patient.
Not just that, they will have ability to monitor what you are playing and also listen to ambient sounds, fingerprint voices and also sense how many people are in the room.
They already do. I've seen it this week in my hotel room. It was a brand I've never heard of before. But at least when watching cable TV, the picture would turn into a PIP and ads were displayed in the frame.
> I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil).
FWIW it's pretty easy to fry eggs in a cast iron. You do have to oil the pan, but I wouldn't call it absurd. Just a dollop of oil in the pan. And the end result has a crispy, yummy texture that's hard to achieve with Teflon. It just takes a little practice and an open mind.
Not only is it possible with a reasonable amount of oil in any cast iron pan, but with a very thin cast iron pan one can do it without oil even. Eggs start sticking with high heat and the thinner the metal the lower the heat needed to cook.
The quality and state of the cast iron pan makes a big difference.
If you have a good seasoning then less oil while cooking is needed. If you have a new pan with a rougher surface then using a steel spatula will smooth out the surface texture and improve performance (without making it too smooth where seasoning won't stick).
There's a lot of varying advice on cast iron, but the prevailing wisdom seems to be that if you keep using it then the pan will improve.
I actually machined, de-oiled, and polished a cast iron skillet I bought in the the supermarket. After seasoning with flax oil it was effectively non-stick. I would use a single pat of butter for 3-4 eggs. Regular use with heat control and edged steel spatula are essential to maintain seasoning. Also make sure helpful people don’t try to wash it in the dishwasher. I would just wipe it out with a paper towel and soft salt, sometimes heating it the oven with a bit of oil to restore surface smoothness. I also have a ca 1875 Swedish manufacture cast iron skillet which didn’t seem to need any machining.
Cast iron doesn’t seem to work as well on electric stoves: Temperature control is problematic. Perhaps induction heating would be more effective?
You probably want to use a wrought iron pan for that. They can be really cheap (starting from less than 10€), are indestructible (they don’t break if you drop them) and can be much thinner than cast iron. They are better for eggs, where you want to change the temperature during frying very quickly.
Yes, a good Matfer or Solidteknics carbon steel / wrought iron / blue iron pan is fantastic for eggs, omelettes, and crepes. Matfer as a French brand even has specific crepe and omelette pans made this way.
The only downside to a Matfer, or any other carbon steel pan, is that you need to be prepared to season it yourself. They do not come pre-seasoned like most cast iron pans and it is a good bit of work. Having said that, I absolutely love the one I have and plan on buying at least one more in the future.
You can also poach eggs just fine in a cast iron pan.
Fried eggs are just aldehyde cancer hell. There's so much out there you can cook without any oil and it's handy to know for sure. Try cooking stuff in sauces instead for example.
how much is a "dollop"? Based on what I've seen[1][2], it requires significantly more oil than what I use with a non-stick. The first link definitely seems absurd to me.
I use butter. no more than a a couple millimeters slice from a stick for 2 eggs. no stick. warm the pan to a low heat. cook eggs on lower heat (should be doing that anyway regardless of pan)
Of course it's crispy, you are deep-frying your eggs in oil, like McDonalds-style fries. It may feel delicious, like almost anything overcooked with high temperature, but it is not quite healthy.
This is just not true. Not even if you have a single egg on super large pan. And you can also use smaller pan or more eggs, that way it will be even higher.
Just because you have drowning eggs in oil does not mean everyone does it that way.
Mine take ~ 1 tsp for three eggs. I let the pan get hot enough that it slides around with water like viscosity, spread it evenly with a paper towel and throw the eggs on.
Comment I was replying to meant crispiness. That means frying in oil, in my experience. Do you know another way to get crispy texture on cast iron skillet?
I cook exclusively with cast iron pans (not because I’m some sort of purist, but because that’s what I happen to have), and you can absolutely fry an egg with just a bit of butter or oil and no crispiness.
> I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil).
We fry our eggs every morning on a cast iron skillet with a tiny amount of oil (<1 teaspoon for 6 eggs). The only time I have problems with stuff sticking is if I get impatient and don't wait for the pan to preheat.
This is one of the biggest contributors to teflon's mythology: you can't preheat a teflon pan safely (it ruins the coating), so people learn to not preheat. They then get frustrated when using other pans that things stick that wouldn't have on their teflon.
(Edit: the skillet is a cheap, unaltered Lodge, nothing antique or sanded.)
I have never put the least bit of thought or effort into frying eggs in cast iron over, say, stainless. It is a better non-stick surface overall. Teflon is gross, do you really want to risk breathing the fumes and eating even more plastic?
I always found the plastic argument in teflon vs cast iron a bit weak. Its health risks are well documented at this point. But the seasoning on a cast iron? That is polymerized fats... One might even go so far as to call it plastic. I am told the seasoning is also a carcinogen and in my experience more likely to be ingested than Teflon from a pan (getting a good seasoning that lasts on a pan can be tough!).
It might be the pan but I tried to fry eggs on stainless and it was a horror movie. Even polished the pan as it had a lot of cleaning scratches and it was even worse. I seasoned it and it was better but still you have to use the right oil. Used olive oil and it stained the pan.
> smart TVs are cheaper than dumb TVs because they're subsidized by ad revenue.
What if you count having to view ads, and having the tv spy on you as a cost? RN,for many TVs you can just not connect to wifi, but how long until the TV won't work unless it is connected?
> Also, the claim itself doesn't really make any sense. Even if you stop getting software updates, that doesn't prevent you from using it as a dumb display.
Perhaps a better argument is that a bad software can brick the TV, or the components of the smart functionality break in a way that prevents you from using it as a dumb tv (i.e. it has more "moving parts"), and if you don't use the smart functionality, then it is a waste of the materials to make those components, and probably electricity running through the circuits. And it isn't too hard to imagine a future where the tv just stops working if it can't phone home.
>What if you count having to view ads, and having the tv spy on you as a cost?
I don't connect it to wifi, problem solved.
>for many TVs you can just not connect to wifi, but how long until the TV won't work unless it is connected?
Is there reason to believe that it won't work? The "smart" TV I have hasn't been connected to wifi for years and still works.
>Perhaps a better argument is that a bad software can brick the TV, or the components of the smart functionality break in a way that prevents you from using it as a dumb tv (i.e. it has more "moving parts")
I don't get it, are you trying to have your cake (smart functionality) and eat it too (smart functionality randomly breaking stuff)? If you use it as a dumb TV from day 1 I can't imagine why it would randomly break later.
>and if you don't use the smart functionality, then it is a waste of the materials to make those components, and probably electricity running through the circuits
The nvidia shield TV uses 6W while streaming. Presumably the smart TV component probably uses something similar or less than that. In the grand scheme of things it's nothing.
>And it isn't too hard to imagine a future where the tv just stops working if it can't phone home.
That's seems to be more of a theoretical concern than something that's actually happening right now.
> Is there reason to believe that it won't work? The "smart" TV I have hasn't been connected to wifi for years and still works.
I've heard of some tvs that work that way, rn it is the exception rather than the rule, but there is an incentive for tv makers to move in that direction.
> If you use it as a dumb TV from day 1 I can't imagine why it would randomly break later.
Smart tvs have inherently more complicated electronics, and that means more things to break. If you don't use the smart features it might be less likely for those components to break, but unless the designers were careful to sufficiently isolate the smart components, it still increases the chances of breakage.
> That's seems to be more of a theoretical concern than something that's actually happening right now.
For TVs maybe, but it is already the case for other "smart" devices like thermostats.
>I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil).
That's because many cast iron pans you can get these days have unpolished bottoms unlike antique ones. If you get a polished one (or polish it yourself - there's plenty of youtube videos on that) it'll be incredible non-stick. You can also just get a carbon steel pan which doesn't need polishing.
Modern mass-market cast iron is garbage. Lodge's marketing department has managed to convince people that their garbage pans are actually better, and that the texture holds on to seasoning, but it's all nonsense. It's vastly cheaper for them to produce pans by skipping the polishing step. You can still get good polished cast iron, but the pans cost hundreds of dollars. Next time an old relative dies, go raid their kitchen for the good stuff.
I have a 20 year old Lodge and I also use some of my grandmother's old Lodge/Griswold pans which were polished. My pan is well seasoned and pretty smooth after constant use. I've never noticed any practical difference except that mine can easily be replaced
Maybe you just aren't used to cooking on the pan or it needs to be seasoned further? I can cook amazing eggs on my Griswold, so I doubt the issue is the pan itself.
Lodge is just fine. All of the cast-iron snobbery overlooks the fact that it's a big hunk of metal that cowboys used to throw on a campfire to make beans. Keep cooking with it, and the bottom and its seasoning will smooth out.
I don't know; too rich for me. I just use some pans I stole from my dad's basement after he refused to give them to me, despite not having used them in 20 years.
My parents gave me a new set of cast iron pans shortly after I started living on my own. I noticed they didn't have smooth bottoms like theirs did, so I asked my dad if he could help me smooth it out. He put a grinder attachment on the drill and went to work. I still remember it as one of the nicest things he did for me. And the pans still work great, 40 years later.
There is only one conspiracy theory I believe in, it’s /reddit/r/castiron is a troll site created to make people believe ‘seasoning’ is really a thing.
After spending a few weeks trying, I’ve had multiple people tell me they got theirs ‘seasoned’ after three or four months.
That's weird that you believe this, because cast iron was the predominant way of cooking for literally centuries, and it works exactly as described. I have some new pans I've seasoned, and I have some vintage pans I inherited that my grandmother was cooking with for most of her life, and then I cooked with extensively after. Both are effectively nonstick, and I don't need much oil at all to cook with them. Care is also way easier.
There is a /lot/ of bullshit myths around cast iron, like that you cannot use soap for instance, or shouldn't scrub it, both of which are totally fine, but the idea of seasoning and what occurs when it's done properly are entirely true. Most people just want to otherthink it. All you need to do with cast iron is use it and care for it properly, the longer and more often you use it, the better it gets.
Yeah, it's very largely BS. If you cook enough bacon and high-fat foods in it over time.... sure.
But people who say you can easily cook eggs in it or everything else "after its seasoned" are just not to be listened to. Use a nonstick.
EDIT: Or carbon steel I guess. Even then, meh. Remember that the vast majority of professional chefs use nonstick skillets specifically for eggs both at home and in their workplace.
But you can, and I do. I cook everything in cast iron and nothing sticks.
That said, one thing I have come to realize over the past couple of decades of cooking with cast iron is that seasoning is less some mystical ritual that is performed one time, and more a result of proper use and care of the pan over time.
But yes, there is lots of ritualized BS (“Don’t wash it”, “Never use dish soap”, “Only season it using flax oil in the oven at 200 degrees for four hours”, etc etc etc).
I ground down a pan and started over on it this year. This is all it took to get it perfect:
-In the very beginning, bake it in an oven with a very thin layer of crisco two times
-Only use it for eggs for a while, letting the butter turn into seasoning with higher heat as it cools. Find the right preheating ranges by experiment.
I cook the family breakfast on a cast iron skillet every Dadurday. I like the taste of butter with eggs and use about a 1/2 teaspoon per pan full. It's about the same for pancakes if there's oil in the batter. My best advice is to never wash the pan ...just wipe it down with a paper towel.
> My best advice is to never wash the pan ...just wipe it down with a paper towel.
Eww... You can and should wash your cast iron pans. Dish soap is no longer made with lye or other harsh chemicals, just use a bit of Dawn and a blue scrub pad (same you'd use on nonstick) and properly clean it, make sure it's very dry afterwards and put a very thin layer of oil. Also don't use paper towels on cast iron unless it's a smooth bottom pan, the modern style cast iron will cause shreds of paper to get embedded in the pan which will burn and get nasty (also paper towels are bleached and that's nasty).
Seems to be a real thing[1]. I took you literally at first, but I guess you mean you’re looking for a specific result and not seeing it? This article[2] makes a case for using (pure) flax oil and a special procedure.
It’s definitely a real thing. But some people go nuts and I’ll never understand.
Use the right tool for the job and cast iron is definitely not the right choice a lot of the time. Unless you exclusively cook meals where heat control is never needed, I don’t see why you’d only use cast iron.
Yep, I have a small cast-iron pan that I use for eggs. It's well seasoned and the eggs don't stick. The key is you need to get it hot (not too hot, about 275 degrees F is good) then add a little butter and when that has melted, spread it around and add the eggs.
If you add the eggs with the pan too cool and then heat them up, they will stick.
> I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil)
Which means you need to do a better job at seasoning. Cast iron is used almost exclusively at my place and I use less than 1/2 TSp oil for eggs. Granted my newest skillets are made is 1930s.
A $50 angle grinder and a little time will turn $20 lodge cast iron pans into the kind of quality cast iron pans that I've seen people spend hundreds of dollars on to buy antiques.
Before something like the 1950s, casting techniques created a much rougher pan that fundamentally required grinding of the surfaces to make a usable cook surface. New(er) casting techniques developed that had a much tighter sand-pack for the casting mold, plus some sand blasting after the mold, made for a faster production cycle, but at the cost of leaving a slightly pebbly surface on the pan.
Because the older techniques weren't close to usable after the casting, the cleanup process made for a smoother pan. Because the newer techniques were much closer to usable after the mold, less cleanup was put into them, resulting in a rougher pan.
A cheap angle grinder is good enough for the relatively soft iron alloy used in cast iron pans. Grind the surface down smooth (don't forget to wear a face mask!), then finish up with increasing grades of sandpaper until you get a nearly mirror surface on the pan. Season the pan a couple of times and you'll be left with one of the most durable, non-stick surfaces for cooking that you can possibly have.
Years of working as a programmer have left me with little in the way of endurance in my ligatures. Anything involving "elbow grease" is not a great idea for me. Even an orbital sander has too much vibration/takes too much down pressure for me.
I wouldn't bother with all that. I'd recommend finding an antique cast iron pan (local thrift store, flea markets, Etsy, or eBay) and restoring it (there are services for this or you can do it yourself fairly easy) and using that. The antique pans are just way better.
Or you can try carbon steel which is more forgiving than cast iron. Blanc Creatives makes a great carbon steel pan/skillet.
I was not able to find an antique pan for less than the price of a modern pan and angle grinder. So I recouped my tool investment on the first pan alone.
That guy is not wearing a face mask or proper eye protection. You don't want to make a habit of inhaling iron filings.
Do it in a well ventilated area, preferable outside. The fillings get everywhere, include into any vents of any other equipment you might have nearby. My glasses weren't enough to keep the filings out of my eyes. They are fine enough that they won't scratch or cut your eyes, but you will feel like you are having the worst bout of seasonal allergies you've ever had.
Have you ever in your life tried to use an angle grinder for this sort of thing? It’s one of a family of cutting tools built on the Ouija board principle. It transforms human energy into a crooked, unpredictable motion, and the more you attempt to influence its course, the more dismal your future becomes.
If i had a cast iron pan I had to flatten, I’d dog it down on my CNC router, set up a 1/4” endmill, whip up some code for 33% overlapping passes in Fusion 360, and take off .005” layers until it was flat.
Probably, random orbital sander would do the trick, but slower and chew through a lot of sanding discs. It took me years to finally acquire a grinder - just no real need between sanders and saws. Once I started working on concrete and metal it became necessary, and now it seems like a luxury for all the little things which I probably should have been enjoying a long time ago. But IME, most people under 40 don’t have an angle grinder laying about. So borrow one from a 40+ friend before making the ROS do the work, IMO.
> To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
This really bugs me. We have a product, designed to be used over heat, which leaks literal poison into your food when it gets "too hot"... WTF is that? What does "too hot" mean and how can you expect anyone to know which of their burner settings (which often have no guidance at all as to temperature beyond gradients between "low", "medium", and "high") will be hot enough to leak poison into the food they feed themselves and their families. Non-stick coating seem like the kind of thing which should be banned at this point until it's proven to be safe under typical conditions. None of the chemicals which have replaced teflon have been proved safe. They just haven't been shown to be dangerous yet, which isn't saying much considering the decades it took to prove the dangers of teflon and the efforts the manufacturers went to hide those dangers from the public they poisoned.
> smart TVs are cheaper than dumb TVs because they're subsidized by ad revenue.
I've never seen that proved anywhere. Costs have gone down over the years, and the amount of ads and data collection have increased but I haven't seen any evidence at all that there's a 1:1 connection between the two. Companies seem to be perfectly happy to charge you the most they can get away with while still collecting your data and pushing ads in your face. By limiting the availability of dumb TVs you don't even get to vote with your wallet on this one. Currently I'm recommending people replace their TVs with computer monitors, but "smart" computer monitors are the new thing and will push out the dumb models too.
> French press + grinder is straightforward and has little maintenance
And even that comparison is unfair, as with that you're getting fresh ground coffee which is much better. Pod coffees are preground minimum months before you're brewing with them.
Yes! Every spring we open up our summer place and I have some Nespresso pods left over from the previous year. I always expect it to be terrible but find I can't tell the difference to fresh. Still, regardless of age it's just not that good to begin with, unfortunately. I get it for myself when I'm in a hurry or others who don't seem to care.
Oxidation is only one component of flavour degradation - that said, its the dominant one. So while the pods would be much better than a months-opened canister of folgers, certainly (as sealed canisters are also generally nitrogen or CO2 flushed), there are other aging processes that come into play. Pods also just don't have the best beans - and if you're grinding your beans fresh, you're probably also buying fresh beans, of better quality, from a smaller roaster.
That's still much more work than a pod machine. With a pod machine you just pop a pod in, put a cup under, press a button, come back 1 minute later and you're done. With your setup you have to pour out beans, wait for it to grind, start boiling water, wait for it to brew, and then clean everything up.
As another commenter said, if you don’t care for quality, you can get pre-ground. Then, you just boil water and brew, which is a few cups of coffee, so potentially less amortized work.
Cleanup is fair but it’s on the order of putting your hands in the grounds and throwing them in the trash. I suspect people think machines are easier because they don’t mind mold or scale building in their unclean tank.
Yep it's a lot more work. I think the "wait until it kinda looks like it might be ready before you press down" part is the most annoying step of the french press.
That is the best price/quality approach. However, if you love frothed milk a good little $200 espresso machine is good. And of course learning to make your own espresso is a fun little hobby, too. I have a strange fetish for Illy capaccino cups. My kids particularly love frothed chocolate milk! (What's really cool is that the chocolate milk can easily triple in volume, so the kids think they're drinking much more hot chocolate than they really are.) Try doing that in a French press!
I make espresso, too. The problem is the espresso machine cost and quality impact the final product significantly. A high-ish grade machine is $700 or more. You can froth milk with less, but the coffee extraction usually is subpar. And actually, people who are snobby about espresso roast their own beans so it’s hardly comparable in effort. Espresso is basically the hot-rod of coffee.
Or just get a super automatic espresso machine. More convenient than a Nespresso, better taste, essentially zero waste. Higher initial investment (~300 EUR), lower running costs.
Get a Delonghi Dedica ec685, you can find it at ~150€. It's the cheapest good machine I can think of.
It comes with a pressurised filter so you can throw whatever ground coffee you buy in the supermarket and it will make a decent espresso.
If you want to take it to the next level you should buy a non pressurised filter, good fresh coffee in beans and an extra 300 for a good electric grinder.
That's pretty much the cheapest setup I can think of to make a good espresso.
>Oh… I dunno, but this seems to be a fairly likely failure mode for a pan.
"too hot" in this context means "higher than smoke points of most oils". Like I said, they have their uses. If you're frying an egg you're likely not heating your pan to the point of smoking, and I'm certainly not going to be searing meats on a non-stick.
> I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil).
Fried eggs were a thing long before before teflon. I dont know what you consider absurd about of oil, some oil is needed, but I would qualify it as "normal"
> To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
Teflon pans kill birds unfortunately. Once you live with a bird, you can’t have any hot teflon in the house because it releases toxic fumes. Fine for a human because we’re large animals, smol birds reach lethal levels within minutes.
There’s stories of people turning on an air fryer and their pet bird dropping dead in another room.
At regular cooking temps, the chemicals still leach into the food. Also, you should throw a teflon pan out if it has a single scratch, since it leaches much more rapidly after that.
I don’t think Teflon leaches into food at normal cooking temperatures (it’s a very stable chemical), but even if it did, it’s totally fine, as Teflon is biologically inert. It is used in medicine for implants, catheter linings etc.
It leaches estrogen analogues (sometimes called xenoestrogens), and ~ 100% of people alive today have biologically active levels of those compounds in their blood.
In particular, Teflon brand nonstick coating contains PTFE and PFOAs. This has been settled science for at least 20 years.
>They have their uses. I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil).
It requires proper seasoning. Once you got that, egg away!
>Also, claiming that they "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
Agreed - they're not poisonous to use, but the manufacturing chemicals used to produce them are, and those chemicals are often dumped into the environment - they're also known as, "forever chemicals", which reek some havoc on well: us.
>Why are they only superficially convenient? They seem pretty convenient to me.
The plastic waste they produce still have the inconvenient problem of what to do with them. Like many conveniences, the problem is just offloaded to someone else.
>The plastic waste they produce still have the inconvenient problem of what to do with them. Like many conveniences, the problem is just offloaded to someone else.
>Some feel microplastics in our blood stream is a worthy compromise to easy-to-make coffee.
If you're in a first world country with proper garbage disposal, those k-cups most certainly aren't contributing to the problem of microplastics. Where I live they basically get landfilled. Kind of hard for that to end up in my veins when they're buried underground.
> The newer pans perform worse, and must be replaced on a shockingly regular basis.
No.
Like most things in this life, you get what you pay for.
If you cheap out on "newer pans" then sure, they won't last you because the manufacturer will use cheap manufacturing processes in order to achieve your stingy price point.
If you buy decent pans from reputable manufacturers, they will last you a lot longer.
>>*Also, claiming that they "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.*
Watch this documentary, "The Devil We Know" (About the history and toxicity of teflon.
tl;dw - its a cancer causing birth defect, testosterone/endocrine system atomic bmb and there isnt a single person alive today who can be found (according to the doc) who does not have measurable amounts of teflon in their blood.
You seem to be conflating the effects of chemicals previously used in the manufacture of Teflon, such as PFOA which is indeed very dangerous and toxic, and has been banned in the US, with Teflon itself, which appears to be safe.
I mean, if Teflon is so toxic, and there isn't a single person alive today who doesn't have Teflon in their blood, then why aren't there tons of documented cases of Teflon poisoning?
>Watch this documentary, "The Devil We Know" (About the history and toxicity of teflon.
Sorry, but I'm not going to watch a 95 minute documentary on a whim. Based on the wikipedia summary, it doesn't seem to contradict what I said, specifically
>regarding allegations of health hazards from perfluorooctanoic acid (PFOA, also known as C8), a key ingredient used in manufacturing Teflon
I specifically mentioned in my last comment that they were "poisonous during manufacturing ".
The linked study reported 7-337 ng of PFOA emitted per pan, over the span of 20 minutes. According to [1], the concentration of PFOA in the average american's blood is 2.1 μg/L, which is orders of magnitude more. I concede that there's technically some PFOAs left over in pans, but I stand by my claims that the pans themselves are a non-issue.
I don't dispute that the amounts are "pertinent", whatever that means, but going back to the original claim of the pans being "poisonous", I'm not sure the concentration is high enough to warrant that. The first result for maximum allowed concentration for PFAS is drinking water says it's 0.3 ug/L[1]. It's hard to compare drinking water standards to atmospheric standards, but at least intuitively it seems to be several of orders of magnitude higher than what's being emitted from pans during normal use. Given that, it seems a bit irresponsible to call pans "poisonous" when they're meeting all safety standards. I mean, arsenic is poisonous, a detectable amount can be found in most rice, and people eat a lot of rice, but it still seems a bit irresponsible to call rice "poisonous".
