Apple Sued Based On Greenpeace Report

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Another week, another Apple lawsuit in the news. This time around, hazardous material found in the iPhone’s headphones are supposedly at levels higher than what is prohibited in young children’s toys.

“There is no reason to have these potentially hazardous chemicals in iPhones” said Michael Green, Executive Director of Center for Environmental Health. “We expect Apple to reformulate their products to make them safer from cradle to grave, so they don’t pose a threat to consumers, workers or the environment.”
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just a quick typo:

"are supposedly at levels higher than what is prohibited"

.. i guess you ment "allowed"...
 
I wonder if they contacted Apple and asked them about this first or if they just sued them right off the bat.
 
This lawsuit is bullshit. The group of chemicals in question are phthalates, which in really high doses may cause increased hormonal activity in rodents. More environut faux alarmism and kookiness out of the fear of chemicals. Apple should sue Greenpeace vigorously for this type of nonsense.
 
Not only that. "Blah blah blah... young children blah blah." Oh no, my 3-year old son is going to develop cancer from listening to his iPod headphones all day. Anyone see anything wrong with that?
 
This lawsuit is bullshit. The group of chemicals in question are phthalates, which in really high doses may cause increased hormonal activity in rodents. More environut faux alarmism and kookiness out of the fear of chemicals
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Regardless of the lawsuit, Apple shouldnt be producing them as is. Even the article mentions that under certain laws its REQUIRED that it must carry a warning.....which it doesnt, therefore its breaking the law.

Apple should sue Greenpeace
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Center for Environmental Health is suing Apple, because of the evidence that Greenpeace supplied via testing, if they didnt think there was enough evidence or it wasnt done correctly then im sure they wouldnt be suing them.

The Center for Environmental Health wants Apple to clearly label the iPhone saying that it contains phthaltes, but ultimately it wants the company to get rid of them altogether.
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The Center just wants what is required by Apple to comply with the Law (at least of certain states), although im sure you would agree that removing the phthaltes completely is surely for the best. Everybody else is able to manufacture perfectly good headphones without breaking the law, why cant Apple.
 
Actually, the piece in which Greenpeace is upset about is not exactly "headphones," but the headphone part of the iPhone. It is on the board where you pace your ear to the phone, that area.

While this is against the law, in only specific places, one must wonder who else in the cell phone industry has these "toxic parts" in there cell phone. Apple does not exactly produce the phone, but a third party who also creates other phones for other companies, where are the investigations against there phones? Picking X company out of a group and going after them is wrong; now if they go after all companies then then it is fair grounds and they all will need to change.
 
Toytown said:
Center for Environmental Health is suing Apple, because of the evidence that Greenpeace supplied via testing, if they didnt think there was enough evidence or it wasnt done correctly then im sure they wouldnt be suing them.
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Yes, because every lawsuit that has been filed in our legal system is a completely justified and reasonable one :rolleyes:
"In general what we try to do is encourage the manufacturers through a negotiated settlement to reduce the use of these chemicals," Caroline Cox, a spokeswoman for the Center for Environmental Health, told Macworld. "That would be our goal with Apple."
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Another Apple witch-hunt. The removal of these chemicals (4 teh children!) is likely of little concern to this organization. May as well call it the "Center for Acquiring Monetary Settlements From Large Corporations For The Hell of It".

Ambulance chasers.
 
pxc said:
The criticism is valid, the lawsuit is not.
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Actually the criticism isn't valid since there isn't a single study linking phthalates to any serious forms of cancers or other disorders. Since phthalates are used in cosmetics, I wonder why Green 'deep pockets lawsuit abuse' Peace isn't going after cosmetic makers. This is another case of alarmist, chicken little nonsense from a group of people that are petrified of the world around them, technology and manufacturing. Phthalates are an essential ingredient in our everyday lives and these fools want you to fear them because they 'feel' that they are dangerous.

Phthalates have around for over 60 years and there hasn't been a single study that suggests, much less concludes, that phthalates are a danger to human beings much less human children. Greenpeace and the center for environmental health should be ashamed of themselves for promoting such misleading and erroneous information about a class of substances that help more than they have ever hurt, if ever. Fact based opinion is essential in pursuing correct assessments of products and ingredients that actually do impact health, not kook-based fear mongering due to an obsessive hatred of the chemical/chemistry industry.

