COURTESY OF ED BROWN
TOXIC
DANGERS
taurant, visited 78 environmental experts and advocates — from
Vermont to California — in search
of answers. (Industry groups and
government agencies refused to
meet with him.) His resulting documentary, Unacceptable Levels,
will be available for community
screenings starting in January.
Brown said he found many of
the answers difficult to understand
— everything from the years, even
decades, that a product can spend
on the market before being proven
toxic, to the lack of action that the
government may take after a product is deemed dangerous.
“The worst part, for me anyway,
was learning that our corpora-
HUFFINGTON
11.11.12
tions, our courts, and even the
government, feel that all of those
chemicals inside of our bodies are
completely acceptable — they are
an acceptable level of risk,” Brown
says in his film. “And acceptable
doesn’t mean good here, folks.”
A PARENT’S
PREDICAMENT
Over the past few years, Brown
and his wife, Lauren, have attempted to rid their family’s home
of toxic chemicals. Brayden, 4, and
Maia, 2, now play with wooden
toys — although their parents are
still careful to avoid arsenic-treated wood. They also eat organic
food and use carcinogen-free personal care products.
But Ed and Lauren Brown have
also learned that a parent can only
A still from
Brown’s
documentary
of his children,
Brayden and
Maia.