According to this [1] the limit for PFAS in the states ranges from 13 ng/L - 1000 ng/L. So it’s on the same order of magnitude. I also would guess that the limits are conservative, just because it’s so wide-spread already.
>Why are they only superficially convenient? They seem pretty convenient to me.
how can anything that produces a worse quality of a productivity enhancing stimulant than you would have using another method ever be truly convenient in comparison to that other method?
This one, in this world many things that lose quality lose convenience, for example insulin - if you decrease the quality of insulin you will be decreasing the convenience.
basically in any situation when you decrease the quality of anything to such an extent that you use it less and thus get less of the benefits that it gives you it would follow that it would be more convenient that the quality was higher.
For example - condoms, condoms that don't work very well would be inconvenient.
But also coffee, when coffee is of such poor quality that people do not drink it that is inconvenient if you are employed turning coffee into code as the funny t-shirts have it. Hence my humorous reference to productivity enhancing stimulants.
I cook eggs on cast iron every morning. I do almost all my cooking on cast iron, including crepes on occasion. Proper seasoning and maintenance makes a huge difference.
I bought the majority of my cast iron 20 years ago for about $25 and it'll likely outlast me.
> Cooking equipment: essentially indestructible Cast Iron skillets transition into teflon pans. The newer pans perform worse, and must be replaced on a shockingly regular basis. They also seem to be poisonous.
No one should be surprised that people will pay more for the exact same thing over time. People want to get as much as they can as quick as they can. If you spend $100 for a cast iron pan now instead of $30 for a Teflon pan, then you have $70 less money to spend on other stuff. The average person doesn't care that over the long run they could spend $1000 on pans instead of a $100 pan that lasts a lifetime.
Unless you're getting Finex or bidding for sought-after collectors' cast iron on Ebay, you can get a plain cast-iron skillet from any big-box store for $20-$30.
I got mine for £15 in TK Maxx (TJ in the States). It was a "Hairy Bikers" branded one, so presumably a white label manufacturer. That's not a one off either, there are always some in there at the price.
I did sand it a bit with a palm sander because the Internet told me to, but I'm pretty sure it would have been fine anyway.
It's been years, and I've deliberately seasoned it only once, and I don't think I actually really needed to. Sometimes when it's been used for tomatoes and looks thirsty, I'll put a wipe of oil in and heat it up for a bit.
I don't miss the very expensive Le Creuset wedding present non stick pan that turned out to be as bad as all the rest.
However, also in T[KJ] Maxx are 10 times more truly terrible Teflon pans.
Get a vintage cast iron skillet; before the race to the bottom resulted in unfinished junk like Lodge, manufacturers used to machine polish the surface of the skillet.
I can put a tiny amount of oil in my cast iron and fry eggs without sticking.
Over time, cooking oils polymerize from heat and form a smooth seal in the microsurfaces of the cast iron, resulting in a natural non stick surface which is resilient and replenish-able.
80% of my stovetop cooking is in a 70 year old cast iron skillet, the rest happens in stainless steel or enameled cast iron.
>They have their uses. I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil). Also, claiming that they "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
Nonstick pans contain hormone disrupting chemicals. Just google it and there are numerous resources. Nonstick chemicals are also released into our rivers and waterways and basically impossible to remove (lots of resources for this as well).
>From nonstick pans to food packaging to make-up, hundreds of everyday products are made with PFAS chemicals that have been linked to adverse health effects, including cancer, weakened immunity and low birth weight.
>They are also a persistent pollutant in the environment, with high levels found in many public water systems.
If you don't like cast iron then carbon steel is a similar but easier to maintain alternative. If those don't work, then enameled cast iron (i.e. Le Creuset) works.
>I checked on wikipedia and I found no mentions of that in the finished product.
It's both/ Read the article I linked above "most people in the U.S. have PFAS in their bloodstream" so these chemicals are toxic in the finished product (which they then digest when using) and during manufacture.
>While contamination of drinking water around military bases and factories gets most of the attention, the EPA says 80 percent of human exposure comes from consumer products in the home.
>It's both/ Read the article I linked above "most people in the U.S. have PFAS in their bloodstream" so these chemicals are toxic in the finished product (which they then digest when using) and during manufacture.
The "product" in this case being "non-stick pans", or various other consumer products? The wikipedia article seems to suggest the latter.
>they are still produced internationally and are imported into the United States in consumer goods such as carpet, leather and apparel, textiles, paper and packaging, coatings, rubber and plastics
>In 2020, manufacturers and the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) announced an agreement to phase out some types of PFAS which are used in food packaging by 2024
>PFAS are also used by major companies of the cosmetics industry in a wide range of cosmetics, including lipstick, eye liner, mascara, foundation, concealer, lip balm, blush, nail polish and other such products
Based on that, I'm inclined to believe that there's a bunch of ways for PFAS to get into people's bloodstreams, but cookware isn't one of them (I did a quick search and they're not mentioned in the article, aside from a reference to a california legislation requiring them to be labeled). That's perfectly consistent with my prior claim that "finished non-stick pans are safe" and your claim that "most people in the U.S. have PFAS in their bloodstream".
>I'm inclined to believe that there's a bunch of ways for PFAS to get into people's bloodstreams, but cookware isn't one of them
You have the burden of proof to prove your claim/belief. I already provided a source that says "80 percent of human exposure comes from consumer products in the home." which you're making the illogical leap that that must not include pans coated in these chemicals that we use to cook on... That seems illogical. Yes there are other sources of PFAs, but you're trying to exclude one of the most obvious sources.
>That's perfectly consistent with my prior claim that "finished non-stick pans are safe"
You have literally cited zero evidence for your claim--so no it's not consistent. You're pulling this out of your ass.
>You have the burden of proof to prove your claim/belief. I already provided a source that says "80 percent of human exposure comes from consumer products in the home." which you're making the illogical leap that that must not include pans coated in these chemicals that we use to cook on... That seems illogical. Yes there are other sources of PFAs, but you're trying to exclude one of the most obvious sources.
If you really want to talk about "burden of proof" and whether something "seems illogical", I'm going to take the easy way out and point out that PFAS is a set of substances which include PTFE ("teflon") as well as PFOA (used in the manufacture of PTFE). We have been conflating the two, which means many of the sources you provided for PFAS are actually invalid, at least in the context of discussing whether non-stick pans are "poisonous".
Technically the original discussion was about PTFE (ie. the stuff used on pans), not PFAS (which is what your sources reference since your first reply). If anything, you're the one who moved it my subtly moving the discussion to be about PFAS. I suppose it's "moving the goalposts" to bring the discussion back to PTFEs, so I do apologize if you think that me replying to your comments constitutes acceptance of moving the discussion to be about PFAS.
>Why are they only superficially convenient? They seem pretty convenient to me.
Because it is absurdly easy to make a pot of coffee, if you want a single cup just adjust the amount of water and coffee.
There is also instant coffee. Which can be better than Keurig.
It's not to say that there is 0 convenience its just barely so and not really worth the added cost and waste. Also if you happen to be the one that has to refill the water or wait on it to heat it's no more convenient than any other option.
> I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil).
I use nothing but cast iron,s on a wood-burning stove. Frying eggs is no problem at all and it does not take "an absurd amount of oil", just a light coat of butter or margarine will do the trick assuming the pan is well-seasoned. I make pancakes for 4 people about once a week, also no problem, using a silicone brush to coat the pan in a light coat of molten butter/oil (I often mix these two) and they slide right out. Just clean the hot pan with water and wipe it clean/dry after use, it will work even better the next time you use it.
PTFE-covered pans are only a thing because people have been told fat is bad. The truth is fat is not bad, just like other foods are not bad per definition. What is bad is too much fat, just like too much carbohydrates or too much salt or... etcetera. Knowing that fat is actually a good ingredient there is no reason to use those flimsy disposable aluminium pans covered in PTFE.
> Also, claiming that [PFAS] "seem to be poisonous" without any qualifiers is a little misleading. To my knowledge they're only poisonous during manufacturing (ie. the precursor chemicals) and when they get too hot.
It’s a bit difficult to exactly measure the effects of PFAS and how much of it makes it poisonous—when a study sought a control group of people without any in their blood for a study, they were not able to find a single living person on this planet that fits the definition anymore—but even with what we know the author is likely significantly understating that particular point[0].
Even if we ignore the poison released into the environment during manufacturing, I am yet to see a used Teflon pan that has no scratches (and that’s just the ones visible with naked eye). Combine with the fact that non-Teflon pans are becoming nearly impossible to find in many retail stores, and it becomes somewhat concerning.
I have invested in a complete range of cast iron pans. I really don't care if it's convenient or not, at least I can use whatever piece of cutlery which happens to be at hand (while not poisoning my entire family, which is a huge plus)- oh and they'll last forever.
I find that the amount of knowledge and effort to "care" for a cast iron pan is overestimated.
I treat mine no differently than any other pan and do all of the things that I do to any other frying pan. I wash it with soap and the scratchy side of the sponge, I store it with no oil, I cook acidic sauces, I let it soak in the sink, etc...
The seasoning is fine, once I accidentally left it on the burner and it burnt off the seasoning (something that would have destroyed any teflon pan). I just used a little extra oil the next few times.
I haven't used it extensively with an induction burner, but I don't have any complaints....
In exchange for learning how to keep it seasoned, you get to use metal cooking instruments again.
Cleaning cast iron is easier than cleaning teflon or stainless. However, you'll want something to scrape it with, and a stanless steel pot scrubber.
We use cast iron on our induction range with no problems. The only issues I've heard of involve scratching. The new models don't seem to have that issue (and cast is no scratchier than stainless, etc).
I just put my stainless pan in the dishwasher. Doesn't get much easier than that. That's why I got it. I keep a Teflon and my old cast iron pan around, but the stainless steel one is the workhorse. If I had to let one go, it'd be the cast iron pan.
Our top of the line dishwasher doesn't reliably remove burnt on stuff from stainless steel, so I end up scraping it before putting it in the dishwasher. Cast iron would be done at that point, but stainless needs a degreasing step after that.
Cast iron is best if it's the workhorse. Not using it regularly degrades the seasoning.
> Cast iron also has multiple issues when used with induction ranges, which are by far the most efficient/environmental cookers.
This is the first I’m hearing of this. My understanding is that pans only need to be magnetic to work with induction, in which case cast iron are prime candidates for induction.
My issue is the induction area is smaller than my pan and cast iron conducts heat poorly, so only the middle ~7" of my 12" pan is hot, the rest is downright cold.
Though my cast iron wok heats properly, for almost the same reason!
Scratches are a minor issue because the induction surface is flat, as opposed to electric/gas which are not. A heavier dropped pan can also sometime shatter the glass surface of an induction range. And being heavier, a cast iron pan requires more electricity to heat. If you are cooking an egg in a 5-lb pan the vast majority of the power goes to heating the pan. A thinner/cheaper pan will heat faster, pass more heat to the actual food, and therefore use less electricity.
What? There's no such thing. There won't be any of the disk left over on the pan after your done grinding. And you clean the pan before seasoning it. And seasoning it will burn away/encapsulate anything left over. Stop being such a worry wart.
Yeah, it’s metal man. You’d be shocked at how many non food safe implements of destruction have touched that pan in its fabrication. Being metal, it’s easy to clean up to become food safe. A little oil, maybe a little salt scrub, a rinse, then low heat with some oil for a while to drive out the moisture and start the season.
Their point about "smart" TV's having a shorter life than older dumb TV is a valid point. Some models tend to become pretty useless and at least inconvenient when their software gets outdated. Some require internet access to function while others just make it difficult to use streaming dongles and the like.
The real issue is the lack of security in these devices. Updates are rare enough but for something that bridges your home network with the internet this is an agregious failing.
This doesn't even touch on the repairability issues inherent in modern TV design.
>Their point about "smart" TV's having a shorter life than older dumb TV is a valid point. Some models tend to become pretty useless and at least inconvenient when their software gets outdated.
This sounds like a non-issue, in a "broken escalators become stairs" kind of way. If your smart TV doesn't work because it hasn't received software updates for years, and the youtube/netflix app no longer works anymore, can't you just... use it as a dumb TV?
>This doesn't even touch on the repairability issues inherent in modern TV design.
What "repairability issues"? TVs hasn't been repariable for decades now.
> I wouldn't try frying eggs in a cast iron, for instance (technically you can, but it requires an absurd amount of oil).
You’d be surprised. I have a Lodge cast iron pan I fry eggs in regularly. A tablespoon of butter is enough for three eggs, and only occasionally is there a spot or two that sticks.
The trick is heat. High heat causes them to unstick fairly quickly, to the point where I can typically just shake the pan to release them in their entirety.
That said I haven’t tried to scramble eggs in cast iron. I suspect this would not work nearly as well.
I've done eggs frequently in cast iron and in non stick and I think they turn out a bit better to my tastes in cast iron, but are slightly easier and quicker in nonstick.
>> Even if you stop getting software updates, that doesn't prevent you from using it as a dumb display.
Until a software update on your media player means you need a display with a different DRM. No matter what display you use, the media transfer method to that display (DVD/VGA/HDMI/Wifi etc) will probably be obsolete before the display itself goes dark.
My dad bought me one of these bulky 12 speed razors, 5 years ago. I've used 1 cartridge from it about 6 months ago. I hadn't shaved my face since before they came out. I use a clipper to keep it trimmed. Why use any disposable product whatsoever.
His point on single use plastics is spot on. I know a lot of people that love to lecture me about my moralistic views, the types of people who believe in overpopulation and are sad about the plastic in the ocean, not a single one of them pays any mind to the packaging of anything they buy. I do, and I'm not even one of those people. My "footprint" is probably less than 10% of most peoples, and I don't even care the way they do.
People consume too much disposable crap. People act like they have to buy what's on offer. People are convinced they're helpless in the face of corporations. Start refusing to buy things and stop making excuses and until then you should feel ashamed to lecture anyone about anything.
> Start refusing to buy things and stop making excuses and until then you should feel ashamed to lecture anyone about anything.
This does not make sense to me. The single biggest consumption item is living in a detached single family house with yard space (due to knock on effects of everything you consume having to travel further, including the people in your house).
I know this, and I can advocate for change such that it people are incentivized to live more densely and consume less space (drastically higher fossil fuel taxes). But that does not mean I should give up my enjoyment of resources. If everyone else is going to consume, then so am I. But if the collective decides to sacrifice, then I am signaling I am willing to also. There is no reason for someone to not live it up if the collective is not going to also sacrifice.
> There is no reason for someone to not live it up if the collective is not going to also sacrifice.
If everyone thought as you do saying "Until everyone agrees to sacrifice, I won't either" then no one would ever sacrifice. Leading by example on the other hand is a proven way to help inspire change and can help avoid adding to harms caused by people who choose to live selfishly as long as they can point to anyone else also being selfish.
Housing is a subject full of complications and increased population density causes problems for the environment as well. Personally, I don't care of you live in a McMansion or a shanty town. I don't care of you buy the plastic razor with 47 blades or whatever they are up to now or switch to double bladed razors, but don't blame your selfishness on "the collective". You have no power over what they do, and they have no power over what you do. You alone are responsible for deciding for yourself what you're willing to give up in order to help the environment.
The collective has entire power over what you do. Global climate change was never solved by individual decisions, because when you live a different lifestyle than your workmates, you basically give up both the jobrace and the friends.
As for myself, I absolutely blame society for having a house. I live in France where class warfare is still a thing, and living in a block with people of the other ethnicity is unthinkable (they raped my goddaughter, but that’s only one example of storied - they kill gays at the train station too, so I take my car). Give me love and I’ll turn over my lavish house and happily live in a small flat, if I’m not hated for being there.
>I live in France where class warfare is still a thing, and living in a block with people of the other ethnicity is unthinkable (they raped my goddaughter, but that’s only one example of storied - they kill gays at the train station too, so I take my car).
Jesus, do you live in _Banlieue 13_ or something?
"They" ("the other ethnicity", as you put it) did nothing to your goddaughter. A criminal, on the other hand, did — and I hope they are paying a high price for it.
I live in France as well, and I share a block with many ethnicities. Without exception they've been warm, welcoming people.
Quite frankly, your comment exposes your racism. C'est une honte.
> Jesus, do you live in _Banlieue 13_ or something?
I live in the center of Lyon. The problem has grown bigger than you imagine.
> Quite frankly, your comment exposes your racism.
The one who did my goddaughter at the age of 7, I invited him home because I wasn’t racist. I couldn’t imagine they systematically raped the white girls when given the opportunity. I also couldn’t imagine police knew it and left him free despite 7 previous condemnations. He was a nice guy, met at salsa lessons, invited several people for my birthday.
Police left him free. Police left him free because the judges free them. They wouldn’t free a white guy. It’s outrageous. Police left him free!!!
Faulting people for stereotyping and generalizing is not going to do any good. It is human nature, and the nature of all animals, to do this. You get bit by a hyena, you avoid hyenas. You cut yourself with a knife, you become careful with all knives. You may very well be correct, but lecturing someone usually only hardens their resolve. This lesson is something people have to learn for themselves.
People should be called on their bullshit. And saying that an entire race is to be held responsible for a rape is bullshit.
If it were a "white" person that had raped his god-daughter would he be clamoring to live in a different community. Without knowing this person, I can confidently say no based on the stereotypical racism in his outlook.
Racial categories are a societal invention. They are completely made up and arbitrary which is why we should be especially intolerant of racists. Not only is it a cruel viewpoint, it's a stupid one.
A knife is a knife is a knife. But the definition of what race someone belongs to is entirely up for debate depending on where in the world they are.
I don't think he mentioned race, I think the word he used was "ethnicity" which is inclusive of culture, and doesn't necessarily include race at all. Culture is a shorthand way of saying "behavioral trends within a self identifying community." You might say its a "dog whistle" for race, and you may be right, but we argue the point and take people at their word, in good faith, here.
If I were a white person that lived in a white community that had problems with women getting raped, I'd leave. There are communities like this, and plenty of people trying to find a way out of them. If I were a brown person that lived in a brown community with these problems, I'd leave, which is why I am sympathetic to immigrants leaving their countries and going to ones where women don't get raped all the time.
Also, after reading more of this thread, I don't think he's saying "this ethnicity rapes people" necessarily, I think it's more like "when someone from this ethnicity does rape someone, they don't get punished because the judges are afraid of being wrongly called racists, so if I move away from them, at least the rapists where I move will go to jail. It's not safer because they rape less necessarily, its safer because the rapists are in prison."
But that's all beside the point. You can't fault people for generalizing, we are pattern finding creatures by nature. It's a shortcut to bettering our lives. The pattern might only be correlation and not cause, but that doesn't change the improvement we get when we make decisions based off the recognized pattern, hence the evolutionary advantage to pattern recognition. The apparent pattern might not even exist, but behaving as if it does might not cause us any detriment at all, so there's no selective pressure against it. Berating people for this doesn't solve the problem, it in fact worsens it, and if you're indeed right, then over time people will meet nice people that fall into a negative stereotype in their mind and adjust their world view accordingly, no lecture required.
> I don't think he mentioned race, I think the word he used was "ethnicity" which is inclusive of culture, and doesn't necessarily include race at all. Culture is a shorthand way of saying "behavioral trends within a self identifying community." You might say its a "dog whistle" for race, and you may be right, but we argue the point and take people at their word, in good faith, here.
Ethnicity in french is the equivalent of race in english, when we speak about human beings.
If a white person raped my goddaughter, he would be in jail, period.
The guy wasn’t in jail. Think why.
> People should be called on their bullshit.
I’m calling you on your bullshit, but only because you present it that way: You are denying that there is a widespread rivalry between two ethnicities in France, and there are real victims. Real victims on one side (including rape, murder) and mostly paper victims on the other, and you are helping this situation to happen, mostly by putting pressure on the police to not jail the culprits. It’s like foxes in a hen enclosure, where you would blame the hens for speaking up.
> The collective has entire power over what you do.
No, they don't control you, but they can influence you, just as you can influence them and their choices.
Climate change isn't solved by individual decisions because the worst of it isn't the result of an individuals choice. Corporations are primarily responsible and as individuals we are largely powerless to change their practices. That doesn't mean we can't make personal choices that reduce the harms we cause, it's just not going to solve the problem.
I have yet to visit France, but I doubt everyone there would share your view that living with people of another ethnicity is unthinkable or would by necessity result in rape. That doesn't mean you shouldn't make sensible decisions to protect your safety. If your train stations are unsafe, don't feel bad about driving a car, but you should probably be pushing for improvements to the security of your public transportation. Make choices that are good for the environment where you can. Our circumstances may limit our choices, but if we're doing our best that's all anyone can ask.
This is circular. If the individual is constantly checking the dysfunctional apparatus of the public, then the public won't change because the individual won't. Gandhi pretty much tackled this in whole. Individuals have to independently strive towards this, of their own volition, to dismantle the heteronomous shitshow that the West has constructed with their virulent socioeconomic modal.
Nobody in their right mind agrees with the state of civilization, probably at all; this is the consequence of heteronomy. So even if you're affine to laissez-faire idealities, their realities with the concentration of wealth and the fundamental aspect necessitates someone ultimately is sacrificed to turn the wheel, typically the "third world". Or any of a huge battery (probably infinite) of other similar moral concerns.
We're all culpable for the continuity of this, myself included. We need exceptional individuals to live exceptional lives more than ever, though. We need to take it upon ourselves to begin dismantling these systems and their fundamental concepts.
Yes, there is. Personal fulfilment. Living up to your own standards.
Why do you want to consume because everyone else is doing so? Is the only reason you're willing to consider doing otherwise to save the world? Is life worse without the disposable products? Why are the decisions you make in your life contingent on some insurmountable, unachievable goal such as "everyone else must do it first"?
Life is worse without disposable products. In some cases, the disposable products are cheaper. In other cases, they are more convenient. In most cases, you can't buy products without a ton of disposable plastic, foam, and cardboard packaging. It's hard/extremely expensive to not buy a detached single family home in the US. Public transportation in America sucks and you can't get anywhere without a car.
I want to live a world with as close to zero carbon footprint as possible, however, short of sacrificing all my possessions and living like a hermit, I can't do that without collective change. I've taken many steps to minimize it but it feels like the next step I take will have almost no impact while also making the quality of my life significantly worse.
Well I disagree. Life is better without disposable products. Life is better with less things in general.
I use almost no disposable products. I think the disposable products I do use once, would be floss picks and fuel for the car. I even avoid buying trash bags and just reuse grocery bags. My carbon footprint is on the order of a village dweller from a third world country, and I don't even do it because of my carbon footprint, I do it because life is better when it is simpler. I'm not a hermit, I have an active social life and an active life in general. And my life is good, better than it was when I had a bunch of things and lived in an apartment.
I don't care about carbon emissions, the collective, any of that, and I am doing vastly more for those causes than 99% of the people that lecture me about them, and my only motivator is living by my standards, being honest with myself. That's all it takes, if you care about these things live like it, if you can't be bothered to live by what you say then quite frankly shut the fuck up about it.
You consume grocery bags, you dispose of trash, you buy floss picks, and you put fuel into a car, and those things alone put you way above a village dweller from a third world country, who buys no floss picks, owns no car, puts no fuel into a car, and does not buy groceries at a market that hands out bags.
I use on the order of a half gallon of gas a month. I'd say a village dweller has a larger carbon footprint in firewood alone.
I re-use grocery bags for trash and use no trash bags. I reuse any disposable plastic I can, at least once. That cut's my plastic output roughly in half compared to other people around me.