First of all, I'm not even an Apple fan and I wish that their iLife product line would die a horrible branding death. Hell, I don't even own an iPod, but whenever I spot phony, bullshit lawsuits based on fear, I will step up to defend those being targeted. If any of you think this is strictly relegated to a warning label issue, then you are sorely misinformed. If any of you are going to defend greenpeace and it's legal arm, the center for environmental health, then your trust in them is sadly misplaced.
 
Toytown said:
Regardless of the lawsuit, Apple shouldnt be producing them as is. Even the article mentions that under certain laws its REQUIRED that it must carry a warning.....which it doesnt, therefore its breaking the law.
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So, you are complaining about a warning sticker not being there? I can accept that. However, Apple is well within it's rights to produce the product since there isn't any health affects from using phthalates.


Center for Environmental Health is suing Apple, because of the evidence that Greenpeace supplied via testing,
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I'd like to see the Greenpeace testing study and their particular methodology in assessing the nature of phthalates and it's particular use in the wiring and what the negative health affects it has due to it's usage.

if they didnt think there was enough evidence or it wasnt done correctly then im sure they wouldnt be suing them.
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This is the sort of blind buck passing that directly chips away at our liberties. You are going to leave the fact finding to a group of violent and dubious environmentalists to dictate what is healthy and what is harmful with respect to the products you use? I wonder why it isn't called the The Department of Greenpeace, The office of Environmental Health and Safety instead.

This sort of blind acceptance on your part is disturbing because it conveys a type of obedience you aren't willing to shake. Just because they brought a suit doesn't mean they are right and just because they have some sort of evidence doesn't mean it has merit.

[quoteThe Center just wants what is required by Apple to comply with the Law (at least of certain states), although im sure you would agree that removing the phthaltes completely is surely for the best.[/quote]

No, I don't agree. I don't believe that phthalates pose any significant health risks at all. I use products that have these compounds in them every day and so do you and so does everyone else and there hasn't been a single health affect from these compounds that I know of. It's a case of enviro/anti-chemical industry kookyness that is driving this suit, not whether or not a label is missing.

Everybody else is able to manufacture perfectly good headphones without breaking the law, why cant Apple.
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That is just patent falsehood, since multitudes of manufacturing and manufacturers use products that have phthalates in them. Please educate yourself with regards to phthalates before you spew nonsense and try to pass it off as fact.
 
So, you are complaining about a warning sticker not being there? I can accept that.
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I wasnt complaining, i was just stating that if, that is the Law then they should abide by it and by not doing so, they are making themselves a target for such crap. Regardless if there is or isnt any health affects. They only have themselves to blame and if they cant rectify the issue quickly then it should be removed from the states where it is Law. Everybody else is made to follow the law and corporations should be no different.

However, Apple is well within it's rights to produce the product since there isn't any health affects from using phthalates.
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It can produce as many as it wants, but if it plans to sell them in the various states with the law, then they must produce the warning sticker.

This is the sort of blind buck passing that directly chips away at our liberties. You are going to leave the fact finding to a group of violent and dubious environmentalists to dictate what is healthy and what is harmful with respect to the products you use? I wonder why it isn't called the The Department of Greenpeace, The office of Environmental Health and Safety instead. This sort of blind acceptance on your part is disturbing because it conveys a type of obedience you aren't willing to shake.
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I meant that the Center for Environmental Health would have verified the tests before shouting there mouth of and suing them. Im not from the USA, but in my country thats what would have happened (maybe!). Its not blind acceptance, its just i dont care enough about the issue to do my own testing and would think that the CEH would have.

No, I don't agree. I don't believe that phthalates pose any significant health risks at all.
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Its not up to you/i to agree, it doesnt matter what you/i think, its a Law, there breaking it by not putting up the sticker. Believe me ive been in situations in the past, where i have had to do equally dumb things, but you should not be breaking the law especially where Health is concerned, regardless of what you/i know/think. If the law is wrong, it should be changed but it should not be skipped.....doing so only opens up a can of worms.