I've taken to using a water pick now, so a bag of those picks takes me maybe a year to use. That's miniscule.
I don't know if you've ever been to a third world country, but plastic bags even at small street shops are all the rage. I probably dispose of less plastic than they do. And to top that off, most developing nations don't have the infrastructure to handle it, and you see the bags clogging up waterways and blowing around, it's a big problem. So the direct pollution, even if I used more plastic, doesn't compare because most of the plastic I use goes to a landfill, not the local creek that's used as a sewer.
I think environmental damage scales directly with consumption of energy, whether it be to move mass or manufacture plastic. The sheer amount of consumption due to living far away from each other, with all the human mass, water, fuel, trash, machines, food, and everything else that has to move because of the distance people are from each other dwarfs everything else.
There is no “sustainable” world and a lifestyle that allows 8 billion people to have their own cars, fly to island vacations, and live in suburbia, with current energy transformation technology. Doing all the other things is a rounding error.
At the end of the day, the physics is simple. Moving mass a certain distance takes a certain amount of energy. Our current method of harnessing that energy results in a lot of byproducts, and we have yet to find alternatives with sufficiently better properties. Either we find that breakthrough technology, or reduce the mass and/or distance it is being moved.
Reminds me of George W Bush vs Al Gore in that Bush had a modest ranch house with all the eco friendly features and Gore, the environmentalalist had some 20,000+ foot megamansion.
Yea... it was unfortunate that so many people focused on that instead of the general problem and now we are barreling toward a very bad outcome. Ultimately, it doesn't matter what wealthy people do - they're going to be just fine regardless of what the rest of us do, except that if we kick and scream about their big houses and refuse to do anything we just wind up inheriting the problem and they're still right where they started. I somewhat feel this way about abortion - like I can afford to move my family or fly a family member somewhere to get one. Can you? Might want to think about that.
The other issue is that focusing on something like this megamansion (as grotesque as it is anyway - seriously a lot of these rich people are just tasteless losers) leads down to a never ending condition where you just never do enough to satisfy people who have no interest in changing their habits anyway.
If Gore sold his megamansion they'd say "hey you are still flying", if he stopped flying they'd say "hey you're still driving a car", if he stopped driving a car they say "hey you're not growing your own vegetables", if he started growing his own vegetables they'd say "hey the tools you use come from a carbon emitting supply chain" and if he stopped using tools and made his own they'd just keep on and on and on forever until we get global warming anyway and so many people are screwed. There's no genuine interest in solving the problem, they just want to distract you.
people need to set examples. "Do as I say not as I do"
it's not about distraction, it's about showing you're sincere. If you're like "save the planet" out of one side and on the other planning your 5th airflight you don't "actually" care.
it's like asking poor countries to bare all the burden of climate change and rich countries doing little. "I've got mine and sorry you don't but too bad, you're not allowed to have it" is not going to convince anyone except to follow your actions, not your words
I think the difference comes down to a question of leadership style and effectiveness vs correct policy making. For example I used to be 100% vegetarian for ~5 years due to ethical concerns. The reason I stopped is that I am pretty sure that no single animal's life got spared because of me not eating meat. However, I'd immediately have voted "yes" to ban all meat eating. If I had run for office on that platform nobody would have elected me because they perceived me as insincere. Not understanding that might be bad leadership rather than actual insincerity.
Greta Thunberg the way she travels to the conferences is admirable, she genuinely lives what she is talking about and it is a stark contrast to every single politician that turns up to a climate change conference with a giant team in a plane and lives extravagant lives.
Its not about the complete abolition of everything its about the hypocrisy of being one of the biggest polluters in a country let alone the world while suggesting others on substantially less consumption drastically change their lives when they are least financially able to do so.
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If they were eco-conscious they wouldn't travel in first place. Anyone who travels to fight against climate change is a hypocritical liar. I expect them to absolutely minimize their footprint. That is no heated conferences, just single loudspeaker with regular phone call to present their ideas, outside. Anything more is just pure destroying of the planet.
> If Gore sold his megamansion they'd say "hey you are still flying", if he stopped flying they'd say "hey you're still driving a car"
This is not true at all. People aren't stupid. They know the difference between Mega mansions/private jets and driving a car. Sure, there might be a few trolls online that will still say "But you don't grow your own vegetables". But it would definitely not become a nation wide focus in a way that living as hypocritically as Al Gore does.
You're comment comes off as really dismissive. Almost like you're saying "the people calling him out for his mega mansion are just as bad as people who would call him out for not growing his own vegetables".
I am being dismissive. The whole point is focusing on his stupid mansion is just a useless distraction and doesn’t stop climate change whatsoever.
> People aren't stupid.
Then why are they getting hung up on his mansion instead of demanding that their government do something? Him having a mansion doesn’t change basic scientific facts even if he’s the one stating them.
Quite. It's easy to find fault, but if you could magically rank everyone who's ever lived by the indirect CO2 reductions of their actions, I'm pretty sure Al Gore would be near the top of that list.
The bad-faith narratives about Al Gore's personal life were hilariously wrong and offensive and irrelevant 25-30 years ago. I guess some people still haven't caught on.
Al Gore was right about, well, basically everything he said on major policy issues.
BTW, that supposed "megamansion"? It's a 5-bedroom home, really quite modest by the standards of today's billionaires. It's basically what you'd assume a former Senator and Vice President might have. Efforts to paint this as somehow offensive are obviously in bad faith.
I don't know if I'd go so far as to say that everything he said on major policy issues was correct... seems like that'd a lot of room to be wrong there, but he was sure as hell right that global warming was real and needed to be addressed.
The attacks on him for his house were just to distract from his message. He also paid extra cash to his utility company to get blocks of "green power" produced using renewable sources to help offset the extra power his home consumed each year.
> until then you should feel ashamed to lecture anyone about anything
I'd take it a step further and say -- just do what you feel is best, what matches your morals, etc, and skip the lecture in any case. 99% of what is wrong with social media has to do with people lecturing the world as if their own personal opinion deserves special consideration. Focus on doing, not talking about it.
It’s not a multi-billion industry on account of it not working.
This individualistic refrain doesn’t make sense in the context of a critique of the overall system. Maybe as advice on how to be a self-flagelating low-eco-impact consumer or how to better master your personal finances. But ultimately it’s just an excuse for corporations to do the usual thing because the buck stops with the consumer (and corporations can just claim that they are just fulfilling a need that someone else would fill in their stead; they only sell the proverbial guns, they don’t pull the trigger).
Part of the point of this article is that more economical and environmentally friendly alternatives have been made harder for consumers to find. There's nothing wrong with shaving or drinking tea, yet when we go down to the shops to get the things we need, all our choices are limited to plastic disposable razors and pre-filled plastic tea bags. We don't always have the choice to vote with our wallets because the alternatives aren't equally accessible.
Yes, people are being steered towards behaviors that are more profitable for manufacturers and away from behaviors that are better for themselves.
And the way to stop it is to stop buying that stuff. Stores get pressured to stock things, and they can only justify it if it gets bought. If a store doesn't stock the things you want, don't buy things from that store except the things it does have that you do want. They will make the alternatives equally accessible when we demonstrate that we can go without what they have on offer. We always have a choice, always.
You have a choice to the extent that you're willing to be homeless and live without income and act in violation of the law. The rest of us are constrained in our choices by the society we live in and the expectations it places on us.
I want a cell phone that respects my privacy, but none exist on the market today so I have no choice. I still need a cell phone though since my work requires one. We also don't all have the same amount of choices. Those with fewer resources have fewer choices. People should do the best they can given their circumstances, but its worth trying to remove the artificial barriers which limit our choices where we can. Especially when those barriers are put in place to funnel profit into the hands of a small number of people at our expense.
We aren't talking about purchasing products anymore. We were talking about purchasing products at the store a minute ago.
"If I don't participate in this economy I'll be homeless, so I have to by Gillette mach 20 disposable plastic razor cartridges." Do what you can where you can. Can you stop buying disposable razor cartridges made of plastic and still not be homeless? Then do so.
> "If I don't participate in this economy I'll be homeless, so I have to by Gillette mach 20 disposable plastic razor cartridges."
More like: "I want to get a job, the employer requires me to not look homeless so I have to shave my face, which means I have to buy a razor, but I've never heard of double bladed razors, or seen them being offered for sale and every store I can access that sells razors only sells plastic razors with disposable plastic razor cartridge so that's what I'll buy"
If you're lucky enough to have heard of a better alternative, and you have the means to get it, you should, but unless nearly everyone has the means, opportunity, and then does that thing, it will never force stores to change how they stock shelves.
I haven't shaved with a blade in 11 years, minus the one time 6 months ago I decided to see what this 10 blade thing was all about. I have gotten jobs in that time. Good jobs even. I have not been homeless once within that time frame. If I can do it, you can too.
> I've never heard of double bladed razors...
now you're jumping through flaming hoops to rationalize your excuses. I challenge you to find a man with hair on his face anywhere in the world who has never heard of single blade razors, straight razors, double blade razors, electrical razors, or trimming a beard with scissors.
" The double edged razor has become a product that you can only buy on the internet, and which you will only buy if you know that it exists."
How did you learn of this product? Have you ever seen ads for one? I only knew of them because I've seen it discussed online (in the context of "shaving club websites") but you'd be kidding yourself to think that that's something everyone would stumble on.
Electric razors are an alternative, and I've seen them in shops although they were expensive enough that it might be hard for some. I'm sure they can picked up at low prices elsewhere, but again, that will vary by location. Straight razors I've heard of (thanks to Sweeney Todd and old cartoons), but I've never once seen them for sale anywhere. I guess growing a beard with scissors is an option for workplaces that allow beards, but I wouldn't trust myself to do it well enough for a job interview. Another option might be an old fashioned barber shop too, but while I'm sure they still exist I've never seen or been to one that offered shaves.
It really all just depends so much on where you are and what you've been exposed to. When you're counting on the masses to have identical access, experience, knowledge and behavior to drive changes on store shelves I don't think you'll find much success and I don't think we have to depend on speculation there since we can see from the state of store shelves now that things have not been working out to our benefit.
What if we already do so, the status quo is already the equilibrium, and thus your idea already worked? But it cannot find any more understanding in those doing their complex routine. You’re asking to sleep less, to work more and to get less from people literally competing to have some nice time.
It is of course true that we have some choices. But we have less power than the companies that shelf and produce all of that stuff.
Each company has their own marketing department. Public Relations is the science of manipulating desire, developed for over one-hundred years now. And they just have to focus on selling their coffee machines or whatever.
Take just one commodity as an example. A soda. They sometimes put just a little bit of salt in it to (1) mask the sweet flavor, and (2) to make you more thirsty. But you of course don’t notice any salty taste or the fact that it is unreasonably sugary because the salt and the sugar (to a point) cancel each other out. But a reasonably conscientious consumer could read the what’s-in-this-shit label, go on a message board and convince a lot of others (hundreds? thousands?s) to do a boycot campaign until all major producers start to issue “no salty business” labels on their products, so that the somewhat less conscientious consumers can pick the no-salt options without reading the what’s-in-this-crap label.
Now you just repeat the above step for all of the hundreds of items that you have to buy.
Who has time to do that on a big enough scale? No, not just on the scale of getting the bragging right of “I consume X times less than the average person”;[1] we’re talking about actually pressuring companies (with our awesome wallet power[1]) to stop producing whole lines of products.
Each company just has to sell their coffee machines or whatever else. And you just have to do wade through and make sense of the the propaganda given out by dozens/hundreds of companies, for hundreds to thousands of product lines.
[1]: Some fringe “anti-consumption” lifestyle groups does not threaten the bottom-line of any company.
[2]: Speaking of which: one can of course vote with one’s wallet. That is a form of power. But here the issue of how relative that power is painfully obvious: some (most) people have wallets (including savings) consisting of hundreds to thousands of dollars, while some people (and entities) have wallets with hundres of millions of dollars. This is not a one-person-one-vote kind of power!
What items do I have to buy? This is a serious question.
I'm going online right now, telling people how I live, maybe 10 see it and say "he's right, I have to live by what I claim to believe" and make an effort to change what they do. Maybe 10000 do, maybe none. But I did this because I wanted to.
I don't care what companies do, if they don't have what I want they don't get my money. It's really that simple. We talk about marketing and propaganda, how much marketing has gone into muddying the water and poisoning the discussion just to get people to forget this one fact? If everyone just lived by their own stated rules they wouldn't be able to get away with any of this. They get away with it because we let them get away with it, by making excuses for ourselves. They want you to make these excuses you're making, convince yourself why you need their junk, convince yourself that it is insurmountable because you can control only your own behavior. You're demoralized into wanting "the collective" to change your life for you. You focus on your peers instead of yourself, and this is precisely how they can get away with what they do, because of the choices you make, because of your focus on things out of your control.
My goal isn't to save the world, my only goal is to be honest with myself and live the way I want to. And that's all it takes, everything else is excuses.
I feel like you are all over the place. Or maybe just two places. Those two things:
1. We can “save the planet” (whatever that means to us) by forcing companies to change: ultimately it is we who have to change because the change flows from us
2. None of this matters: it’s just about personal integrity
Because these two can be combined: if everyone just had sufficient integrity/character then we could “save the planet”. We wouldn’t be trying to do that, as individuals, but that would be the emergent result.
What I’ve been complaining about all along is just the apparent idea that we can help the environment by voting with our wallets. But if this is all about (2) then I don’t give a shit at all: I don’t care about the personal finance aspect, the frugality aspect, or the “living your values” aspect; I simply think the idea that we as consumers have more power than companies is wrong. And specifically when it comes to “saving the planet”.
But if “saving the planet” is not a concern then we are just talking past each other.
And all of that crap about “excuses” is just you projecting your living-your-values mission onto others; I don’t care, for even one second, about that stuff. At least the way you present it.
It is, by the way, funny how you think that “companies” want us to think that we are powerless. Well sure, maybe they do. But they have indeed invested money in the idea of the all-powerful consumer. The now famous “carbon footprint” was an invention by British Petroleum: the idea that we should, as individuals—always as individuals—just turn off the bathroom light and maybe not drive on Sundays. The “carbon footprint” is of course the fault of individuals, not of entities like BP. British Petroleum and you would at least agree on that much.
Maybe the perfect consumer (as far as companies are concerned) does feel powerless. But she also has to feel a sort of paradoxical guilt for using about ten planets worth of resources (if extrapolated to the human race).
And yet another trick is to reduce people to consumers (as in only that). Hence your fallacious conclusion that my line of reasoning is that people should feel powerless. But that ignores the fact that people are also citizens, and they have more potential power as citizens (political animals) compared to your don’t-tread-on-me code of conduct.
I eat the carbon equivalent of about a half pound of plastic a day, the result of which either ends up in the atmosphere or in the ground. Whatever packaging I do use (and I don’t go out of my way to avoid it) is a rounding error compared to what goes through me for basic life.
Most of the resources used are in the supply chain anyway.
The most environmentally friendly thing I’ve done in my life is delay replacing my totaled car.
Is that cycle natural? More people means more for-food animals, more petroleum on growing and logistics, doesn’t it. Everything depends on everything, there is no clear end of chain. Humans don’t naturally starve at scale anymore except in few fucked up regions.
I started using Braun electric razors about 34 years ago. This turns out to have been a good choice. They are lasting around 16 years each, on average. I recently had to get a new one; only the 3rd one I have had to buy in all that time.
No packaging used up for all kinds of shaving soap or cream or other products, no packaging or plastic or metal used up to buy thousands of blades, etc.
I've been using an electric razor for years, too, and I agree that they are much cheaper and more environmentally friendly.
The only reason I've had to replace them so far is that it becomes impossible to buy replacement blades and foil. So I have to buy a model that is only superficially different, instead of just replacing the expendables.
They do this on purpose, create non-interchangable disposable parts and EOL the system by ending manufacture of those parts.
You can do what the article says and just buy a double bladed razor, more environmentally friendly because you don't get stuck in this trap, the disposable part is just steel, it's easily manufactured and not proprietary. Or, you can buy the disposable parts for your electric shaver with the shaver, keeping in mind the actual, working lifespan of the device. Or, you can use a straight razor and a strop, no disposable parts necessary.
You do, but I have consistently found that you actually hardly ever have to do that, if you keep them clean. Certainly way, way less than the manufacturer insists that you have to.
In any case, whether you agree with me or not about this detail, it's vastly less use of throwaway plastics, less use of metal, less energy use from manufacturing and delivering all that stuff, and of course, way cheaper.
I've used a straight razor for almost 20 years. Vindicating to read that the price of a Dovo pays for itself. I think my bar of shaving soap is probably the better part of decade old as well. In the interim, a whole peculiar subculture around shaving has developed, but you don't have to be a part of it to just use a razor. Makes you unreachable by corporate marketing as well, which is itself its own reward.
I have a straight razor it's almost a lost art using one. I tried one but I figured I'd end up killing myself by accident. Plus I don't have to patience to sharpen and strop the blade.
A safety razor is also a great investment and cheap. I bought a Wilkinson Sword handle $20 and a pack of five blades $5. It's an old name-brand sold practically everywhere. I can get more than a month out of one double-sided blade. Plus it shaves very close much better than multi-blade razors.
It's better than the two, three, four, five blade monstrosities that always get clogged in days. They also cost far too much literally 5x more than safety razor blades.
I'm also shaving with a safety razor for 6+ years straight. The only problem is that you can't take the blades to the plane (when you're not checking the baggage in), so I have to use my old, unused cartridges on short trips, and use them until they dull when I return. This is good for using the old stock, too!
I've invested to a couple of stainless steel safety razors. An Edwin Jagger 3one6, and a Mühle R94. They're easy to maintain, have infinite life, and shave much better than top of the line cartridge razors from any manufacturer.
I also use a good but not expensive boar brush and shaving soap.
As a result, I either buy a new stick of shaving soap every six months, or a can of foam every year (for emergency morning shaves), and buying 100 blades every 2 years or so, for a much cleaner, comfortable and enjoyable shave for negligible money. Both razors have paid themselves as savings too.
Just want to warn that both razors are in the "efficient" category, which means they need some experience to use without any nicks, but they're not as wild as the open-combed, aggressive razors. If you want a milder, but equally long-living razor, go Mühle R89, Edwin Jagger EJ89, Merkur 34HD or Timor Gentle Butterfly.
+1 on the safety razor. I bought an Edwin Jagger model, a box of 100 Astra superior platinum blades, a nice brush and a tub of Arko soap. That was honestly over 5 years ago and I haven't spent a cent of shaving since then. I think I have 35 blades left. It's amazing how long they last. I'm really close to the end of the soap.
I've got an Edin Jagger model as well, used for many years now. Double-edged safety razor. I also use it to shave my head. Knifes I can generally use a couple of weeks before replacing and it's cheap to buy a box of like 100 knifes. That will probably last me multiple decades.
I use a safety razor as well but only because it's easier than getting mad at roommates for destroying my straight razor blades because they're too lazy to find a real knife. Straight razors are waaay quicker and easier to shave with, and I cut and scrape myself way less when using one.
I have a straight razor that uses replaceable blades (they're half-blades, not the double-sided mentioned in the article). I've been using it exclusively for the last 10 years. I'm only just now getting to the bottom of my original box of 100 blades.
I tried straight razor but it was just too much maintenance. Parker safety razor and plain old dove beauty bar have been the sweet spot for me. I like the idea of a straight razor but the maintenance just wasn't worth it. If my safety razor blade gets dull I just toss it and know that it's just iron and carbon and will degrade and not pollute the earth.
I use a safety razor, too. I shave really infrequently, as I’m now bearded, but I do use it regularly to keep the edges trim. I think I’m still on my original pack of razor blades which I bought for a few bucks 5 years ago. Really old bar soap, too. It’s inexpensive, simple, and not really any less convenient than the expensive new razors.
Aside from differences in cost, do you find anything about a straight razor compellingly better than e.g. a Gillette Mach 3?
I go through Mach 3 cartridges pretty slowly, so price isn't a big concern. And I don't notice anything deficient about the quality of my shaves. But one thing I really like about safety razors is that there's zero risk of serious injury.
Safety razors are much better at making a neckline, if you only shave clean partially and trim the remaining beard. Personally I also get less skin irritation from the safety razor compared to the Mach3 I used before. Given I use it correctly. If you move "against" the hair instead of "with" the hair it caused a lot of irritation for me. But that was essentially user error.
In total I would never go back to a Mach3. The safety razor is just the all around superior product at a fraction of the price once you use it correctly.
The “once you use it correctly” is worth highlighting though.
I tried the double edge safety razor. Got the brush, shaving cream, big pack of Astra blades. Watched a bunch of YouTube videos on technique.
Spent way more time shaving. Nicked myself an ungodly number of times. Somehow got a worse shave out of it. Ended up going back to the cartridge razor.
I really want to be a double edge razor guy, but I was not able to make it up the learning curve.
"I tried the double edge safety razor. Got the brush, shaving cream, big pack of Astra blades. Watched a bunch of YouTube videos on technique. Spent way more time shaving. Nicked myself an ungodly number of times."
Maybe it's the blades?
I started with Derby Extra blades[1], and without using any special technique I've nicked myself only maybe once a year with them.
The weight of the razor might also figure in to it -- I got a Parker 66R razor[2], which has a nice heft to it, which means I don't have to press in to my face with the razor -- the weight of the razor itself is enough.
If you had a plastic and/or light-weight razor maybe you had to press in to your face, which could account for the nicks.
I got a vintage Gillette handle off eBay - it definitely has heft.
Could be worth trying a different set of blades. The Astra Platinum were the Reddit hive mind recommend at the time, but this was ~8 years ago.
I’m also wondering if it might be a hair thing. My facial hair is thick/coarse, particularly on the upper lip, which is where I consistently nicked myself.
Short of a several pound handle I can’t imagine cutting it with the weight of the razor alone.
You probably don't need to be told this, as it's pretty obvious, but just in case: you should curl your upper lip in to your mouth when you shave to make the skin taught and decrease the odds of nicks.
Also, before starting to shave you should wet your facial hair with hot/warm water for a few minutes to soften it up. I usually wet my face as soon as I get in to my shower and shave inside the shower a few minutes later.
It took mea little while too, but I've been using safety razors for almost ten years. Yeah, it took just doing all the right things by intuition. Dialing in the angle of the razor as i held it, getting good blades, getting the face clean and hot. Also, don't shave every day. I get a much better and more comfortable shave if i have two or three days of stubble.
That's my experience as well. And if I don't go against the grain, I may not nick myself, but it doesn't result in a close shave at all. It feels like one day after I shave with a Mach3 which I can use against the grain.
I really want it to work, but it's literally a blood bath.
To help differential the styles, (double-edge) safety razors and cartridge (safety) razors are named slightly differently to help reduce confusion in general conversation:
the skinguard they have is great now. its basically a modernized mach3. super smooth and you can get away using it when its old and dull without being cut as much as the old mach3s, and it has a single blade on the back for edging.
There's a ritual to straight razor and traditional single-blade safety razor (what I use now) that is compelling in modern times when everything tells you to shave off minutes from every single thing in your life so you can free up your time. Seemingly this means just more time for internet browsing and things that have no impact on your life but I digress. The daily or semi-weekly ritual that takes time, attention and care is relaxing. I stopped using a straight razor since I couldn't get the edge as sharp as I'd like to but I may pick it up again once kids are older. I moved onto purchasing a $20 classic single-blade safety razor about 4 years back and now buy the razors in bulk. Can be very cheap depending on where you buy them. For the ones I buy it's probably $10 a year if that since I only shave every 3 days or so and a carton of 100 blades lasts a year. Does require 2 passes though but doing it right with shaving cream and brush is something I've come to enjoy.
> I stopped using a straight razor since I couldn't get the edge as sharp as I'd like to
Don’t get mad at me, but what you need is a 5000, 8000 and maybe 12000 grit Naniwa (or comparable) superstone. Also, a good strop. Leather would be sufficient.
Send your razor off for establishing a good edge to Portland Razor Co. Once you get it back, you should be able to maintain that edge with minimal fuss.
Carbon steels can get sharper but you need to be really on top of it on maintenance. Stainless steel is more durable and tolerates some abuse but does not retain edge as well.
Lastly, don’t hurry while shaving, and don’t drop the damn razor please.
For honing I swear by the Coticule stone[1], you only need the one stone as you can vary the grit. Tip: the non-rectangular stones are just as good and a fraction of the price.
Also guilty: I did start growing a beard after dropping my favorite razor :/
I couldn't manage it. I'd send mine off to get that edge, it would come back, I'd put it on the Nanis, ruin it, boom one shave. And those Naniwas were expensive. Went back to the safeties. I might try out shavettes one day.
For a daily use straight razor, about once a season or twice a year.
Remember that you keep a razor sharp by using the pasted strop and having a good maintenance routine. After a while the cutting edge becomes more convex, which is where the stone is needed to straighten out.
A coticule is flattened on every use, because you rub a smaller stone on it to create the milky suspension that will do the actual abrading. I've had the same stone for 20 years.
That has not been my experience with stripes. Things got way better once I did a quick pass On an "Arkansas" stone before each use, but I still need to use something coarser once a month or so.
Nailed it. Almost as if I wrote this. One difference in application, though, is it seems you change your blades every time. I’ve not found a good / meaningful cadence.
If you clean shave your face, then a safety razor is probably better as it's easier to glide along a large distance across your face. For me, a straight edge razor allows me to shape my beard better. I do cut myself pretty much every time (since the hairs on my neck go in a million different directions), but that's easily addressed by showering right after a shave + after shave cream. The cost benefits over a safety can't be overstated: the razor is a cheap one-time cost ($13 off Amazon at the time, you don't really need a "high quality" razor IMO), blades are single use but super cheap ($15 ish for 100 blades), and since I shave at most weekly I only have to buy blades once every few _years_. As always YMMV depending on your facial hair style.
For me I found that I get much less razor burn with a safety razor. Whenever I shaved with a Mach 3 or another 3 blade cartridge razor, I would always get razor burn on my neck from the two additional blades. Never had that issue with a safety razor.
Aha you can totally cut yourself with a safety razor (unless you mean the Mach 3 and not what this article is calling a double edged razor which has historically been called a "Safety razor" )
You can cut yourself with a multi-blade razor too. The point is, little of the blade is actually exposed, so it won't be a serious injury.
A straight edged razor, by contrast, is just a knife, that you actually can kill yourself with by slicing deep enough into your neck to take out a major artery. You can't do that with a safety/multi-edge razor.
With a "safety razor" you can really cut yourself. Surely it's my fault, but I don't want another visit to the E.R. I went back to Mach3, $30 per year is worth it to me compared to risking expensive emergency room visits.
I think you're confusing terms. A safety razor exposed no more of the blade than a cartridge razor. I think you're probably referring to a straight razor.
The straight razor incidents were pretty traumatizing, so much blood..
Stay safe <3
Edit: I double checked, it actually was with a safety razor. They don't have any buffer to avoid slicing you up compared to a mach3 or modern disposable razor. Please do be careful folks, they are super sharp and a single swipe can cut you up real good.
If you're using carbon steel (not stainless), they will turn back into dirt within a couple years/decades of weathering (aka turning into a heap of rust).
If feasible, re-smelting them would be superior, as it'd skip the ore-to-iron high temperature chemistry process.
> Aside from differences in cost, do you find anything about a straight razor compellingly better than e.g. a Gillette Mach 3?
Quality of shave. If you maintain your straight razor, and mind it, it does require some maintenance, the quality of shave is of no comparison. My wife can instantly make out the difference when I shave in a hurry with Mach 3.
More between DE and cut throat, leaning very heavily towards CT. Experimenting with one now: not a lot of margin of error with regards to technique as there is with DE.
Straight razor here too. Primarily because I wanted to get off the cost and waste wheel. It’s great.
I sharpen my own knife and woodworking tools. So learning to sharpen my razor is no big deal.
Now my only expense is occasionally buying some soap or aftershave once a year or so. And my time I suppose maintaining the razor which isn’t much at all.
>And my time I suppose maintaining the razor which isn’t much at all.
Definitely not the case for me. As someone whose been recently exploring properly sharpening some high quality kitchen knives at home, there's a cost in time for sure to do things correclty both learning and executing. Once you learn, it's not too bad but there's a learning curve and time factor that's difficult to ignore. I need to set aside a good hour or 1.5 hours on a given weekend to sharpen my knives (find and soak my soap stone, gather my knives, get back my angles and motions down pat).
I'm still a novice for sure and an expert may be able to sharpen quickly but that's a big difference from just grabbing a new disposable product ready to use. With a straight razor a certain amount of care also needs to be taken when shaving to reduce cuts -- safety razors aren't a bad invention overall. I suspect if you do a lot of regular shaving (e.g. body hair that's not just your face), it might become time consuming.
I'm not saying reuse and repair are bad investments, I'm a huge fan of these ideals, but the time involved can't be entirely ignored for some consumer products. In many (perhaps most) cases, I agree with the thesis of the article that modern business practices are becoming increasingly misaligned from consumers and societies interests and becoming nothing but wealth extraction optimization factories in various forms. But, I think not all products are so clear cut and some legitimate progresses are not reasonable tradeoffs for everyone, like a safety razor (maybe not cartridge based but similar to the one described in this article). Now a safety razor for a cartridge is a pretty close set of advantages/disadvantages with clear cost savings.
Sure, learning how to sharpen is non-negligible. Like most skills it takes time to gain proficiency at first and pays off later.
I only have to sharpen my straight razor maybe twice a year at most.
Kitchen knives depends on use but a typical sharpening is 15 minutes maybe? I might do this 3 - 4 times a year.
I do woodworking with hand tools which need to be sharpened far more often and that is fairly time consuming... but so is making wood projects from hand tools. I consider it part of the process.
If we get to fully economic decision making the case can be made to prefer convenience over all else because of paperclip maximization. Instead of buying organic clothes made by hand and spending the time to maintain and repair them we prefer fast-fashion. It's cheaper in time and money to simply buy a brand new shirt. Along with the many other benefits it entails.
But that has a cost too, doesn't it? Landfills chock full of disposed-of clothes, beaches covered in cables of clothes that have washed up on shore, and they're mostly made of oil-based products and will take centuries to degrade. People with families and children literally starving and wrecking their bodies in sweat shops to produce these throw-away, convenient, cheap clothes.
Some times taking time to do things the slow, inconvenient way has a lot of benefits too that are not immediately obvious until we take a step back and stop trying to be in such a rush.
I use safety razors because it is must sharper than a regular disposable razor. As a result, you don't need to do multiple passes over the same area which leads to less razor burn and skin irritation. I buy a couple hundred new blades every few years for $25-$30 and never have to throw money away on a $10 Mach XXX or whatever... I am actually surprised more dermatologists and skin experts haven't recommended safety/straight razors.
ymmv. its interesting reading everyones different techniques and experiences here. I've never felt I had to do two passes with a 3 blade. I let them get dull too before they are swapped out, although these 3 blades are for sensitive skin so they are nicer than your standard mach3. I'm probably paying less than you for blades a year though. I can't remember when I bought the huge $35 pack I have.
That number seems incredibly high to me. The most I've seen blades go for in any kind of volume is around $0.20/blade. Even if you were discarding them every day, that would only account for $70/year. You can admittedly buy some rather nice shave soap, but $180/year still seems aggressive.
I admittedly don't shave every day, but I've been using a safety razor since 2013. I went back and tallied up all of the purchases for materials, including my razor, and I believe I've spent a little over $200 for that entire period, so maybe $25/year.
I buy Feather blades at around 44 cents a blade, and I use a new blade every day.
I have coarse hair, so that dulls the blade faster. And shaving a whole head probably counts as like three face shaves (in terms of both blades and shaving soap.)
For soap I use Proraso (which is cheap) or Taylor of Old Bond Street (unscented - they call it "organic" - which is not cheap.)
In the past I stretched blades and spent far less, but the experience was not as enjoyable.
Shaving is like an Inception-level hierarchy of waste and affectation. It's easy to feel superior because you ditched the biggest brands, and still be wasting your money on unnecessary and crappy products because you were tricked by marketing. Those hipster shave-by-mail clubs are not really better than Gillette. And the safety razor market-disguised-as-a-community is also full of waste disguised by hipster affectations. Specialty soaps, exotic animal hair brushes, elaborate rituals, etc. Underneath it all is the fact that you CAN buy a cheap, adequate, no-name safety razor somewhere, and you can buy cheap adequate blades in bulk with some trial and error, and you can find some combination of products that will work on your skin without going for specialty and prestige. Don't buy these things as tokens of a lifestyle, buy them for utility.
Honestly the wetshaving (safety razor, brush, etc) community is also a wealth of knowledge for bang-for-your-buck shaving. It’s simple enough to get in, soak up the knowledge you need, get out. You don’t have to buy into the acquisition hype, and the community is generous enough that you can often get started for free on some decent basics.
Wet shaving is also a great experience IMO, even with dirt cheap razors and soaps and brushes I prefer it. As the article stated a single safety razor handle will last basically a lifetime too.
Dirt cheap doesn’t mean a bad shave too, which is where that wealth of knowledge can come in handy. Astra plat blades are both some of the cheapest and also smoothest blades around for example.
But it's not necessary to turn shaving into a hobby with toys and status symbols (look at all the conspicious brand-name-dropping going on in these comments). However, the anti-Gillette marketing zeitgeist makes you think that that is THE alternative. Looking for information about safety/straight razor usage will undoubtedly suck someone into SEO-friendly shaving "enthusiast" traps unless they avoid it. People should be aware that there is a cheap, simple, boring, utilitarian alternative, but the "alternative shaving culture" will try to mislead them, even if from innocent enthusiasm.
Or just buy a safety razor (mine is a simple one made of plastic and some metal weight in the handle) and a bunch of double edge blades and call it a day.
If some people want to turn it into a hobby where they obsess over badger hair brushes and so on, that's also fine. Nobody is ever forced to buy that sort of stuff.
All marketing tries to mislead people to spend money on "unnecessary" stuff. That's what people mostly spend their disposable income on. And Americans have tons and tons of disposable income, so they are good targets for marketing. I don't see the same thing in Germany for example as people are generally more careful with their money and don't have ginormous amounts of it like Americans (look up the disposable incomes). For example, you're (assuming you're American) also getting screwed by the mattress industry.
Which is why it might as well be the pro-Gillette marketing zeitgeist. Too easy to turn away from something under the assumption you'll just get sucked into it and waste a lot of money. Another good example of this is the fountain pen community. As a total outsider, I was actually under the impression that a fountain pen cost well over $100 and was difficult to maintain and write with. I happened to randomly look into it one day only to discover that some very well regarded pens are only $30 or so, write well on almost everything, and will last for years of high quality writing.
Yeah, it's pretty much the same effect. Hobbies can cost as much as most hobbyists are willing to pay. Then you get elitism, you get sneers that some beginners are using "too good" equipment that they haven't earned yet (e.g. complaints that beginner photo hobbyists using "too good" cameras) etc. It's just human behavior. As a beginner or casual hobbyist, you need to find a beginner-friendly and mature (ie non-childish) community that understands different levels of involvement, understands there is life outside the hobby as well, understands budgets etc.
I bought my razor a long time ago but I think it was just in an American chain drugstore, which others have mentioned. Amazon is probably the easiest place with the best selection of blades at decent prices. Might take a few tries to find a brand you like, so you'd want to avoid large quantities at first. I've heard there can be counterfeit blades but I've also heard that might be bull.
> Cooking equipment: essentially indestructible Cast Iron skillets transition into teflon pans. The newer pans perform worse, and must be replaced on a shockingly regular basis.
I fell for this marketing thinking non-stick was the best out of everything always and kept having to buy new pans and trays when the teflon would eventually flake off thinking it was my fault. Stainless steel is fine: works without a lot of food sticking for most things, comes out clean from the dishwasher, doesn't require much care, and there's no easily damaged coating so should last decades.
Related but more because of recipes writers repeating tips without considering waste, but I find there's almost zero need for tinfoil, wax paper or plastic wrap either. A reusable silicone mat works if you need a non-stick surface or to cover a dish or bowl, and you can reuse food plastic containers to store things in the fridge. Most e.g. bread recipes insist on putting plastic wrap over the bowl of dough when proving when you can just use a plate, silicone mat or dish towel.
The plastic waste thing is kind of silly. People commenting here mostly live near well managed landfills and aren't worrying about burning 10 pounds of oil driving to work.
Like fine, feel free to use less plastic, but it really isn't a big portion of most people's resource consumption.
That's true, however we don't have exact control on every aspect of our lives. I'd love to walk, bike or use mass transportation to go to work, however it's very impractical (~2 hours vs. 20 minutes), but I have more control over consumption of other things in my life.
So, I can do my best on areas which I have most control, and do whatever I can on the areas with less control, and if you ask me, it's better than nothing.
Why create waste if you don't need to for no real benefit especially in cases where it's minimal effort to avoid? I'm not saying this tip alone is going to save the planet, but you could use the same reasoning to say it doesn't matter if you litter. Not creating waste and littering when it can be easily avoided should be the sane default.
It's far far creepier to be overly concerned about plastic waste than about the gasoline cars on the road. Plastic waste has almost zero impact, zero, compared to the gasoline, brake dust, and tire microplastics coming off of cars.
Where do all the microplastics in bodies of water come from? It's not plastic waste in landfills, it's tires on the road, which wear down and wash into bodies of water. Every single time your drive.
Recently it was found that an essential chemical in tires for hardening them breaks down into neurotoxins that are killing massive amounts of salmon in the pacific northwest. Where is the public outcry? Nowhere!!
So that is what incredibly creepy: people pretend to care about the environment to the point they make massive judgements over plastic waste, but they refuse to even consider the amount of driving that's forced onto nearly every person in the US, and we don't even consider ways to reduce that environmental impact, or allow people to even choose to live with less impact. Instead we ban the types of city planning that would allow people to go about their daily lives without the climate destroying, COPD causing, microplastic creating form of travel: cars.
I didn't want to get in an argument with with you because you seem to presume A LOT. So much "we" and "people" in your posts. This is one of the reasons your take frustrated me as much as it did. Mid 20s, still high on hormons?
The way you argue is pointing out things that you do, and applying said behaviours to everyone else, or at least the the people on this site. Again, very frustrating.
I, for one, do not drive a car. Nor does my wife. We only use our tiny - by your US standards - every few months, and just for a few hundred kilometers. So yeah, you don't get to tell me how much I pollute or waste because you don't know me. I didn't say anything about cars until now but I hate almost everything them and especially the people who "can't imagine life without" them.
Your initial post was a really bad take. At least admit to that. My response was a shit one. See, if I can take some responsibility, so can you
Environmental protection is not something that's solved by personal choice, it's solved by changing our system to a circular economy. Perhaps individual choice can pioneer new ways to live, and demonstrate that other lifestyles are possible that are just as fulfilling and convenient as more environmentally damaging ones. But in the end, environmental protection is a "we" and "people" problem not a "me" or "I" problem.
I did not make the post you were responding to. So asking me to take responsibility, accusing me of being young and full of hormones, is yet more of a shit post in your part.
I tend to find that in my (many more than 20) years on this planet that when responding to someone, the utmost important thing to speak the truth, and secondly to respond in kind in order to be most likely to understood by the person you are talking to. So if you apologize for your post, I too apologize for responding in kind.
Fair enough. I had no idea I wasn't talking to "maxerickson". The 20s and the request for an apology thing was aimed at that person's initial comment that I responded directly to. Your contribution did not ask for that. I am sorry.
I do agree policy is the most important factor. But policy is not created in a complete vacuum. What the vast majority of people do and think is important. The outrageous amounts of perfectly good plastic that is thrown away is criminal. Just for food alone. Dear god.
Downplaying all this completely unnecessary waste because car fuel, tires and brakes pollute as well is odd. Especially given the fact that plastic waste is not just containers dumped in a landfill. Plastic bags are fucking disgusting and their remnants have be found virtually everywhere on the planet, including oceans, mountains, and jungles.
"We" is our society and laws and common discussion topics and social mores, etc.
Let's keep on using the "creepy" adjective here, because I think I applies especially to this comment, even more than the prior one.
Who sets the laws for how buildings are built and whether we have to drive or not? Local communities (at least in the US). So people can get involved, change what is legal and not legal to build, and advocate for it on the local level.
That's what I have been doing for the last five or so years. And what I find realt creepy about the experience is how people will go out of their way to criticize others for small, meaningless actions like reducing single waste plastic, but go ballistic at the idea that we should allow some people to live in a way that doesn't force them to drive every single day and for every trip out of the house.
> People drive not because they want to, but because they have to.
If that is the case, then why don't they make their voices heard? I certainly don't hear anybody voicing that when we do have a chance to allow communities to be built that don't force driving. Instead I head person after person after person demanding that housing and mixed use communities be banned.
At one of the meetings I was at, trying to advocate for a mixed use building, some commenter mentioned an aside of having all single use drinking containers have a tax. None, not a single one, of the board members expressed enthusiasm for this mixed use building that, as a single building, would have far bigger impact than banning all single use cups in the city. But boy did the board take up the idea of taxing single use containers, and not two years later we have a $0.25 charge when you get a to go cup at a coffee shop, but we still have a huuuuuuuuuge fight over every single bit of environment saving buildings.
> Criticizing that is a highly privileged take.
That's utter BS, and a commonly used dodge by people who don't want any change. Of course we can criticize a system, particularly as we change it. Saying that it's "privileged" to point out that people are forced to drive, which is what I said, is utter nonsense. And frankly, extremely creepy.
People are really creepy about cars. They will excuse them, apologize for them, ignore all the damage they do, and even criticize people that point out these massive flaws, before people will admit that maybe we should st least let some people live without them.
The fact of the matter is that the US is laid out in a way that cars are necessary for most places. Even if you actually get people to vote and participate in their local politics, that does not change how things are already laid out. It's not going to magically fix neighborhoods being 10-20 mins driving away from grocery stores and businesses.
I -want- to reduce car usage, but I'm also realistic.
"If that is the case, then why don't they make their voices heard?"
Some people do. See strong towns for example. Yeah, there's also NIMBY-ism. Turns out people working minimum wage jobs (who have to commute because they can't afford to live downtown) don't have as much time or energy to participate in local politics as well-off folks. But let's keep on blaming people!!
Also, I'm not sure if you understand what creepy means. Even if your points may be correct, I'm disinclined to engage with someone who calls everyone who doesn't exactly agree with them "creepy".
Option 3: You are obviously wrong. Take a tally of all the pollution you create in a week, and you'll probably find that plastic waste from the kitchen is rounding error.
Be sure to include stuff like heating and cooling, transport, clothing, and any other purchaes you make. (99% of the stuff we buy will eventually be garbage, after all.)
"Obviously" goes way too far here, even if you are including greenhouse gasses in the tally, which aren't pollution by traditional standards. My apartment's electricity and the public transportation I use to get around are powered by renewable energy sources that don't create pollution. In the average week (or month) 95% of the plastic waste I create is from inefficiently packaged foods, which definitely counts as "kitchen" plastic waste. Probably 99% of the plastic I've purchased in the last 2 years is for kitchen items.
I don't think my situation is particularly unusual.
What about clothes, bedding, consumables, etc? Don't forget the stuff thrown away while producing that stuff.
Also, you should figure in depreciation on things like the apartment itself, vehicles, and transportation of the stuff you buy.
100% renewable energy is great, if true where you are. Most places still use natural gas peaker plants, at least.
Consuming electricity during the day is cleaner than at peak, but even if you're producing your own energy (or your utility is 100% greenhouse free, regionally), the electricity you use could have displaced dirty production elsewhere on the grid. (Also, even solar and wind produce pollution -- they have embodied carbon and finite lifespans).
I'm not arguing against reducing household plastic waste, but the idea that you see most of the pollution that's created by stuff you consume is optimistic.
Anyway, according to the EPA, US municipal solid waste is 12.2% plastic (excluding construction waste, sewage sludge, etc). The US is likely higher than most places:
Apparently you buy a lot more stuff than I do. I am painfully aware of the amount of perfectly good bottles and plastic containers I throw in the "recycle" bins every other week. Couple of half full reusable bags. Still less than what many people I know contribute in a day but who's judging.
It truly does less environmental harm than burning the typical amount of fossil fuel driving to work each day that he mentioned. You can quantify it. CO2 emissions from plastic production are comparable to the mass of plastic which is dwarfed by, say, a litre of petrol.
Landfills aren't an environmental problem. People have just been somehow conditioned to hate them for no particular reason.
What the heck are y’all doing that you are flaking off the non-stick coating? We have a nice set we got for our wedding, and even after using them nearly every day for a decade they look brand new and the coating is still flawless.
I've had the same with an expensive set as well as cheaper sets. I know to avoid exposing them to very high heat or metal but they end up flaking anyway. At least with materials like stainless steel you'd have to do something extreme to damage them so it's not likely to happen accidentally.
That I can believe. The non-stick pans the grocery store sells are barely thicker than disposable pie tins and can be bent with your own two hands. Wouldn’t surprise me if the coating is poorly applied as well.
You can fairly quickly get a temporary non-stick coating on a stainless steel pan by seasoning it as you would a cast iron pan: spread a tiny amount of oil around the pan, heat until just smoking, allow to cool.
Not just temporary. Steel pans can get fantastic non-stick properties if you season them like a cast iron pan. In fact it's even more important to perform a dedicated seasoning on steel, because they don't absorb the fat as easy as cast iron do during normal cooking. It also disappears after a while so in that sense you could say it's temporary.
Once you've done this you should also avoid detergent, dishwasher and acid (tomato sauce). Again - just like a cast iron skillet. Which is a shame because it's easy to believe one of the benefits with a steel pan is that it is convenient to pop into the dishwasher.
Not a new phenomenon: Gillette patented the technique that Wilkinson Sword had invented for making stainless steel blades, and suppressed the production of the much longer lasting stainless steel blades for a while because they "knew that any gain for them in market share would be overwhelmed by the dramatic reduction in the size of the market"[0] (side note: when Wilkinson Sword started producing stainless steel blades using the technique they invented they were "forced to pay royalty to Gillette for each blade it sold"[1]).
Add dishwasher pods to the list. It’s literally just smoke and mirrors for nearly the same formula as powder, only less of it per package. All those fancy colors? It’s die. It’s the same formula across the entire pod. So… Yep: more cost, more waste, and it has some reasonable downsides. For “convenience,” since I guess deciding how much to put into the tray is just too much work.
I watched this video and was very excited to try out the powder, since I’ve just been using the pods they sell at Costco for my entire adult life.
But there are Problems.
1. You can’t find powder anywhere. Not a single grocery store near me sells it. Gel, sure. Pods, sure. Powder, not even Wal-mart had it, and they have everything. I finally found a faded and dented box at an Ace Hardware, where I wasn’t even looking for it.
2. The pour spout is a pain in the butt to open. I don’t have long nails (due to a very bad habit), and it takes me dozens of seconds every time to open.
3. A single clump makes it even more annoying. Now you have to figure out how to break the clump (because it’s blocking the spout), or you have to shake the box for a long time.