Please educate yourself with regards to phthalates before you spew nonsense and try to pass it off as fact
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I have no interest in educating myself with phthalates, why would i waste my time? The issue is they broke a Health law and to continue selling their products they should comply
 
Methadras said:
Actually the criticism isn't valid since there isn't a single study linking phthalates to any serious forms of cancers or other disorders.
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I don't know why you don't consider liver cancer "serious," which it has been linked to in animal studies.

Geez, when did it become cool to just stand for the opposite of something else? :rolleyes:
 
Actually...oxygen is quite deadly to us as well. I encourage everyone to stop breathing it before it kills you. :D
 
Ok, so now the iPhone earbuds will have a friggin' warning tag that's bigger than the iPhone itself and will probably say "Do not remove under penalty of law".

Hey, it's the US legal system. It could happen...
 
pxc said:
I don't know why you don't consider liver cancer "serious," which it has been linked to in animal studies.

Geez, when did it become cool to just stand for the opposite of something else? :rolleyes:
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Liver cancer is serious, but to quantify and equate animal studies where massive doses, many times what a human being would absorb into their bodies as a comparative that phthalates causing cancer in humans is ridiculous. You obviously are simply aren't even capable of doing the most basic of research on this class of compounds.

I'm sorry, but you are just perpetuating a lie. I don't know where you got your information from, but it's false, untrue, specious, and helps only in perpetuating the myth that this class of chemicals are harmful to humans which they are not.

Please educate yourself before you try to defend something that poses no problems nor health risks to human beings. Thanks.

http://www.phthalates.com/index.asp?page=29
 
Toytown said:
I have no interest in educating myself with phthalates, why would i waste my time? The issue is they broke a Health law and to continue selling their products they should comply
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Of course you don't, because doing so would correct your current notion of what you've tried to defend, Greenpeace and it's legal arm The Center for Environmental Health (a sham outfit) just like the rest of these nuts. These people used phthalates as the premise to sue Apple and under that premise that a sticker needs to be put on earbuds. That's why I suggested Apple should countersue and countersue vigorously against this nonsense and get this law struck down for the nonsense that it is.

It's okay, I understand the need for you to do some Olympic level back-peddling on the issue, because you've already admitted to me and everyone who has read this thread that you would rather remain ignorant. What amazes me more is that you are willfully choosing to remain ignorant and that speaks volumes by itself.
 
CNN reported last night that California and the European Union banned all products using that chemical. Bans are underway for some other states. Several toy manufacturers are also imposing bans on products containing phthalates. According to the news, phthalates causes infertality, liver cancer, and mental difficulties in male.

Phthalates are used to soften plastic or rubber, such as pacifiers, bottle nipples and earbuds.
 
Azhar said:
CNN reported last night that California and the European Union banned all products using that chemical. Bans are underway for some other states. Several toy manufacturers are also imposing bans on products containing phthalates. According to the news, phthalates causes infertality, liver cancer, and mental difficulties in male.

Phthalates are used to soften plastic or rubber, such as pacifiers, bottle nipples and earbuds.
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Such stupid nonsense. I wonder that the sources of that news was.
 
Phthalates news and debates has been going on for much longer than most people know. It's just that Greenpeace's involvement caused people to notice it, I guess.

If you search CNN.com for the word "phthalates" you would get news far back in 2000, 2001 and earlier. Vinyl automotive seats are softened by phthalates (which incidentally is the source of the "new car smell"). Nail polish as well.

It's old news. Greenpeace just have big mouths. Thats all.
 
Azhar said:
Phthalates news and debates has been going on for much longer than most people know. It's just that Greenpeace's involvement caused people to notice it, I guess.

If you search CNN.com for the word "phthalates" you would get news far back in 2000, 2001 and earlier. Vinyl automotive seats are softened by phthalates (which incidentally is the source of the "new car smell"). Nail polish as well.

It's old news. Greenpeace just have big mouths. Thats all.
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I fully understand what phthalates do, but the fact that Greenpeace has this kind of juice is sickening. I don't like Greenpeace and I don't like what they stand for. Anything that comes out of their organization must be gone over with a high powered microscope.
 
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