4. Speaking of shaking. If you get too much powder in the cracks around the dispenser, it won’t close anymore! Now you have to figure out how to get the powder out of the cracks before you can close and run the machine.
I’m sure it’s cleaning my dishes a little better, but I am not going to buy another box of powder. The marginal convenience of the pods is much higher than Alec claims. I’m going back to the product that I can actually buy in enormous bulk at Costco.
Yep, that seems like what happened. I went down the detergent aisle at my local grocery store today, and they had a brand-name and two different scents of store-brand powdered detergent.
It's also easy to tell how many pods/loads you have left. Switched to Finish pods after Cascade powder stopped working for me. They took out the phosphorus or whatever apocalyptic chemical du jour it was. Things are almost as clean.
His video about dish washer pods explain they also work significantly worse since your dishwasher was designed with a pre-rinse area to use soap twice during a cleaning cycle. A pod will not be able to be used twice and leaves dishes dirtier.
I don't understand, the pod goes into the same spot as the powder though? It shouldn't matter if its wrapped in a little membrane since a the end of the day you are putting in the same amount of powder into the same spot. The cascade pods at least are just powder aliquoted out for you.
Not saying this is the case as I don't know what dishwasher you have, but one of the points of the video is that this recommendation is often part of a marketing deal and as such shouldn't be trusted. I think it'd say in small print in the manual if this is the case.
Except that it’s also way more expensive and wasteful (edit: both because you have to buy them more often and because each pod is more packaging and the packaging for all of the pods has to be sealed, unlike powder in cardboard…) than just grabbing the powder. If the discomfort from using powder over plastic pods is anything more than completely trivial to you, I’m not sure we can communicate meaningfully on this subject matter.
The tablets I use are wrapped into some kind of wrapper that dissolves in the dishwasher (I think it's some sort of gelatin) so there's no real waste other than the bag they came in. A big bag of tablets lasts me over a year so I really see few downsides here.
To me that sounds like you don’t use your dishwasher that often. Which is fine, good even. But the thing is, for me, the box of powder lasts like, multiple times longer. If a huge bag of pods lasted me a year, I can only imagine the powder would last three. Across the whole industry, the trivial increase in plastic waste instead of less cardboard waste is probably quite colossal, and all for basically nothing.
I ditched pods some time ago and use powder now. I had an issue that occurred almost every time I used the dishwasher (with pods), it left things slightly smelly. Nothing major, other people didn’t really notice it but for me it was a major source of frustration. Powder got rid of the smell, and now I am a happy man. I can pick a glass from the cabin and it doesn’t smell like anything. Wish I had learned this 10 years ago when we got our first dishwasher, and it’s cheaper too!
Smelly "dishwasher smell" on your dishes is usually fixed by cleaning out the filters in my experience, and ensuring the dishwasher is actually loaded properly.
In particular, it's critical to ensure the washing arms can rotate freely, something my flatmates (some of whom are engineers) will never understand no matter how many times I try to explain it to them! Otherwise the dishes will come out looking clean-ish but actually smelly and not properly clean.
Heh, I ran out of detergent not that long ago and had to improvise some with an Internet Recipe of baking soda and a few drops of dish soap. Some of plastics came out with a bit of chalky water marks, but the dishwasher itself was completely odorless for the first time. Filed it away in my memory to run some baking soda every now and then.
Oh, if you're in a hard water area (like many parts of the UK), it really helps to use salt! Where I grew up we never used salt because the water wasn't hard, but in London (for example) it makes a massive difference.
All dishwashers seem to have a reservoir for salt but of course people only tend to use it in regions where it's needed.
Cascade platinum is the only thing that works for me yet only comes in pod form. Buying a 90 pack from Costco improved the economics of having to use them however.
If we do one dishwasher load a day, that is 42.5 minutes saved a year. I value my time at around $150 an hour, which means unless the pods cost me more than $100 extra a year, the trade off is worth it.
It's not a question of where you live, but of how much you value your time.
It's been estimated that Elon Musk's time, for example, is worth around $22,000 per minute. So if he's wasting 7 seconds messing around with his dishwasher, that's a lost opportunity cost of $2566.
The key thing to recognize with modern Gillette cartridges is that the blades last a lot longer than the lubricating strips. For me, those lubricating strips last a couple of shaves at most but I get 15-20 shaves out of the blades.
When the strip wears off the shaves get a bit uncomfortable while that stuff peels off but then they start to feel better again after that. A friend of mine actually hates the strip so much that she scrapes it off brand new razor cartridges before using them for the first time! I think the discomfort caused by the worn out lubricating strip is a subtle push by Gillette to get people to toss the cartridge and start a new one before the blades have even begun to dull.
I don’t want to risk sounding disgusting, I use a Mach III to shave my face…daily. Now I have a beard, so I don’t shave my whole face. Neck, cheeks … but I get 6 months to a year out of one cartridge on these. Having just replaced, I agree 100% about the lubrication strip.
You can get the cartridges to last quite a while if you strop them (as best you can) and keep them away from moisture when not in use. I have heard of some people just putting them in a tiny glass of mineral oil.
That said for as often as I shave, a couple times a week, I switched to a safety razor and got a sampler of double sided blades years ago. I am just about out of blades now and you can get 100 for like 10$.
> When highly refined, mineral oils do not cause any adverse effects. However, if the petroleum is not highly refined, it may include polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons (PAHs), which are carcinogenic. This means it may increase the risk of cancer.
> A 2019 article notes that in Europe, companies are only allowed to use mineral oils in cosmetics if they comply with specific purity regulations regarding PAHs. These regulations and safety requirements ensure that the mineral oils go through the refining process to remove any substances that may cause cancer and reduce the presence of PAHs.
> However, according to the Campaign for Safe Cosmetics, the mineral oils used in the United States are not as refined as they are in Europe.
> As a result, people should avoid buying products that contain mineral oil unless the label states that it is fully refined as white petrolatum or white mineral oil. White mineral oil is highly purified and meets specifications to ensure that it is safe to use in over-the-counter products.
I have no idea as I don't use the cartridges myself but I think the point is to keep them away from moisture so a closed container with ethanol or food grade oil or whatever would probably work as well.
I usually shave with a DE but do use cartridges sometimes.
I really wish you could purchase them without the lubricating strip. I have no proof but strongly suspect they encourage microbial growth and contribute to skin irritation.
Why is a thread on electric razors not the top comment on a post about the expense/waste of straight razors?
I get that they have some downsides, but if we’re talking about the expense/waste of straight razors, then it would make sense to consider electric razors.
I’ve seen so many ads about companies trying to “invent” the most effective, lowest cost straight razor and it still confuses me, given we already have electric razors that will last literally years before needing to be replaced.
I’ve been using my current electric razor for probably close to 10 years, and while the blades could probably use to be replaced (still on the original), they get the job done about 98%, which is completely fine given the expense, waste, and mess of straight razors.
Edit: the article itself doesn’t even mention electric razors (as a solution to the expense/waste of straight razors), almost as if they don’t even exist. And before I posted this (after 3 hours of comments), maybe only one or two other buried comments referenced electric razors. So genuinely curious why so many don’t even give them a second thought?
I started shaving a few years ago with a cheap Chinese electric razor. It needs cleaning occasionally but is otherwise trouble free. It shaves close enough to get a good respirator seal, which is close enough for me. It's impossible to injure myself with it, and it's so easy to use that I can literally shave while browsing the web.
Unless you are concerned with getting the closest shave possible, electric seems the obvious choice.
And it's worth noting that a blade razor usually removes a bit of the top layer of skin, causing irritation, ingrown hairs (on top of avoiding injury from cuts).
There are some really fantastic electric razors that are cheap and get close enough that it makes no visual difference, except they don't cut the hairs under the skin so I haven't had an ingrown hair in years and years.
I too use a Merkur safety razor (for the past ~18 years) and Feather blades. I only shave once a week nowadays (with very few exceptions). It’s my weekly routine: it takes me some time, but I get the shave I want.
I get around a dozen shaves or more from a single feather blade. Bought a box of a 100 for $35 after trying a variety pack of blades and fixing on the Feather brand, and at around 3 shaves a week and just trimming up around my goatee and neck, I think I am somewhere around 1-2 cents per shave and probably golden until the robot overlords take over.
Much better than $15/mo I was spending for cartridge razors. I’ll never go back.
Agree. But the good thing is, you don't have to entirely give up your awesome turbo cartridge shave. I still will use one when I'm in a hurry or something. But my day-to-day shaving is done for far less money. I may buy a pack of cartridges every other year or so.
If you have thick hair then it's probably better to get cheap Derby/Shark/Lord blades and just use them for one shave. Gives a great shave every time & is still very cheap.
I’m using a higher-end Panasonic I bought over ten years ago, which is a foil type rather than the three head. Works great. Still have to replace blades every so often - far less often than a safety razor - and the foil periodically/rarely. Electrics are never as close as blades (despite marketing) but far easier, far quicker, and amortized out over many years, pretty cheap. Cheap electrics suck, so prioritize best shave quality within the electric razor type (foil vs three disc) that’s most compatible with your face and get the functionally best example you can afford, ignoring add-on gadgets like cleaning stations etc.
I don't want to link to vendors, but I've had the "Philips Norelco OneBlade Hybrid Electric Trimmer and Shaver" for years, replaced the blade once, shave with it at least every other day, and it's been closer than anything else I've tried.
But I've also had it several years and the technology I'm sure constantly improves.
> Why is a thread on electric razors not the top comment on a post about the expense/waste of straight razors?
The post doesn’t even mention straight razors [1].
Also, I’m not sure electric razors are the less wasteful solution. Any electric appliance is likely to be much more environmentally costly to manufacture than a simple gadget. It certainly can’t compare with safety razors (or double-edged razors, as called in the article).
I won’t comment on the convenience of electric razors. My very limited experience with them (and not only mine) is that they don’t work on all beards, or if you don’t shave every day.
I've been using a safety razor for years and figured I was getting a pretty good deal out of it. Then a few months ago I reached into my travel bag without looking and sliced my finger open badly; the resulting stitches and tetanus shot came out to about $200, probably wiping out whatever money I'd saved by using them.
I still think it's a good deal.. if you're careful.
I've looked around a lot, but find traveling with safety razors to be surprisingly annoying. I cant really find anything that will clip or wrap around the top like I can for cartridge razors. The other problem is flying with them. Since they're large and metal they often get flagged. If I remember correctly, the advice was to put the blades in your checked bag, but I still get flagged because they see a big handle and I often travel without checking a bag.
I also switched away from a DE when I shave in the shower. I'm too afraid of dropping a heavier handle with a sharp blade attached.
I suppose I've been getting lucky, but I've flown probably two dozen times (domestic in the US) with safety razor + blades in my carry-on luggage and it's never been noticed. The first time was a mistake, but after their scanners didn't notice I stopped caring. This has reinforced my belief that the TSA is mostly worthless.
I'm not sure how I'll pack my razor next time (the time I cut myself was the last time I traveled) but I'll have to change how I do things going forward. Maybe I'll put the whole thing into one of those plastic clamshell soap containers, although that would be a bit bulky.
One subtle problem I've noticed with shaving in the shower is whisker splinters. Twice (both times during the pandemic, after not shaving for two or three weeks) I've gotten a whisker embedded into the bottom of my foot and didn't figure out what the strange pain was until a few hours later when it worked itself in deep enough that I couldn't ignore it anymore. I think this only happens if I've let my hair grow too long, so now I avoid this.
Yep, I've had two electric razors in my adult life (now in my late 40's) and they do the job well enough for me. Need periodically washed out and regularly charged, but apart from that they're maintenance free.
Both Philips, only got rid of the first one as it got broken by being knocked off a high shelf.
The idea of shaving being expensive, just seems ... odd.
Same for me; I've used Philips/Norelco rotary shavers for almost[1] all of my 45+ shaving years. As the battery technology has gotten better (NiCd: awful!; NiMh: decent; Li-Ion: wow!), the shavers last longer and longer; I bought a dup of my current shaver on sale for $20 as a backup maybe 5 years ago, but it's still unopened.
So the idea that "shaving is getting expensive" strikes me as silly; I'm sure you could spend thousands if you wanted to, but that's a choice.
[1] I tried a Braun "wet or dry" shaver, but one drop in the shower was the end of that "upscale purchase".
And I never cut myself or get razor burn with an electric razor. I also don't have to worry about running out of shaving cream or whether my shaving cream is too big to pack on an airplane.
I switched to electric years ago and will never go back.
I've replaced the blade on mine like once in years... I'm honestly surprised by the different experience. Maybe it's because I use a trimmer on the lowest setting before trying to do a real "shave", so any stubble is short.
I have a weird combination of skin type and hair. My skin will inflame if I use an electric razor, even using a cheap 2 layer razor will make me itch and scratch for a week. The two things that do work are shaper electric ones (can't get a close shave with that) and 3 blade cartridge ones. Thankfully I can get away with rarely grooming completely, just use the shaper.
I think it's preference. I started out using electric when I first started shaving when I was like 16 or something. As soon as I tried actual razors I couldn't go back. Been like 26 years now.
I guess it’s hard to imagine the upsides of straight razors justifying the (apparent) downsides. I mean, other than a somewhat closer shave, it seems like everything else about them is worse (expense, waste, time/effort, mess, cuts/removing skin, ingrown hairs).
It’s a little pedantic, but what you’re calling “straight razor”, you probably mean “disposable razor” or “cartridge razor”. There is also “safety razor” which has replaceable blade, shown in the article. The “straight razor” looks like a long foldable knife.
So TFA addresses the expense/waste issue. If you're using a safety razor (or a leaf[1] if you prefer the multi blade style), and are buying blades from feather or similar.
Technique will eliminate ingrown hairs/cuts etc,
The exfoliation provided by using a razor (disposable, safety, or straight) is something some people find desirable (see also microblading) YMMV
Time and effort is more interesting to me. For me the time spent shaving (and on other parts of self care) is part of the value of shaving in the first place. This isn't a process that I choose to speed up
As for travelling, I use a soap puck rather than shaving foam or cream, so TSA doesn't care about that, blades are more of a crap shoot.
[1] https://leafshave.com — I use one of these for armpits and back hair, and then a traditional style merker for face
It's not about "closer shave." Electric razors never get close enough for me. Complete areas of my face they do nothing to and it just causes irritation on my skin. Frustrating, takes way too long vs my DE razor.
Eh, shaving isn't that hard. I know we've gotten lazy but holy crap. A DE shave never results in any of that for me. Shower, lather, apply, shave. 5 minutes.
I have a DE razor and am using it for the weekend or other special occasions only because the fast way is too fast for my skin and beard (beard is like steel...). I need it properly prepared and that takes more time than I want to spend in the morning on normal days. I use an electric one than.
And I mean, why not? I quite enjoy to take some time if I don't have to wake up early for it. I listen to my audiobook and do it properly.
It's weird that men still shave at all to be honest. The world is casual enough that you're not expected to have a "close" shave. I use a Wahl Peanut with no guard, takes maybe one minute. Costs $65 and lasts 5 years easily.
You can also use it to give yourself a buzz cut, if you're so inclined, and save even more money.
That'a fair, I believe it. I've tried it and do like it.
But the marginal gain in closeness I get from a wet shave versus the method mentioned above, when paired with cost, razor burn / irritation / breakouts, and cuts, doesn't seem worth it to me.
Your talking about electric 'shavers'. "Electric razors" AFAIK don't exist. There are plenty of good options for keeping your hair neat but I've never seen of one that can give you the type of clean shave you get with a plain ol fashioned razor, at least not if you have coarse/dark hair.
I've tried three different electrics and in every case the performance degraded over time making them less comfortable to use. A replacement head restored the original performance, but it was not inexpensive. I'd estimate the costs were not very different from cartridge razors for a typical user who would not be able to replace the batteries when they wear out. Options that take AC power or use field-replaceable batteries would be better, but those don't seem to be the norm now.
I use a straight razor now. The initial cost was high and there's a learning curve, but comfort is great ongoing costs are minimal: shaving soap (much cheaper than anything that comes in a can, even for premium options) and cubic boron nitride paste for my strop (this is not conventional).
I shave my head as well as my face, and I’ve only gone through two razors in 15 years. I’m only a couple years into using the second one.
The first one I actually broke down, cleaned, and partially repaired several times. I replaced wiring that had corroded and had to replace small parts. I suppose I might be on my third by now if I couldn’t repair stuff.
They do the job quickly and make it so a regular razor is easier to use if you want that close of a shave. I rarely care that much because the electric gets almost indiscernibly close by my standards
I also use electric. Bought a very cheap one in college and now a decade later only now needed to replace it because the battery stopped holding a charge and had to keep it plugged in while using it. About annually I would put a drop of oil on it and that’s all.
Now I recently purchased a very expensive version (comparatively) and it does the same job.
>"I get that they have some downsides, but if we’re talking about the expense/waste of straight razors, then it would make sense to consider electric razors."
I've tried using electric, even expensive ones few times in my life but had always ended up with skin irritation starting to develop. No soup for me ;(
I use my cast-iron pan before I leave for work, then I shave my face on the way using a ladies' electric single-foil type.
Actually these came with a trimmer on each side of the foil which you need when taking down a full bush, but I remove these and just use the foil.
It takes a lot of passes but I have plenty of time while traveling.
Brush & blow it out completely every time.
I tried reversing the procedure and shaving before I left for work, but the cast-iron skillet proved about as useful as tits on a bull while commuting.
Fortunately, the lady who gave me the shaver and the skillet decided not to use them while commuting herself, so here I am the lucky one.
Hair trimmer set to shortest length will make your face like shaven 2 days ago. Costs nothing. Needs no foam, no aftershave gel, creates no irritation or red skin, just splash of water and optional facial creme. My condolences to those who must have a clean shave every day of their life.
With my trimmer (Philips OneBlade) I'd say the result is more like "shaven 1 day ago". I kinda like the idea of a good ol' safety razor but so far I always got skin irritations from those. With trimmer I do not experience those issues. The blades are more on the expensive side with about 10 Euro per blade. But I replace those only about every three months. So it's not a big deal.
That’s what I do as well - a beard trimmer without any guards. I always struggled with ingrown hairs after shaving, both with cartridges and with a safety razor.
I do it once a week. I have a full 5 o’clock shadow on the first day and a pretty short beard on the last, but I don’t like how much of a waste of time shaving or trimming is so I deal with it.
I used to shave once a week. I bought a safety razor ($20) and 100 razors ($20) in 2015 and only ran out about a month ago. I ordered 200 more razors ($40) and decided to start shaving every day. I find a razor is comfortable enough for about a week, so I expect to get about 3+ years out of them. I have a pretty heavy beard with thick black hairs, I'm not sure if that has an actual effect on how quickly a razor degrades but, if it does, I expect it could last that long for most. I use hand soap as "shaving cream", which I buy to wash my hands anyway. I prefer the auto-foaming kind but liquid and bar soaps work just as well.
There is maybe another reason why cartridge razors are standard now, apart from the lower upfront cost: They are foolproof. It's more or less impossible to hurt yourself with it. On the other hand, it's absolutly possible to cut yourself with a double edge / safety razor, as you have to handle a razor blade and you can scratch yourself quite badly if you don't hold it at the right angle.
But IMO, as with many of the other things mentioned in the blog post, the "additional hassle" to stay out of such closed ecosystems is often worth it. It's a nice experience and I can absolutely recommend the DE / safety razor. Also try different blades from different manufacturers, there are real differences between them :D
Huge fan of safety razors. At least for me, razors with multiple blades would tug on my hair too much and cause ingrown hairs often (I think those two are casual)
Plus, nothing wakes you up in morning like potentially cutting yourself
Safety razors are a much more reliable shaving experience for me then multi-blade razors too, but the big win was once I learned about them suddenly I also learned about a whole bunch of other stuff which made shaving so much easier.
The big win was using an alum block - disinfects and seals nicks quickly, and styptic pencils (same thing but stronger).
Safety razors are so sharp it’s hard to feel when you’re cutting yourself - I get little spots sometimes and see them more than feel them. Weirdly the biggest factor between getting cut shaving and not for me is how foggy the mirror is. I never get cut when the mirror is clear.
I bought a double edged saftey razor in my local Muller store (similar to cvs), it's a cheap King C. Gillette razor, I think DM also has them. Maybe a sign of a comeback, although certainly niche. I nick my self all the time, but I don't mind. Ordered a variety pack of blades on amazon as well, it will last for a while.
If you don't want to give up the convenience of cartridge razors, you can still avoid paying the price for name brand Gillette razors. The manufacturer originally used by Dollar Shave Club, Dorco, sells their handles and refills directly on Amazon for 50% less than you'd pay for a comparable Gillette pack.
Meanwhile it's perfectly possible to cut yourself with cartridge razors too. As that saying goes, "down, not across." Move the cartridge sideways against the skin... ouch.
It is, however, hard to find these sorts of razors. If you go into a shop to buy a razor, you will almost certainly not be able to buy one - but you will be faced with a wide range of very similar cartridge razors. The double edged razor has become a product that you can only buy on the internet, and which you will only buy if you know that it exists.
This was true -- in about 2010. My local CVS has three or four DE razor models available plus packs of blades, and has for several years now; it's been interesting to watch the market switch.
I stopped razor-shaving a while ago, and just use a corded trimmer without a guard to set neck and cheeklines when i trim the rest of my beard.
edit:
In fact, a lot of examples listed in this piece have a similar pushback story. This is encouraging!
- cast iron pans are ridiculously available, cheap, and heavily marketed.
- shaving soap pucks (and bar shampoo, upscale bar soap, etc.) over body wash are pretty hyped at the moment.
- 2.5 kilo bags of loose-leaf brand teas are available widely (taylor's of harrowgate, etc) as well as from more specialty shops.
- everyone i know shits on pod coffee machines (though they are widely used, alas; some shifts towards compostable pods have been made)
- retrogrouch cycling, which never left, has been boosted with "party pace" cycling advocates. eTAP is certainly here to stay, but quality mechanical components are and will remain widely available.
smart TVs, food deserts, and bullshit food subscription services are harder to rebut :/
In the US, these days even Walmart has them[1] in stores I've been to. This particular product isn't necessarily a great deal, but just by virtue of being on the shelves, people are exposed to the idea of using a safety razor.
In the UK, the bigger Boots used to have cheap safety handles and blades (at least ~5 years ago when I was using them.) I'd guess they're probably in the bigger Superdrugs as well. There's also a bunch of smaller brands like Truefitt & Hill, Mühle, etc., that have physical shops in London which sell them.
Definitely not "you can only buy on the internet".
The argument seems to be that people pay more money for products they find more convenient. That's true, but I don't think it's a problem by itself: it's their choice how to spend their money.
The problem would arise if the more convenient choice also externalized in some way: if it hurt other people, or the planet, and so on. There is some vague idea that throwing away a cartridge "produces more waste" than throwing away a razor blade alone, which may be true, but the difference between them seems like a trivial amount, as does for that matter the total share of waste from all shaving cartridges put together.
In other words, I don't see the harm; shave however you want.
> throwing away a cartridge "produces more waste" than throwing away a razor blade alone, which may be true, but the difference between them seems like a trivial amount
Trying to do approximate math for this is difficult and the difference seems small but greater than trivial. The larger point raised by the author is that the more packaging, dyes, adverts, etc. that a product has associated with it, the more likely a consumer is to buy it(??), and each step of the marketing-to-consumer pipeline costs more environmentally and energetically.
This is not a condemnation of advertising or marketing. In order to sell an environmentally-conscious product, you still need to sell the product.
It might seem impossible but there probably are long-term solutions to much of consumer waste. We aren't even really trying that hard overall to cut down on this and amazon et al are world leaders in packaging and return waste. There might not be easy answers but even partially solving the consumer packaging problem would cut down on landfill/recycling use.
It's a good thought exercise to imagine how you would sell razor blades without any packaging.
So there's not much difference between a cartridge and a safety razor. Therefore they're roughly equivalent? Oh and all the total waste of shaving products generally isn't a big deal?
Cartridge and (quality) safety razors don't last the same amount of time. The additional plastic on a cartridge doesn't seem like much, but when you look at the millions of cartridges disposed in a year, it certainly adds up. Compare the packaging and space of 100 safety razors to 100 cartridges and you'll see an enormous difference. This all stacks up to a bigger impact in packing, shipping, etc.
Not to mention the disposable whole-stick razors that some people use (those are terrible).
You also don't provide any data to back up your claim that the total share of waste from all cartridges is trivial. You can't just hand wave this away so easily.
I think OP's point is that convenience becomes the default rather than an active choice.
Once people have forgot about the less-convenient alternatives, they can't accurately price convenience anymore and will just pay whatever is the market rate for the convenience product (be it coffee pods or razor cartridges).
My dad never taught me how to shave, and for the longest time I just used these disposable Gillette style blades, and got terrible results. Missed spots, cuts and skin infections.
At some point I decided to do some research and settled on double edge disposable blades.
I've never been happier, and feel much better about my skin too. These are the products I use:
* A wooden synthetic shaving brush (I felt bad about the beavers)
* Taylor of Old Bond St shaving cream. It lasts forever.
* A ceramic lathering bowl
* Floris after shave. Also lasts forever
* Jagen David B40 (make sure to get a butterfly version, they're much more convenient)
* Derby blades (I bought a bulk of 500 blades for like £30 quid, and I'm only halfway through using them after many years).
Now I probably spend less than £40 per year replacing shaving cream and after shave, having had to spend that amount monthly on disposable blades, and that terrible canned cream, and I hardly ever get any cuts anymore. And my shave is much closer.
Besides these products look great in the bathroom.
Mine "taught me" by handing over a cheap electric shaver and basically saying "you can't go wrong"... I think you can change the blades but he never did, so neither do I, just wait for the entire thing to break or get lost. So all the debate around what's cheapest or most manly has always somewhat confused me.
I have thick and coarse beard hair, and when it gets a little bit long it starts to curl in on itself.
I still use electric. But the trick is to buy a beard trimmer. Trim beard with that, gets you to pretty short stubble, then you use electric shaver to go clean shaven if you want. I actually have found stubble to short beard to be ideal spot for me.
I fall into roughly the same setup. I use Feather blades from Japan (which are a “premium” option) and a 100 pack lasted me 8 years for about $40. Even for nice stuff it is so cheap per shave.
Was also never taught to shave and have similar setup. I really wish I would have discovered styptic pencils sooner - would have saved me the embarrassment of going to work with pieces of tissue paper all over my face lol.
The brush my father gave me aged 16 had an alum block built into the handle. I don't see brushes like that any more. I bought an alum block 2" x 1" from a barbershop for about £10; it never seems to get any smaller. In the east you can buy lumps of alum in souks and bazaars for almost nothing.
As well as being a styptic, alum doubles as an antiperspirant.
I made the mistake of doing something like that, but you can totally use foam in a can which lasts a long time and is much more convinient and, for me, better and use that in a combination with a safety razor.
My facial hair is very thick and realistically I can use any type of blade at most once. I used to use Gillette blades, but at the advice of the Internet I switched to double edge razors.
The Internet claims this type of shaving is best, not just in terms of cost and enviromental impact, but that it reduces irritation and produces a closer shave.
After using a double edge razor for over five tears now, let me dubunk these claims. They are 100% grade bullshit. They don't produce a closer shave, not even close, and they are way, way, harsher on my skin than Gillette disposables. Maybe my skill in using them just sucks, and for other people these claims are true, but here's the thing, the Gillette cartridges are foolproof. They are more convenient in every way, you can actually fly with them, and you can use cheap shaving foams instead of hard to get shaving soap. And of course, they are much, much quicker to use. I can shave with disposables in less than five minutes, but using my double edge razor takes me around 20 minutes.
I still use my double edge razor because I like the feeling of accomplishement I get after I manage to get a decent shave with such a primitive technology, but anyone who claims double edge razors are "better" is simply insane.
Have you experimented with blades? This was my takeaway after using Merkur blades and I abandoned safety razors for a while. I tried again using Feather blades and the experience was much better: far superior to cartridge shaving. With more practice I also improved my technique which undoubtedly helps.
Yes, I experimented with blades, I didn't think it would make any difference, but to my surprise it makes a huge difference. I still don't understand how there can be such a huge variance in the experience you get with different blades, it's not about the sharpness, they are all sharp.
To be honest, this is a negative point, because it takes time to experiment with blades, and it's extremely unlikely you will be able to find your favorite blades when you travel somewhere.
Practice undoubtedly helps, how much more more can I practice. I shave every other day. In fact, when I used disposables I shaved every day, and I wish I could still do that, but double edge blades are too harsh on my skin to be able to do that. After I shave, I need a day to heal. And this is with special creams and balms and alum blocks. With disposables I didn't even need to use any kind of after shave treatment at all.
You've probably tried everything but if not try soap with lanolin that helps a lot and try cream instead of soap. Also some people don't get so irritated skin if they use duller blades. But you might just be out of luck.
I have bought and tried pretty much any brand of blades i could find online. Surprisingly enough when talking with owners of shaving specialist shop the owner said many people prefer duller blades. Its supposed to not irritate the skin so much and take all the moisture out.
I also prefer Feather blades the most but they are expensive compared to rest. When i was looking for alternative funnily enough the next sharpest (and a lot cheaper) was... Gillette blades. They have few different lines and some of them come close to Feather. Now i am torn when buying blades if i cheap out and buy Gillette or go for Feather... (95% of time i support the Japanese :))
I personally used to get really bad irritation on my neck, ingrown hairs, etc, that completely went away after I switched to a double edge safety razor. I can't stand the cartridges anymore and it's been a long time since I have cut myself.
IMO min maxing everything is sometimes not great either. I just don't shave every day, maybe every few days but no longer since it gets too long, and it seems like the blades last for a very long time (over a month at least). I can't remember when I bought the $30 pack of a bunch of cartriges but its been sitting in my bathroom seemingly forever.
Then there is the actual using of the thing. Go ahead and shave with one of those box cutter razors. The first couple of times your sink will look like bloody murder and even after that you need to be careful. I don't want to think about technique. I barely heed grain. With a cartrige I can even use just hot water in a pinch and mash the thing against my face and get an OK shave in not very long. I'm paying extra sure, a dozen dollars a year I guess, but I get the convenience of speed and being able to have the sloppiest shaving technique imaginable and not walk out with a dozen globs of tp fused to my bleeding face.
Exactly this. The Wilkinson Sword Hydro 5 blades I use last so long that I only spend around $8 per year for the blades, and I don’t need to be particularly awake when shaving. The plastic waste is rather negligible compared to all the other plastic crap that e.g. food comes in.
Norelco (Phillips) electric shaver user here. I'm in my 70's and have used them all my life. Got the habit from my dad, who sold them in his store and used them all his life too. Not as close as a blade, but much more comfortable to use, quicker, and less mess. Don't need a sink or a towel, shaving cream, blades. You do have to replace the heads once a year or so, so they're not super cheap, but they're way, way more convenient.
I use a Braun Series 7. It has detachable heads for different kinds of shaving (body v/s face) and for different “lengths”. It takes a bit more time than a razor to get a close shave, but no chemicals, no waste and no recurring expenses (except in the cleaning alcohol I guess, but that’s optional).
The Gillette cartrdiges last quite a while and, for me, 15 shaves would be a conservative guess. I don't recall ever cutting myself either, unlike with old style razors and cheap disposables where it was pretty much a daily hazard.
Nonetheless, I often go a week between shaves nowadays and this seems to be much more socially acceptable than used to be the case.
Shaved head for 20+ years here. I use Gillette and get at least 8 weeks shaving daily without issue (ie. 8x7 = 56 shaves or 350% of your reported longevity). The trick is wet shaving (in the shower) with good lather (I use soap). Dry shaving is an anachronism in this day and age, save for water-scarce or highly unsanitary environments, where I prefer to just not bother.
As an aside, I'm pretty sure they are incrementally tweaking the chemistry of the blade-front indicator to break down more rapidly, which destroys the uniformity of the leading edge. IMHO older cartridges actually last longer. If you find a stash in the developing world or some other slow-moving place, buy them.
I had commented above about how long Mach III blades last me, and I do wet shave.
However, reading your comment, I wonder if my Mach III blades (purchased in India) are different in the metal composition from what I would purchase now in the USA.
As I recall from a long ago experiment in school, a lot of the "wear" on a razor blade is actually corrosion. So it may actually be possible to extend the life in various ways.
You can keep a razor sharp longer by submerging the blade in a little dish/shot glass of mineral oil after shaving. It slows the microscopic pitting and corrosion from air/moisture.
As a bonus, mineral oil is a decent shave gel on its own, though it can be difficult to wash out the whiskers and gunk from multi blade razors.
depends on your beard hair, mine can blunt a razor after 1/2 of my face... I stopped using razors about 10 years ago, not just trim to stubble... shaving sucks
Gillette is ceramic coated and should last you about a month. Other razors are Teflon(PTFE) coated and last a couple weeks. I used to work in the shaving industry.
OP is simply referring to the Gillette Model [1] of business practice. I've been spotting, and avoiding it like the plague, for years.
Just wished that more people saw, understood, and voted with their wallets - the world would be a less costly place (both to ourselves, and the planet).
I don't understand why people think it is so important a thesis to convince people that a person sells something to get as much profit for his product. Much as it is important to educate people of loss leaders, subscription models, brand marketing, and other newer ways profit maximization happens, they aren't really cutting edge concepts either.
I make a decent living now, and I use Harry's razors. Could I use and change the cheaper disposable ones more often? Sure. Is Harry's quality worth paying for so that I nick my face less? Very much so. I don't really need to be told they're "out to get me". I'm a big boy who can do simple price math.
I switched to double-edged wet shaving years ago. Not mentioned is that they also are a better shave, and less prone to causing ingrown hairs / bumps. A 100-pack of Astra platinum blades costs me 10 bucks, and lasts 3 years.
Same for me, switched to a safety razor, a shaving brush and shaving soap few years ago and never looked back. Disposable razors and disposable shaving cream are real waste of resources and money.
I bought a traditional "safety razor" 15 years ago, and haven't looked back since. No more razor burn. I shave regularly and got somewhat dense and coarse beard, yet I spend less than $10 a year on blades now, down from about $100 when I used disposable Gillette cartridges.
I totally agree on this and I would like to add an item:
- glass smartphones - the iPhone X and Pixel 3 are all in a unibody of glass that is very fragile despite all gorilla glass marketing bullshit.
The result is that we have to use plastic bumpers.
We could have just stayed with plastic/aluminum frames that allowed to open the back and replace the battery.
Glass unibody smartphones are made to last less and be less repairable.
I'm sick of this and next phone I'll get a Fairphone https://www.fairphone.com/
and I purchased a Nokia 105 for 25$ whose battery last 35 DAYS on standby as backup.
I have both a double edge razor and a cartridge razor. I used to use the double edge razor more. I now use the cartridge razor more, for two reasons: first, it takes less time. Second, I figured out how to make it cost less money and generates less waste.
The trick on the latter is that I discovered I can keep a single one of Target's store brand Mach3-compatible cartridges going for 3-ish months. This was due to a combination of tricks I had already been using to keep Mach3 blades going for a while (dry after use, store in a dry place, strop before use), plus the more recent discovery that Target's generic blades are higher quality and greater durability, at a fraction of the price.
With double edge blades, on the other hand, I can get two shaves out of one, tops, before it starts to give me nicks. I've tried stropping these blades, too, but without much success.
So that works out to me being able to get about 2 years' worth of shaves for about US$7 with the cartridge razor. I'm not sure what the exchange rate is right now, but I think that works out to about 1/3 of the £10/yr that the author calculated for safety razor blades.
(On the other hand, I can definitely get a better shave out of the DE razor.)
I think there's an accidental old-vs-new comparison which is causing a conflation between the (a) low up-front cost vs low per-use cost and waste (b) convenience and ease-of-use vs products that require slightly more attention from their users.
E.g. some here are saying "multi-blade cartridges are easier and faster" ... which is true. Users of old-fashioned safety razors often have a little learning curve when they adopt, and have to be a bit more careful even after they've on-boarded. But that ease of use doesn't come from the cartridge per se -- it's from the multiple blades and pivoting head. Recognizing this allows for the possibility of low-waste multi-blade pivoting-head safety razors (e.g. leafshave.com but I think they're not alone).
Lower cost-per-use and lower waste doesn't have to get rolled up with some nostalgic return to products as they existed decades ago. But I think both consumers and systemic corrections (e.g. we should tax externalities associated with waste streams, and with carbon) need to nudge companies away from making disposable or short-lived products.
Semi-serious cyclist chiming in about this part of the article:
"Well understood mechanical bike shifting transitions to electronic shifting which requires you to pay more and charge your pedal bike (Not sure about this example, as in theory a bike derailleur needs not be a repeated purchased)"
One of my bikes has a Shimano electronic shifter. The others are a mix between mechanical SRAM and Shimano components. The electronic shifter has two advantages that mean something to me. First, you never have to deal with "cable stretch" whereby the alignment gradually shifts off-center and you have to use the micro-adjustment knob to re-align. It starts out perfect, and it stays perfect. Second, "oops" shifting (i.e., failing to shift before you've hit a hill and have to shift at low a RPM while applying force to stay moving) is much smoother. Those are both real advantages to me.
The problem I've run into, at least with the Shimano electronic shifter, is durability. Both the front and rear derailleurs have failed on me mid-ride for different reasons. The front because there's a part that pushes against a plate when up-shifting, and that fatigued to the point of snapping off completely after a couple of years of use. The rear because of a minor slide-out. Some sensitive part broke in the mechanism, and the entire thing had to be replaced. I've slammed plenty of mechanical rear derailleurs into the pavement or a tree stump or whatever, and they've all survived just fine, so long as the hangar was intact. I've even subjected a mechanical rear derailleur to the dreaded "get caught in the rear wheel spokes" abuse, and it came through just fine after replacing the hanger.
I've never forgotten to charge the battery, but I've heard of people on longer group rides (think 70+ miles) losing the ability to shift when they're 40 miles out into the countryside because their battery died.
The electronic shifter just seems much more fragile to me. But it's a really nice shifting experience while it works!
All that said, my N+1 bike I just picked up last weekend has mechanical shifters. I'll adjust the knob when the cable stretches and deal with the occasional "oops" when I hit hills in the wrong gear because I value durability and robustness more.
I assume you're a sports cyclist, where I agree that electronic shifting can make sense. For general transport use I think hub gears are a better solution to the "oops" shifting problem. Hub gears let you shift while stationary, as well as being clean and reliable. They won't win you any races, but performance is more than acceptable for shopping/commuting.
You can eliminate the oops shifting uphill entirely if you let off on the power the moment you shift. You need to get a feel for it but it will feel perfectly smooth like it does on flatground. I use some ancient shimano 2x8 brifters too mostly 105 some ultegra and dura ace components in there.
Mechanical rear derailleurs do wear out and get sloppy. Never so bad that you'd notice with friction shifting but indexing will be degraded. It does take a long time and three or four pulley sets before it's noticeable.
i think the real digital advantage is mid-ride fine tuning. nothing like hearing a chain rub, setting the Di2 to adjust mode, and moving it till it doesn’t make noise. it’s amazing because the effect of your power in the stroke on the chain alignment is vital, and always missed when tuning a derailleur in a stand
I'm a mountain biker, so I may have a different perspective.
I just flip the bike and dial in the adjustment by eye and spinning the crank. Assuming the derailleur isn't bent, this is usually just about perfect.
I get what you're saying about power being a variable in adjustment, I just haven't found that it's a concern for me. Maybe MTB drivetrains have less flex/are less succeptible to that, or I'm just too unsophisticated to realize :)
>>A set including the razor body and some heads generally costs a little above £20 and replacement heads cost in the region of £1.75. Gillette claim that each blade can be used for 15 shaves. This sounds pretty optimistic to me. But who knows.
Who knows? I cannot possibly be the only male here who disputes this math. I have a Gillet razor, one with a fancy 5-blade rotating head. It also has a silly vibrator that I am too afraid to use. The blades last forever. Not 15 shaves. More like 150 or more. I have to shave literally every morning, often in a hurry and without shaving cream (military). But I never have any issues. I think that the last time I switched out the blade might have been September of last year when. I had dropped it on concrete and damaged the plastic head. The blades were still fine. The metallurgy behind these things is frankly astonishing.
Oster small animal trimmer: $100 or so initial investment; no ongoing costs. Electricity to run it is trivial compared to the light to see yourself shaving.
Might need a new set of blades after a couple decades.
I use an Oster as well. You can sharpen the blades with a sharpening stone (definitely recommend doing so once a year - especially if you keep forgetting to oil them like I do), in which case the blades will outlast you.
The Wahl Peanut costs half that. It may not last as long, but I know someone who's used the same one for about 10 years. Zero ongoing costs as you say. Also saves time over anything involving shaving cream.
I bought a Hero some fifteen years ago. You can lap the blades if you like, or buy very good replacements for like $15 or less. You should be able to make this run for decades.
The cord annoys me though, but cordless will definitely not last as long.
Why shave? Just grow a beard. Get one of those mechanical clippers [1] to keep it at the length you prefer and you're done. Your can also let it grow to $legnth, cut it to a stubble and let it grow out again. Whatever you do you'll be doing your skin a favour by not pulling a blade over it every day.
maybe, but many men have decided not to shave anymore anyway
> about gillette and co
I have used both the "disposable" blades (that barely last a week) and the more robust ones that last a month (proper razor blades), and the thing is, the shaving experience is completely difference. The proper razor blades are very sharp and can result in cuts if you are not careful, whereas it's fairly difficult to cut yourself with a Gilette or Schick for that matter. They work in very different dimensions. It's almost not the same product.
Right, even if you do manage to somehow cut yourself with a cartridge razor (they usually last months for me, but I'm careful to keep them dry after every use), the cut is superficial and you don't even need a styptic pencil.
I might just be clumsy, but even after using a safety razor for about a year, I still occasionally cut myself, and due to the nature of the blade, the nicks tended to be much deeper.
The "cartridge razors are a scam, safety razors are better in every way" line has always been a little silly. Like you said, they are really different products with different pros and cons. Being able to take my razor onto a plane is a big plus for longer trips. Safety razors are much cheaper, more efficient, and better for the environment, but you're losing out on convenience and idiot-proofness.
I've got a later version of the same thing. They work very well, but the blades do eventually need replacement--and it's the same game of the blades being unduly expensive.
Electronic bike shifting is a bad example here imo. You do have to stay on top of the charging (you get about 20 hours of riding out of a single charge), but aside from that the precision and consistency is waaaaaaay better than anything that had come before it, at least from my perspective. I used to have to adjust my derailleur every couple of rides on my mountain bike, but with electronic shifting I haven't had to adjust it in _years_.
The elimination of shift cables may (eventually) result in a simpler lighter setup as well. Could also allow some innovation in gear design if the shifts are computer controlled. We’ll see.
Yes, modern razors are a scam; they have AMAZING marketing teams. You still can buy old-style razors and blades cheap from Amazon because there's still a healthy demand.
As for the rest of the article:
> Cooking equipment: essentially indestructible Cast Iron skillets transition into teflon pans. The newer pans perform worse, and must be replaced on a shockingly regular basis. They also seem to be poisonous.
No, no, and no. Teflon pans perform wonderfully, are replaced maybe every 10-20 years depending on workmanship if you don't scratch them up with metal utensils, and are not poisonous unless you're eating the flakes from your scratched up pans.
> Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands, replace many styles of coffee brewing. Provide much worse coffee, at a higher price but are superficially convenient.
They produce good coffee in many styles that would normally require a lot of work, and are MASSIVELY convenient. Press a button and a couple of minutes later, your cup of coffee is ready to drink.
> Televisions moving from being screens which accept input, to self contained 'smart' devices that require software updates and thus have a shortened useful lifespan.
Their lifespan is unchanged. You can continue to use them as "dumb" screens using HDMI input and plug in an external device. You can also buy a smart TV and never connect it to the internet.
> In many inner city shops it is now hard to buy an individual piece of fruit.
For some fruit maybe, but if the point is saving money, why are you buying individually?
> Subscription services like Hello Fresh, where you can pay well over the odds to have some vegetables delivered to you.
So buy them from the market like we've been doing forever. If you're lazy and rich, use these delivery services. You have choice.
> Their lifespan is unchanged. You can continue to use them as "dumb" screens using HDMI input and plug in an external device. You can also buy a smart TV and never connect it to the internet.
That does not mean that the smart features will not work tirelessly against your attempt to use the device as a dumb display. Menus you don’t want, EULA prompts that cover almost the entire UI, and weird spottiness in the CEC support that one can only assume is designed to fuck with you. And it’s buggy! It’s really buggy. On one of my TVs, I have to hold the power button down to entirely reboot it frequently for it to see the HDMI signal on one of my outputs. Otherwise.. it just sits on a gray screen. Sometimes I also get a loading spinner (!?) or, despite it having been set up for about a year, a “detecting device, please wait” message. I have manually set the type of device to PC on both of the TWO HDMI ports (yes, two, hope you have your own HDMI switch.)
Of course, there’s no convenient way to hook up speakers to these modern marvels of technology. At least not the speakers you already own. If you want to stick to what the manufacturer wants, you need an HDMI ARC port and a soundbar: a worse speaker that sounds like shit and costs more and sometimes might only fully work with some TVs. It eats an entire HDMI port, though some of them provide it back to you less conveniently.
I see your optimism, and I raise my burning inferno of rage towards smart TVs.
I once bought a TV that tried to work against me (Samsung). I returned it after a few days and bought one that didn't (Sharp). This one's great! It has all the IO ports, starts quickly, and reopens the last input you selected (my Android TV box). I can even control the whole shebang from just my old Amazon Fire TV controller (it's a mix of bluetooth and IR).
Take the time to test your devices, and return them if they don't meet your needs. I've also had CRTs in the past that disappointed and I had to return. Fortunately, these modern TVs are light enough for one person to move.
No CRT has tried to work against me; they just, at worst, suck. I do have a trinitron in my basement that has Zero of these problems, of course!
Now of course I can return my Samsung TVs, but I do test my devices somewhat, and Samsung seems to have the best overall TVs, looking at aspects like value, panel quality, latency in game mode, etc. Other models I’ve tried (Vizeo, whatever the hell Best Buy sells generically) have been very disappointing. Sony screens are probably much better, but cost an absolute FORTUNE.
You're comparing a Trinitron (must have cost a pretty penny) to a low end Vizio and a Samsung (who have a long history of consumer hostility in their products).
I am only comparing it to the Samsung. And for what it’s worth, I have not been buying cheap Samsung TVs. Also yes. You get what you pay for. But also, I have other reasons to not pay the Sony premium. I can actually mildly tolerate Android TV and its stupid home screen ads, for some reason, but having it shipped with my TV seems like a step too far, and that’s exactly what Bravia TVs do.
My only real option is to have a monitor and use that as a TV. But aside from a lot of other downsides, like no TV remote and a UX not designed to handle TV use cases, and builtin speakers that are just embarrassing, large monitors are also horridly expensive and the most likely to have extremely bad problems (like the horrible backlight bleed on some of the larger screen options from ViewSonic.)
A big reason I bought the Sharp TV is because it has Android TV built in. When it's disconnected from the internet (I haven't connected it to the internet except once to update the firmware), it behaves just like a monitor. Turn it on, it fast-boots in 3 seconds and displays HDMI1 (the last input I selected).
I can give you at least one reason why I do not own a Sharp TV: I haven’t actually seen one for sale. The most obvious place to buy one locally is Best Buy, and my Best Buy has legitimately zero. I could, of course, buy one online, but for TVs I generally haven’t done this in the past. There’s obviously pros and cons to this.
This is all getting very silly though. We went from a market where you got what you paid for to well,… this. You can get what you paid for… kind of, if you don’t care about certain things and do fairly thorough research. And sure. I can try to dilligently pick an option that works best for me. The average consumer is getting completely fucked, however, and they are the ones driving all of the demand.
We've gone from a market where you got shit if you weren't careful, to a market where you get shit if you're not careful.
JVC and Panasonic produced garbage CRTs and VCRs and DVD players and stereo equipment for years, but they sold like hotcakes because they were cheap. You had to choose carefully what to buy, and make sure the place had a decent return policy just in case. There were some brands with good reputations, others that were hit-or-miss, and some just plain garbage. Now is no different.
FWIW I bought the Samsung and the Sharp online through Amazon (because they have a good return policy). I returned the Samsung and kept the Sharp.
> JVC and Panasonic produced garbage CRTs and VCRs and DVD players and stereo equipment for years, but they sold like hotcakes because they were cheap.
Yes. That’s not the market today. If we were talking about truly cheap TVs, I’d be talking about Insignia and subsidized crap like FireTV. I’m talking about Samsung TVs with “quantum dot technology” and whatever other yahoo crap.
Back then, you could most definitely buy any decent Samsung CRT and be confident it wasn’t going to suck. Hell, the model of Samsung CRT TV I had as a kid is now often used for RGB modding because of its excellent picture quality and the fact that they’re mostly still around and working great. Was it expensive at the time? No. It wasn’t.
Certainly if you bought a Trinitron back in the day you knew you weren’t getting ripped off. Is it the same with Sony Bravia? I’m not willing to incinerate money at a high enough rate to find out, but the fact that it comes with Android TV stock makes me unhopeful. My car comes with Android 4.2 and that’s aged about as well as polio by this point.
The market today for consumer electronics is completely ass. Not only do the cheap options suck ridiculously badly, even the expensive options are hard to stomach.
I'm reading this on a panel that's at a *minimum* 17 years old. I think it's older than that.
The newer panels are nicer but since this is a 19" and they don't make nice 19" panels anymore I can't upgrade them. (I also have a 27" Dell Ultrasharp--it's superior, but it doesn't come in 19" and 19" has the largest pixels--nice for older eyes.)
I'm still using a 15 year old Philips panel TV in the bedroom. Works as well as the day I bought it. I've had CRTs go out of alignment faster than that (RCA and Panasonic were particularly bad with that).
OP is incorrect, eating flakes is perfectly safe. The whole point of Teflon is that the bonds are so strong that it will not react chemically with anything else, including your insides. Scratching it up is just you damaging your stuff, not a safety risk.
The safety problem with Teflon is when it is overheated. Don't heat a pan without anything in them, because then the Teflon will decompose into some really toxic chemicals. Good news is that water boils at 100C, an even the highest smoke-point oils decompose at 250C. Teflon only begins to deteriorate at 260C, and only full-on decomposes at 350C.
I don’t know what you are trying to say, but for clarity: people want to buy the amount of fruit / vegetables they will actually use between the time they buy it and the next time they plan to shop. Not everything they plan to eat / make will necessarily call for the same produce.
Plenty of produce doesn’t last a week from when you buy it and this varies based on where and when you buy it.
As an example, a few apples might last for over a week. A package of raspberries might last 4 days. An avocado that is ripe may last 2 days.
I found that wiping down Gillette cartridge blades with Isopropyl (rubbing) alcohol after use significantly improves their longevity, specifically how long they keep a sharp edge for.
Shake off the excess water, splash some rubbing alcohol on them and shake that off. I think that slows the oxidation on the blade. They seem to last many months this way.
It’s not a conspiracy, it’s just convenience. Shaving with a Mach3 is a hell of a lot easier than a DE. Cooking with a Teflon pan is a hell of a lot easier than looking after a carbon steel skillet. The vast majority of people have busy lives, and don’t want to deal with that hassle. For those of us who do, great.
For you perhaps. I cannot handle the weight as easily, and there are a lot of extra steps to keep it clean which need handling (especially over a sink). Extrapolate to the whole population and you can see why there is a market for them.
I use a cast iron comal. I wash it in soapy water (no scourer!), same as any other pan. The only added hassle is drying it before putting it away. It's as goodnas a Teflon pan for non-stickness, but I don't have to eat Teflon or replace the pan. And it spreads the heat better.
I stopped buying Gillette products after their bizarre woke advertisement. That being said, cheaper cartridges can be had from other retailers, making their economics look more favourable compared with double-edged razors. Not to mention that I’d rather avoid the bloodbath of shaving with the latter.
I have been exclusively shaving with a double edged safety razor and hard soap/brush for about 2 years. My skin is in much better condition now than when I used either a 5 bladed monstrosity or an electric shaver, an I generate less waste. I used to get a lot of red blotchey rashes on my neck, no more. The blades I use cost between 7 and 14 cents each and last a full week of shaves. I did accumulate about a half dozen handles, some vintage and some high quality modern ones, but one of the most comfortable and reliable has been the Qshave Adjustable, which is a clone of the Merkur Futur after it’s patent expired. It costs $10-$15 dollars from the usual online retailers. Throw away the blades it comes with and buy 100 Astra SS for $10 and you have 700 great shaves for $25.
Meuh. I have a light-coloured beard and modest growth. Daily shaves are more than adequate - due to the light colour, a spot missed one or two days is practically invisible. Hell, you can hardly see the beard until 10 or so days of non-shaving. You can feel it though.
Anyway, I use similar razors such as his and tossed them when I realised they were too dull. A 10 pack could last me a year, but only if I pay attention. Otherwise, it's bound to be closer to 2 years. Note that I don't deliberately do this for costs reasons - I just prefer not to thrash something that is still decently usable.
Obviously, your mileage may vary. Nevertheless, for at least some people, shaving costs about one 10-pack per year.
I've been using a Philips electric razor that someone didn't want and gave me for the past 15 years. The battery (I think it's still a NiMh, that's how old the thing is) is getting bad, but it's still OK. Never changed a blade.
Word of warning from a 15 year double edge razor user.
Just because it can theoretically be cheaper to go the double edge razor route, doesn't actually mean it will be.
First there are all those blades to try. Then soap brushes, then soaps (so many artisan soaps). Then you find yourself looking at aftershaves (so many of those too), and balms, you might even decide to try pre-shave products. Then you will find more soap, or cream, or shave sticks you want to try. Then more razors, slants, open comb, shavettes....
If you let it, you can find yourself spending way more on products after switching to a double edge razor per year than you were with cartridges.
Yes, you can bring some of these costs down by buying samples.
I've been shaving with double edge razors for decades. I just shave "dry" after I get out of the shower. I have never once used any of those other products. My blades each last a few months (I shave 1-2 times a week), so a package of 100 lasts me... in theory, 25 or so years. Which sounds about right, as I bought a package a decade or so ago and am starting to get towards halfway through.
Another example is dishwasher detergent. I can rarely find the powdered stuff anymore. And even the gel is being pushed out in place of pods. I bought new detergent last week and the shelf was full of pods with only a couple options for gel.
Unlike Gillette, safety razors do not use proprietary systems for their blades. The consequence is you can use any double edge blade and you can have fun finding the double edge blades that best matches your razor and beard.
Shameless plug: years ago with my brother I made this small site (https://www.razorbladesclub.com) that I presented on "Show HN" exactly to allow people to buy samplers of blades and try them out. It didn't get much attention then but years later the site is still alive and hopefully it still serves people well :)
I’ve never understood shaving. Why not just buy a trimmer and trim it down to 1mm? Much more convenient, faster and cheaper. Also there’s very little visual difference - especially now that everything is remote.
Hair density and growth rate and skin sensitivity is going to matter a lot. I use an electric razor because I don't have much facial hair and it doesn't grow very fast. But I'll relatively often get irritated skin from it and have to be careful about how I use it in advance of eg a wedding. Getting a close shave still requires maintenance of the electric razor, cleaning it and occasionally replacing the foils.
> Why not just buy a trimmer and trim it down to 1mm
That works for the most part. The razor is for all the spots where you want no hair at all. I've got a beard and I can shave my neck down with a trimmer and get it really close, but if I want to actually have clean neck I've gotta reach for the razor.
Depends on your beard. I have coarse black hair that grows fast. People with fine blonde hair can get away with a trim. For me, it has to be a choice between a beard and a wet-shave.
Disposable Gillettes have lasted me the longest with the least headache. more than 3 blades is insanity. I bet I get 25 shaves on a razor. not eco friendly but the plastic handle waste is minimal for 12 a year.
I'm in your club. I tried a few other ways to shave, always came back to the good ol' 3 blades (that seems to be more and more difficult to find in shops around my home)
I've been experimenting a bit with different razor brands recently. I've been using Schick Hydro for years, currently US$19 for a four-pack at CVS. I tried Dollar Shave Club at US$12 a pack but came away very unimpressed. Lots of pulling, and not great for smoothness either. Harry's at the same price seems like more of a direct alternative to the Hydro. I use one cartridge a week, so that's ~US$80 per year without even having to try anything significantly different or change technique as with an old-school razor.
The other part of the cost equation is gel/foam/soap. I stopped buying overpriced gel and foam quite a few years ago. Hair conditioner (with maybe a bit of shampoo or liquid soap to make it foamier) works pretty well for a tiny fraction of the price. Liquid hand soap or body wash works even better for slightly more. The same goat-milk soap I use for everything else (including hair) doesn't work quite as well when lathered by hand, but it's closer with the one-time purchase of a brush. While the direct cost isn't the greatest, the marginal cost is near zero since I wear the shower bars down to slivers at a sufficient rate to support shaving as well.
In short, it's pretty easy to save a couple of hundred bucks a year without really changing the experience. If you want to go further than that because you enjoy the challenge (or for any other reason) you certainly can and should, but the incremental savings at that point are a bit smaller.
The author is overlooking the fact that good quality cartridge blade is superior to old-style double-edged one. It gives a closer shave and cause more skin irritation. Depending on your skin type it could be worth extra money. I still recall ocassional cuts from using double-edged blade.
I have been using the classic double edge shaver for a decade now. It's as shiny as the day I bought it. I use a blade about every couple of weeks (my facial hair is kind of "average" I would guess). I shave every 2 or 3 days. I think I use one blade every couple of weeks. It's extremely cheap. If interested I have a Parker brand long handle (do no like the short handle versions) and I use dove soap as my "lubricant". There is no reason to use those money pit plastic polluter, 20 blades. I hear Merkurs are pretty good too. I use cheap Shark brand blades that a 100 pack lasts me basically forever, but I'm sure there are other great brands as well.
Other things I've done, all my pans are cast iron, all my storage is glassware, all my utensils are silicone or metal, I drink only drip or Moka pot coffee. I do have a ceramic coated dutch oven though, but the coating is said to be real ceramic and not ptfe (or any of the "safe" coatings that are claimed out there). All my cutting boards are wood or bamboo. I tried to get as much plastic out of my kitchen as humanly possible.
That two-bladed razor is the same style as the one my father gave me when I was 16. In those days it was called a "safety razor". Nowadays I use a straight razor ("cutthroat") for the first over, and a Mach III for a second over, "against the grain". I've been using cutthroats for 15 years, but I still don't have the confidence to use one against the grain.
No electric razor has ever "cut the mustard" for me. If I can't have a wet shave then I'll stay with the beard, thanks.
A cutthroat of course has no replaceables; but you do need a strop and a stone. I have a belgian stone, which I pass the razors over every 6 months or so.
No pressurised cans of foam for me; I use a cream from The Body Shop, but I could just use a puck of soap like everyone else. Anyway, that means I need a brush: I use a silverpoint badger brush.
So two cutthroats: call it £100 each. One badger brush: about £50. Belgian stone: £120. Total: £370 one-off cost (brushes do wear out, but if you dry them properly they should last 20 years). The Mach III blades are good for about a dozen shaves each, and give a pretty good "baby's bottom" finish. I use a bay rum cologne as an aftershave lotion.
Truth is, I happen to like sharp blades. So I use the belgian stone on my carbon-steel chef's knife and my Buck pocket knife.
> It is, however, hard to find these sorts of razors. If you go into a shop to buy a razor, you will almost certainly not be able to buy one - but you will be faced with a wide range of very similar cartridge razors. The double edged razor has become a product that you can only buy on the internet, and which you will only buy if you know that it exists.
So... I did buy mine off amazon; but that was mostly due to living in the rural areas where there wasn't much for shopping choices to begin with. With that in mind, consider this.
I was still able to find double edged stuff at the local store now and then too, but it was generally a Christmas gift item, and stuff like that. Or tucked away in the top corner of the bathroom section, where only the old fella from the early 1900's might be interested in looking for some Dapper Dan or something like that.
I can even find them in some stores like... I think it was Shopper drug mart?
But all in all, just going on amazon and typing "Double edge razor" or "Single blade razor" is generally enough to find what you are looking for and have in on hand in 3 days or less usually.
For context, I am in Canada. So this might be more of a thing for us here in Canada what with being able to find this stuff without having to go to a specialty store for it, like those fancy beard barber shops.
I have one of those double edged rasor, I've been using it for like 20 years. Mine is made of silver, which is a good anti bacteria. For the blade, I use carbon steel ones made for cleaning the vitroceram/induction hot plates. They cut much better than stainless steel, and are cheaper, but must be changed once a week to prevent rust and also it is better to unscrew the razor a bit to let them dry. I don't use any cream, just regular soap and water.
The opposite could be argued in other markets too:
Spotify/Apple Music is super convenient and relatively cheap, if you listen to music even at moderate levels. Yeah you don't own the albums, but you get all the value-added features like music discovery, playlist, sharing etc.
Netflix also the same: have access to many movies and series at a very low cost (if you watch even moderately), also comes with the same: you don't own the content (but how many times were you planning to watch the same movie/episode in average anyway when there are thousands to pick from? And even if you do, it's still cheaper if that episode is not literally the only thing you watch), and recommendations.
Tinder/Bumble also the same: you don't go out to places (which would cost MUCH more than the app subscription) and try to find a mate: you match and have sex. You might or might not have a partner in the end, but that's not the promise anyway.
Same for iPhone subscriptions in US (the one you pay a monthly cheap fee and always have the latest iPhone).
Pretty much sure there are many examples out there too.
They are all convenient, and are actually cheaper than the "old way", giving access on demand to whatever you like from a big catalog.
I switched to shaving with the double edge safety razor 15 years ago from the cartridge style and haven't looked back. I get a better shave for considerably less money. I find that I can shave daily and get a week's worth of shaves before replacing the blade, each of which costs just pennies. Coupled with using a soap puck and badger hair shaving brush, I'm completely satisfied with my shaving ritual.
Having a beard, i have a trimmer, i only just replaced one i had for fifteen years because i saw a sleeker, smaller and more modern one on sale. I still use razors occasionally for some things, but i’ve never bought more than one pack of blades a year, seems if you only use them for bits of hair in weird places and rinse them well, they last a long time
Pans i understand and probably don’t replace my non stick ones as often as i should, i consider cast iron but it seems like a huge hassle.
I do like teabags, actually particular cheap brands from my home country that i just really like the taste of. At work we have tons of fancy loose leaf tea, but i just really, really like my imported stuff.
I have a mocha pot at home, these are great. I always thought the nespresso machines were slightly less convenient. I have one coffee a day and those machines take up valuable kitchen real estate.
I walk to work or use public transport
I find the packaging of veg intensely annoying, if you’re single and want a handful of a particular veg for dinner it is hard to find. And i hate wasting all the excess i have to buy for one meal i want to cook. I have 2 supermarkets right by me, and they mostly offer loose veg, but on some they don’t (green beans seem to come only in hugely over sized bags) there’s some supermarkets (and markets) in the city that offer all loose veg, but i find i can only use them at the weekends. I find this ine particularly annoying as it discourages healthy eating.
My smart tv is disconnected from the internet and it works just fine with a combination of my playstation as media server, and a raspberry pi running a plex server
I live close to supermarkets, am a fussy eater and the idea of having unknown and unexpected food stuffs delivered to me frightens me
I use safety and very non-safety straight razors for trimming my beard. The converse of the TSA thing is also true: using a straight razor allows you to travel anywhere with a very, very dangerous weapon in your bag that nobody will look twice at. I just check my bag like a big ol grownup who doesn't need to Tony Stark it directly off the plane to get into my caravan of black SUVs.
Why author doesn't take a change in quality into account? I never used a double-edged blades for shaving, but I think that 2- or 3-bladed cartridges will generally shave better or at least quicker. Not sure about 5-bladed, but whatever.
Teflon skillets are much more convenient for cooking than cast iron, that I can tell from the experience. I once bought a super-expensive cast iron with non-sticking coating, and it became unusable after about a year, same as Teflon one. So the problem obviously a coating, not a skillet material.
All right, I am a selfish being who wants to just put the skillet into dishwasher machine and press "start", thus I have to buy a new skillet once a year instead of once a decade. But where are we heading to if we try to reverse this process? At Malta, where wood was in a scarcity, they developed a communal ovens, one for a village, where everybody was coming to prepare their food for the day. It even gave a birth to a very specifiс local cuisine. Do we want something like this in our cities?
If wanting a Teflon coating, is there any benefit for doing cast iron? Or do you mean ceramic coating.
Isn’t a main reason people go to cast iron is to avoid Teflon and get the natural non-stick of seasoned iron? If that isn’t needed, what’s the draw? Seems other pans would be more suitable.
I was under an impression from Internet forums that massive cast skillet will have some benefit while dealing with larger pieces of meat, so the skillet will not drop the temperature the moment product touches it. Then I refreshed my memory on some thermodynamics, but it was too late.
You’re right cast iron is quoted as the best for searing meat, with heavy duty copper a strong contenders. But I think this is a case of there being trade offs I.e dishwasher friendliness
> I never used a double-edged blades for shaving, but I think that 2- or 3-bladed cartridges will generally shave better or at least quicker. Not sure about 5-bladed, but whatever.
Not really. DE doesn't jam as much as 2/3/5 blades, and is generally faster to get to a full shave with about a week's growth for me. Just that the setup and cleanup is a little longer. It also takes a bit more practice to get the DE razor working properly (angle/force etc.,) compared to the cartridge razors.
In general, I prefer DE at home and cartridges for travel, because it's generally easier to travel with cartridges in carryon.
"Why author doesn't take a change in quality into account?"
Followed by advocating the lower quality options...
The old safety razors shave just as well as a new cartridge razor. The only advantage to the cartridge razor is that if you're a moron you have a lower risk of slicing a finger open when changing the blade.
Your idea of convenience from using a Teflon skillet is based in ignorance. Both of the maintenence involved and of the difference in food quality between the two types of pans.
Enlighten me in quality. I am using induction to heat a skillet bottom to desired temperature, how's the material and production method changes anything?
I also used to hate shaving. I've switched to "classical" Timor Solingen razor recently ($25) + hard soap. While shaving took me some more time initially (+5 minutes every other day), overall quality of life was improved. This is single piece razor, so changing blades is as fast, and it gives better results than 5 blade heads. And much reduced plastic waste is also important to me. I don't know from where this myth of how faster or better "G* Mach3" (or similar) razors are, but sure the marketing department of those companies did a good job.
I've literally heard it referred to as the "razor razor blade model" when referring to a low cost disposable where you make your money and a loss leader capital piece of equipment that is fancy and helps you sell more of the disposables. Much of the medical device industry has oriented itself to this kind of model.
My favorite trick is to buy imported Gillette cartridges from foreign countries. These cartridges have been discontinued in the U.S. market but remain my personal favorite brand. I get my cartridges for around $1/each. Not cheap, but half the price of contemporary cartridges, and with far less plastic waste than fully-disposable razors. (I’m willing to pay more to protect the environment.)
As someone who fully shaves his head almost daily, closeness, speed, and minimal risk of injury are the most important factors for me. I’ve tried all the alternatives - electric shavers, old-school double edged blades with handles, etc. and found them either to not provide a close enough shave, or to be too high-maintenance or slow (too many passes required) to be worth the cost savings. Electric is out because I shave in the shower and they don’t cut close enough anyway. (Also, electric shaver blades dull over time, too.)
These shavers are why I now grow a goatee. Even a goatee will cut your shaving costs in half, beards much more.
Obligatory Onion satire on the subject:
I use a double headed razor, and this article is ridiculous. I don't use it because it's cheaper or works better, I use it because I rarely shave and one pack of blades has lasted me years.
But it's so problematic. It does not shave nearly as well as a modern multi-razor disposable, it's prone to cutting me if I'm not careful, and takes more time. You can't bring the blades on airplanes. It's clear that you actually need disposables sometimes, and that they often shave better and for longer.
The best and cheapest shave is from a straight razor. You know how many people use that? About zero. ~$150 for a decent razor and you have it for life. But then it's a chore to maintain and not easy to shave with.
It's clear that we pay more for products that are more convenient. They are providing additional value, even if the cost is inflated.
I spent $80 on my branded safety razor 10 years ago. Maybe bought 3 packs of blades. The disposable ones were really painful for me and the safety razor less so. The only shaving expense is really shaving cream, which my skin is very choosy about (the EOS shea butter works best for me these days).
Not being able to travel with safety razor on plane is the annoying part. Also I accidentally cut my finger on a blade once and had to get stitches. That might have made up for the cost of not buying disposable.
You can get a box of 100 Astra superior platinum double edge blades for £8 on Amazon last time I got them. Something like the Fatip Picolo is a quality razor that will last you 5+ years. It cost me £15 plus shipping.
DE shaving is also better for your skin by a wide margin. It also gives a closer shave. I can’t recommend anything more highly.
However you may get sucked into the rabbit hole and DE shaving can become a hobby and suddenly you have a Muhle SS [1] that cost you £120 together with 100 different shaving soaps that cost £10-20 each and ultra fine ultra thick shave brushes that can cost £80
I use 2 safety razors; a Merica Safety Razor[0], and an old Gillette Superspeed I bought used. They both shave well and I use either cheap shaving cream, or hand soap when in a rush - no brushes or special sauce. The blades are recyclable and come wrapped in paper within paper boxes of x10 blades. I started with safety razors for two primary reason:
1. Throwing away huge chunks of plastic makes me ill. And it's also terribly unnecessary.
2. The quality of new electric shavers is a sham. I had an ancient Braun, inherited from a friend's father. It lasted years, in heavily used condition, until I overcharged it. The foil was never replaced, yet always worked well. All new models require regular replacing of the foil, which I suspect, is due to cheap metals. The new designs are superior in concept, but not in frugality or endurance.
As I became older I found that the fancy multi-blade razors don’t give as good a shave as the safety razor (called double edge in the blog post). The blades are just too flimsy.
The biggest advantage of the flimsy multi-blades is that groggy morning shavers are less likely to cut themselves (but at the cost of being less likely to get a complete shave). In this regard they are good for kids.
And what’s the deal with shaving cream? For my whole shaving life I have just used the same soap I use to wash the rest of myself.
Funny side note: webcams are almost all pretty terrible. I switched to using an iPhone as an external webcam (I use the camo app to make this work) and now it’s clear whether I have a good shave or not. Luckily most of the time I don’t care :-)
I disagree. I alternate between Harry's 5 blade disposable and a classic safety razor (Feather blades and Merkur long handle). The disposables make for a faster and closer shave. It's also much harder to nick yourself with a disposable cartridge.
The advantage of the safety razor is that it's much, much cheaper, and it doesn't lift whiskers like a multiblade setup does, so it's not as close a shave, but it's gentler on your skin. Also, it's somewhat more enjoyable as a process to use a safety razor (once you get good at it).
Biggest issue with an injector razor blades (single edge/straight razor) is carry-on traveling through TSA. Apparently they want to keep a monopoly on barber studios at 30,000 MSL
Switched several years ago from cartridges to an injector blade system, and have never considered switching back.
What a stupid article, for 20GBP you can easily buy electric razor/clipper which will last you for 5-10 years minimum with almost zero maintenance and cost besides electricity.
I just replaced my clipper after maybe 8 years because spring in blade finally broke, it cost originally around 12€, I cut my hair, sons hair and shave myself occasionally. If I didn't mind waiting 1-2 months for replacement blade from China I could get it replaced for 3EUR (oh and I replaced broken pet cable for maybe 1EUR USB cable with special connector). Instead I splurged for new 20EUR clipper but can't say I'd be particularly happy, so probably will end up ordering replacement blade anyway, but at least no need to worry about backup.
This reads like something my 88-year-old father would write.
"Everything used to be better, and hamburgers should cost a nickle!"
Look, as consumers, we make choices. You can still get a safety-razor on Amazon if you want.
The trouble is... man, if you don't know how to use them right, you can get some nasty cuts. For me... modern idiot-proof razors that this article rants against... well they're just bliss. I can't remember the last time I cut myself shaving.
My Dad said something like, "They sure don't make cars like they used to!" And I said, "No, they don't... they're much safer now, much better gas mileage..."
I don't know how much money I have saved over the years by just switching to an epilator. Women's disposable razors tend to be even more expensive than men's where I live; it's always felt like a rip-off.
On the topic of razors, double edged blades also tend to be better at preventing ingrown hairs and irritation compared to the layered 3-4-blade system from what I've read and experienced. My experience is just with minor peach fuzz and not proper facial hair, but after years of trying different methods for this (eyebrow razors, chemical options, facial trimmers, regular razors), getting a cheap razor that takes double-edged blades is the thing that has worked the best so far.
> Pay attention to what you buy, especially when you are changing from an old well understood product to a new, more convenient, equivalent.
Key phrase: more convenient.
We haven't been sold products as much as we've bought into convenience matters above all else. Marketers can market all they want. Some times they do well, others not so well. Evidently they've been most successful selling the idea that we as individuals aren't responsible and/or accountable for our (consumer) decisions.
Blame the razor manufacturers. Blame Walmart. Blame Amazon. For what exactly, meeting a need in the market? I'm certainly not in favor of these outfits, but they're not making our collective decisions either.
I recently bought a 300 pack of double edge razor blades for $31Cad. You get like the article says 3-5 shaves. Gillette is crazy if they think you can get 15 shaves; ya if you want a screwed up face and a breakout rash from the roughness of it. You still only get like 5 shaves before those too start to hurt. You can actually get a double edge razor blade body in the stores Walmart has them for like $20. They also sell blades but they are like $5-$6 for 5 blades it was much cheaper to buy a 300 pack off amazon. The thing is when I started shaving I didn’t even know that type of razor existed. I would have switched years earlier but just didn’t know they existed.
Not being able to buy an individual piece of fruit in many inner-city shops. This isn't about making it cost more, but about reducing waste.
When fruit is loose some people will simply grab what's in front of them, but some will be choosy taking the best specimens. The inferior ones get rejected--but they were handled to do so. They get picked up, looked at and put down again and again--and pretty soon they're not in shape to sell.
When you package fruit you considerably reduce people's ability to determine which are the best specimens and you considerably reduce the amount of inspection/rejection going on.
Thus more of the packaged fruit actually gets sold.
You can say what you like about razors, but I like shaving foam. It seems it has some additions to reduce sensitivity and to stop bleeding. So if you blades are dull, you will feel nothing. No more need to overcome pain or to run to a store early at the morning for new sharp blades. Or if you manage to shave off a bit of skin, you will stop bleeding in seconds. No more chewed paper bits on your face to stop bleeding. I really like this.
Though I totally agree about tea bags. Wildly bad tea, I cannot drink it. Did they boil tea for ten minutes to make it as bad as coffee? I think brits in any case boil their tea, so they probably do not know better. But what a waste of tea.
> The double edged razor has become a product that you can only buy on the internet, and which you will only buy if you know that it exists.
If you have skin sensitivity issues and/or ingrown hairs, then these razors should be at the very top of your wishlist. There is also quite a bit of joy in the art/routine of using one of these. And I've nicked myself far more often (and far more painfully) with cartridge razors.
Cartridge razors are definitely one area where the newer technology is worse than what it replaced.
The only thing to be careful of is safely disposing of the razors, remember that they can cut through your trash bag and hurt anyone involved with your garbage collection.
> Gillette claim that each blade can be used for 15 shaves.
Just because Gillette claims you need to replace the blade after 15 shaves doesn't mean you need to. If you shave regularly, one of these five-blade heads will easily last you 50+ shaves. You may have to run it over your skin a couple more times with an old head - whereas with a new one just once would be enough.
If you let your hair get long then yes, it does get stuck in the razor sometimes and then may get plucked out - which is painful and can lead to infections as well.
Even an old Gillette Fusion is way safer than a double-edged blade or a straight razor, but if you really want to save costs one of those would be the way to go.
I stopped shaving year ago and I couldn't be more happy.
I don't have to worry about shaving almost every other day, replacing razors, shaving creams, aftershave lotions and on top of that I actually look better with a beard.
1 Bought Gilette razors at highway robbery prices
2 Bought Gilette Razors at Slightly less highway robbery prices at Costco
3 Bought Harry Razors at a significant savings (Gilette publishes ads "Won't you think of our employee's familes!?)
4 Grew a Goatee, stopped shaving as much
4.5 Got a Braun to maintain the goatee
5 Found Gilette Razors offer a superior shave to the Harry ones
Now Shave whole face every two weeks and just the non-goatee parts once a week.
(Replace Gilette blades about once every two months.)
Try wet shaving with a double edge blade and old fashioned security razor. You will find that your costs will go down significantly, your shave may improve and you will be using quality products too
I still cannot believe people shave with Gillette razors, or any other of those fancy multi-blade razors. I paid $10 for a pack of 100 double sided razor blades 3 YEARS ago and I’m still not even close to finished with the pack.
If you're reading this thread and wondering how to get started with a double edged safety razor, try this starter kit from Maggard. I wanted to try it for years but never knew where to start. I've solely been using this kit for about a year.
https://maggardrazors.com/collections/kits/products/maggard-...
People used to resharpen safety razor blades. Not worth their time. DE razors are fine as long as the blade is sharp, but you have to change it 50-100 times per year, and there's a decent chance of cutting yourself.
At least on the first few shaves, the three bladed ones have a lot of research behind them, and are technically superior to the single bladed ones; there's a lab in long island that pays men to test razors that has evaluated this.
Whether the increase in quality and reduced effort is worth it is a personal preference
I bought a double-edged razor as mentioned in the article. Tried it several times, including staring at youtube videos to try to learn. Fucking destroyed my face every time, which is quite embarrassing and upsetting. Found it impossible to get a close shave. Maybe I'm just low IQ but I gave up. Superior people that can do it can fairly look down on me, but there is a market for people like me.
I didnt buy a brush, but if it takes a huge ritual to prepare to shave even after a shower, i'd rather just pay Gillette
I've used one exclusively for about five years now, there really doesn't need to be 'a huge ritual' - I just use a bar of soap, rub it into my hands but then on my face instead of rinsing off.
The one I like is sold as for shaving, but it needn't be, and isn't any more expensive than the same brand's handsoaps.
I found it quite anti-climactic when I started, though I was very cautious at first. I think maybe trying to follow videos is just an unhelpful distraction - focus on how it feels instead, touch the top (not blade) to your cheek and angle down until it just starts to engage and stroke; just adjust that angle according to how it feels, not what someone tells you in a video.
I use one of those Philips rotary electric shavers and while it doesn't get nearly as close it also lets me get hundreds or more shaves before I finally give in and get a new set of blades. I even wonder if the fact that the blades are against the metal shield means they effectively self sharpen, since it goes so many shaves.
I'm amazed there is so much waste with these exposed blade shaving systems. Even if they could be sharpened and re-used a dozen times you'd cut the waste down to 1/10th....
This will probably sound weird but, what is the point at which are you changing blades?
I am using mine with just water and I always make sure that I clean/ shake off everything afterwards.
My first proper blade lasted for 4 years. Then I changed just because I clicked on ad to receive free razor from Gillette. That one is already working for 2 years.
So I get that new blades are bit nicer to your skin, but as blade getting dull is gradual I never see the tipping point when I should get a new one. My skin is perfect by the way.
Sunday night. I shave most days with a second-hand DE razor using the cheap blades from CVS and a bar of soap. It's possible that I could get more shaves out of them, but this works well enough. Also, Sunday is a day of rituals for preparing everything for the coming week--make meals, do laundry, shine shoes, etc. Changing the blade is one of them.
I own a variety of pans bought over the years but I've found that I am almost exclusively using a 10" cast iron pan my grandmother used to use and a 12" pan I bought for maybe $30 or $40 some decades ago as well as a 5-quart cast iron dutch oven. They're both seasoned and so are basically non-stick. They heat evenly and retain that heat for a long time. The only downside is that they're heavy so you do not want to drop them on your foot.
Modern 'razors' are a scam. You don't need 2 blades, 3 or even 4. One blade will do the job better than any combination of gillette rubbish and for a much lower cost.
I would recommend investing in a decent safety razor - which will last forever if well cared for. ($40-80 range). Then your razors run about $0.20 each for good ones purchased in bulk.
edit: I now see that safety razors are the point of the article.. great minds?
Overall, I think the author is reaching a stage in their life where they recognize that things are "passing them by". They are proverbially "over the hill". Often this is chronologically after 40's or so, but can come sooner or later. It came about for me in my 50's. I raved and ranted for a few years how things are no longer available, changing, and changing for the worst. I now enjoy that I know the history why thing as they are, and whipper-snappers eat up my 'sage' story telling.
I do use a double edged safety razor, but I run into the same problem. Blades have to be ordered online. Disposable razors was a convenience, that become the norm.
> Cooking equipment
I buy it the commercial grade, ugly looking ones from bulk/wholesale stores. They are not pretty, but they are functional, very sturdy, very inexpensive, and work both on the stove top and in the oven. Fancy pots & pans is a luxury in my opinion, that become the norm.
> Tea bags replace loose leaf tea.
Bagged tea is less expensive (Irish breakfast) where I travel than loose leaf.
> Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands
Agreed, this is purely paying for convenience, at an extreme premium. This is a luxury in my opinion, not the norm.
> Well understood mechanical bike shifting transitions to electronic shifting
Electrified bikes and bikes with electric shifting is not the majority. This is a luxury in my opinion, not the norm.
> Televisions moving from being screens which accept input, to self contained 'smart' devices
Agreed, this is a nightmare as it binds two different vendors together, increasing the chances of stuck with an obsolete system. This is a luxury in my opinion, that was forced upon us to be the norm.
> In many inner city shops it is now hard to buy an individual piece of fruit.
Not the places I have been (Asia, Central & Eastern Europe, all of the Americas). Walk into grocery store, and start picking the individual fruit.
> Subscription services like Hello Fresh, where you can pay well over the odds to have some vegetables delivered to you.
This is a luxury in my opinion, not the norm, that is forced on us. The recent forced isolation make it a necessity for some.
I had to switch to a dual edge razor because of skin problems: I had a not so good combination of soft face skin and hard beard hairs. The multi blade razors are a scam, because you pass 4-5 blades at once on the skin instead of one, that will make your face all red. Oh, the shaving foam it’s expensive as week, but not even close to a real shaving soap in quality.
I've been using a safety razor (a Merkur Futur, for the curious ones) for years. Add in a decent brush and the upfront cost is about 100€.
As far as consumables go, I pay about 10€/year in blades (I buy 100 Voskhod blades at a time), 15€/year in shaving soap, and 20€/year in miscelanea (aftershave etc.).
Shaving is quite cheap if you don't fall into the printer cartridge model.
I am 47 and I have never used any shaving cream more than maybe a handful f times in my life.
I shave in the shower, and I use Aveeno Body wash for shaving. For years, I simply used conditioner in the shower - basically rub it all over my hair and face, then shave my face. I have never used a mirror to shave either. I just use my hand on my face to know exactly what has been shaved.
I shave with a non-cordless Phillips, that I've had since like 1986 or 1987. I changed the set of three rotary shaver heads only like 3 times in 36 years, and it never made much difference.
The thing makes an irregular squealing sound; you might think it's going to go kaput, without the insider knowledge that it's been doing it for probably well over 20 years.
Recently bought a single blade shaver as seen in the picture, it's awful compared to a three blade Gillette. Reminds me of comparing a Ferrari to a Lada [0] and saying it has four wheels what else do you need, comrade!
Smart TVs are the worst. I always hated them but recently my wife had to deal with one at her workplace and now she hates them even more than I do. We're still running a very old plasma TV that we rarely use so it still looks really great, doubt I'll upgrade any time soon. In fact I'm looking for a spare to chuck in the basement.
> Gillette claim that each blade can be used for 15 shaves
I don't get this at all. I use the cheapest disposable razors (a bag of Bics), and can get 200 shaves out of one. Maybe because I shave at the end of a hot shower when my stubble is soft?
I don't need a razor that looks like it is a Star Wars prop, either.
> Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands, replace many styles of coffee brewing. Provide much worse coffee, at a higher price but are superficially convenient.
Nespresso virtuoline machines produce (arguably) better coffee than many cafes. In terms of consumer sentiment, they also perform amazingly compared to other at home brew methods.
Because of this I started using an electric beard trimmer with really low trim length (0.4mm). It does not result in a clean shave but close enough (and I don't look like a teenager).
But the best part: You pay once 60-100 bucks and can keep using it for a few years (in my case 7 years as I just had to replace my old one).
If you really start obsessing over money you're going look like something between Richard Stallman and the Unabomber, and not just in your facial hair.
What's funny about Stallman is that he looks exceedingly well-maintained, even indulgent, compared to the average Unix hacker. Razors are really a Roman military thing, aren't they? When you look at the Parthians, the Macedonians, the Cappadocians, the Phoenicians, the Gauls, the Germans--all bearded. All basically Unix hackers, of a sort. But we imitate the Roman legions for some reasons.
there's a famous-ish law review paper called 'the durapolist's dilemma' about the 20th century history of durable goods marketing. conclusion is that consumers are not totally savvy about buying things that last
If you keep a piece of old denim or cotton fabric around, you can keep resharpening the cheap cartridge razors for an extremely long time. I can basically keep using them until the plastic parts start to fall off. A pack of cartridge razors can easily last me more than a year when I do this.
I use an electric razor made by Philips and I shave dry once a day, although occasionally I skip a day. I am not a "werewolf" person, so I think I get away with this. If I had more aggressive beard growth, I'd probably want to do a wet shave and also maybe use a proper razor.
This post sounds a bit like an ad but i havn't looked back from the phillips oneblade. Its cheap, can be used wet or dry and cost like £30 and its the first razor that actually manages to remove the hairs on my neck effectively, only have to replace the blades every 6 months...
Lots of very questionable assumptions in this article. Let's start with the part where flat razor blades are more dangerous in multiple ways. Having used both types of razors, I would never go back to the flat ones. Similar major issues with most other substitutes listed.
Tip I learned from an interview on Motley Fool money podcast.
Take a cheap plastic razor, use and dry it after every use. Quite dry, e.g. with a towel and blowing on it. It will last from 3 to 6 months, depending how dry you keep it.
Meaning, the razor degrades primarily due to rust, not from shaving!
Ha! I figured this out 30 years ago and only buy the cheap disposable razors and shave after I shower without any shaving cream. The hot water loosens up your beard enough to “dry shave”. I have a trimmer if it gets long. I maybe spend $10/year on shaving.
I have liked the Hexclad pans. Similar nonstick properties to Teflon but it has no chemicals and no annoying maintenance like cast iron. They seem to last quite well (and have a lifetime warranty). Only downside is they cost a bit more but it is well worth it.
I don't know if it's just me, but I'd always nick my face using multiple-blade razors (Mostly used a Gillette Mach 3). This pretty much stopped when I switched to safety razors. That, and the price, is why I've stuck with it.
15 shaves per blade is maybe for the ultra-cheap ones. The Gillette Mach Turbo 3s I've been using for 15+ years last maybe 50+ shaves each, much better than other brands. Even the "ordinary" Mach 3 blades last much shorter.
If you aren’t looking for the closest possible shave, I can’t say enough good things about the Philips Norelco OneBlade. While the replacement heads run about $15 each, in my experience they do in fact last ~4 months as the manufacturer says.
this x100 - its been one of my pet peeves - if its so obvious to many of us here, how are the bad products doing well and the ones that are better for the world and customers not doing so well? free market is broken?
I use a double edged blade and one blade lasts six months for me with daily shaving. The blades have four edges, not two: you can flip the blade over and use the other side. Sounds weird, but it works.
Gillette M3 selling point for me is you can’t cut yourself. It’s really effortless shaving. I can basically shave and finish under a minute, no cuts no hassles, no special movements with my hand etc.
I reckon I cut myself less often (neither frequently) with my DE safety razor than when I used to use cartridges - because it's so cheap that I replace the blade much more readily, I only use an edge once.
As in cooking, it's the blunt edge that cuts you: you slip or (have to) attack harder.
The company in question must be taking planned obsolescence very seriously or else with the R&D budget I assume they have, they would have come up with a nearly durable product by now.
Shaving technology peaked with the Mach 3. I can't even think of the last time I needed to buy razors b/c the Mach 3's last so damn long. It's probably been a decade
The TV thing really bothers me too. Just sell me a TV with a bunch of HDMI ports for me to plug a chrome cast or Apple TV into, I am not interested in your shitty “smart” tv bloatware.
I've also switched from cartridge to double edged a couple of years back. Not for financial or even environmental reasons, I just find it more comfortable than the cartridge ones.
You can keep your razor blades sharper by pushing them the other direction on some bald skin. Also, rinse after use and keep clean. I used to get like 30-40 shaves out of a head.
I don't understand article's complaints on issues with buying alternatives. All "hard to buy" items are available on the internet in a couple of clicks.
I've found that having 2 electric shavers around - one for a beard trimming style shave (I use a Wahl) and one for a close shave (I use a Braun) - is optimal for me.
If you use a double edged razor, it may be necessary to also have a disposable because airlines won't let you carry on the flat blades. They have their place.
my impression is there is some
kind of shaving cartel and illegal price fixing going on. There is no good reason you some competitor could not sell razor cartridges for like 50 cents each but they are sold for $4 each. The only good explanation is some kind of collusion
there is consumer choice on the market though, you don't need to buy a mach 10. If you want to go cheap , you can buy electric clippers that will probably last a lifetime for $30 and sport a short beard
"Safety razors" (double-edged razors with 10-cent cartriges) take a bit of practice, but are quite adequate in my experience. Its one of those things though that you need to practice your skills a bit with. But once you have the skill, there's no point ever going back.
Iron Skillet vs Teflon Pans -- Skillets weigh a lot more, meaning they take longer to heat up. Teflon also is way more hydrophobic. Honestly, they're two different tools for two different jobs. Skillets should be used for longer periods when temperature is key. Teflon Pans should be used for shorter, faster cooking stuff (really, morning eggs / omelets are best on a Teflon pan).
Tea -- Loose Tea saves on packaging and is far higher quality. You'll have to wash a Tea Infuser regularly (I like things like this: https://www.webstaurantstore.com/1-3-4-stainless-steel-sprin... . Available at almost any tea-store, but I guess you can also shop online).
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I guess I only agree on the tea-point and the safety razor / double-edged razor points. The other complaints seem to miss the point. Yes, Teflon pans only have a short lifespan and need constant replacement, but they also do cooking duties that are inconvenient on a cast-iron skillet pan. (It takes longer to heat up my cast-iron than to cook an egg on a Teflon pan).
A few of my friends are experimenting with steel-pans, which are lighter (heat up faster), but very similar characteristics to cast-iron... just heating up (and cooling down) faster.
Self foaming aerosol canisters are only a couple of bucks? While razor costs are pretty high, I'm not seeing much price difference between soap-puck vs aerosol. I'm thinking this is more of a personal preference issue than cost-efficiency.
> Nespresso machines, and other coffee pod brands, replace many styles of coffee brewing. Provide much worse coffee, at a higher price but are superficially convenient.
If people want a more convenient coffee, I suggest brewing coffee ahead of time (possibly cold brew, but hot-brew works just fine) and storing it in the refrigerator. Microwave the coffee to heat it back up and you're good.
Noting beats the convenience of just taking coffee out of the fridge and drinking it (if you're fine with cold). I've found that cold-brew concentrate is very inconvenient to make, at least without special tools. I've stopped doing it because it just takes too long to filter out the grinds.
Hot-brew (and then refrigerate later) is perfectly fine / fast to filter even with crap blade-grinders and whatnot.
> In many inner city shops it is now hard to buy an individual piece of fruit.
So buy fruit at a grocery store? I guess I'm not seeing the issue...
I'm not sure if I see what you mean. My go-to sneakers have a white trim along the bottom edge and it's just... there? Yes, over time it gets dirty, but then again, so do all shoes in general. Perhaps I simply don't understand what problem you're trying to highlight?
It's white, optimized for showing dirt. It's closest to the ground, optimized for getting dirty. And (In the case of your typical sneaker) It's a special weird porous rubber that is difficult to get clean, optimized for quickly looking like crap.
And when your shoes look like crap it's time to buy new shoes.
Have you considered that you don't have to throw out your shoes just because they're dirty? You don't throw away your clothes when they're dirty, do you? What about dishes? I buy new shoes when my old shoes are broken and they can't be fixed anymore. If you like to throw away your shoes when they get dirty, you do you, but in that case you'll be throwing money at the very same industry you seem to strongly dislike. As a saner alternative, I recommend not caring so much about what your shoes look like, they're just shoes.
From anecdotal evidence, I've got the same pair of sneakers for... 4 years now I think? I'm using them daily and yeah, they've got dirty on the bottom, but I wouldn't consider throwing them out just due to that. I'll replace them once the sole is damaged to the point the shoes stop performing their function.
At that point, it doesn't make a difference whether it's white or black for the sole.
You could have made your point two replies earlier and it would be more clear what you consider the issue with white rubber to be.
Just one small disagreement…electronic shifting on bicycles. I have had my hands cramp up on longer rides in humid/hot conditions changing gears manually. Electronic shifting makes a difference, especially when shifting a lot and you are out there for a while. Triathlon bikes are using them now as well, they allow for more aerodynamic designs because they don’t have to deal with mechanical cables anymore.
I switched to a safety razor years ago. I use about $10 worth of blades a year and just use bar soap for lather.
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Convenient consumer products tend to sell better than less convenient ones, even if the product is worse. That's the entire story. People have finite time, so when they receive more income they will tend to spend it to reduce the time they spend doing things that they don't care about.
I for one hate spending time doing all the things that the products in the article make more convenient, and happily pay more so I can spend my time on other things.
My time is precious to me, so instead of spending money on luxury items I spend money to save time. Evidently so do most other people.