3M May Escape Toxic Chemical, PFAS Manufacturing Legacy

Corporate accountability and legal impunity

• Many see the PFAS story as another case of “justice-as-a-service”: huge harms resolved via settlements rather than jail.
• Several argue this is systemic, not about any one president: as long as executives and shareholders follow the letter of the law, they rarely face serious consequences, similar to leaded gasoline or the opioid crisis.
• Purdue/Sacklers are cited as a parallel: massive death toll, no criminal charges, a relatively small civil payout vs gains. Others note the legal hurdles in personally pursuing wealthy families and their trusts.
• Some contrast this with China’s harsh treatment of corporate malfeasance, but others respond that such enforcement is selective and politically motivated.

Who is “3M,” and how should punishment work?

• There is intense anger at 3M and similar manufacturers for knowingly poisoning the world for decades, with calls for executives and key decision-makers to be jailed and ruined.
• Others press on “who” exactly should burn: past vs present management, siloed scientists, current shareholders, small investors.
• Debate centers on limited liability and corporate personhood: some want the veil abolished; others argue LLCs protect small operators from ruin and that the issue is failure to impose existing criminal liability on individuals.
• Concern is raised about how to design specific, enforceable accountability mechanisms rather than broad outrage.

Public attitudes, incentives, and innovation

• One view: the public broadly knows about harms and accepts them because convenience and low costs outweigh abstract future risks.
• Another: tougher liability would reduce some harms but also chill research, increase prices, and those tradeoffs might be closer to “rational” than critics admit.
• Others argue people ignore long-term issues they feel powerless to affect, and media/campaigns shape what gets attention.

PFAS persistence, scale, and science

• Commenters stress PFAS as “civilization-level harm”: generational, cumulative effects (e.g., zebrafish studies) and global spread into snow, groundwater, and even rain, including remote regions.
• Discussion covers how PFAS enter the hydrological cycle and the difficulty of tracing exact pathways, though industrial emissions and global transport are implicated.
• Teflon itself is described by some as relatively inert, with the greater danger in manufacturing chemicals and byproducts like PFOA/PFOS. Others caution that “probably fine” is unacceptable when cleanup is essentially impossible and impurities or breakdown under heat can still cause exposure.
• Ski wax, food packaging, paper coatings, wire insulation, detergents, and textiles are mentioned as pathways by which PFAS have become ubiquitous.
• There is uncertainty about the safety of newer replacement PFAS compounds.

Mitigation, filtration, and futility

• One detailed account describes a high PFAS reading in household water downstream from a manufacturer, followed by investment in PFAS-certified whole-house and RO filtration and extensive product substitutions (cast iron/stainless cookware, glass/silicone, natural fibers, avoiding PFAS-laden detergents).
• Even with substantial effort and money, posters feel exposure remains unavoidable due to food, water, and environmental background levels.
• Others note that while PFAS can be filtered from drinking water, doing so thoroughly at municipal scale is technologically and economically daunting, and it does nothing for lakes, aquifers, and ecosystems already contaminated.
• A PFAS “blood cleaning” startup is mentioned but viewed skeptically as both unvalidated and undermined by continual re-exposure.

Relative importance and public concern

• Some lament that people appear to care more about visible, immediate conflicts (Gaza, Ukraine, BLM, culture-war issues) than about diffuse, long-term threats like PFAS or climate.
• Replies counter that geopolitical crises also have huge long-term consequences, that people can care about multiple issues, and that salience is shaped by campaigns, media, and perceived tractability.
• A recurring theme: harms to hypothetical future generations are discounted compared to present suffering, even when the long-term damage (environmental or political) is plausibly greater.

Information sources and trust

• A popular science video is recommended for PFAS context; a subthread disputes its reliability, with some calling the channel frequently incomplete or biased by sponsorship, and others defending it as acceptable so long as sponsorship is disclosed.

Broader systemic reflections

• Commenters tie PFAS to a wider pattern: lead, mercury, pesticides, plastic additives, tire chemicals, etc.
• Some speculate that unchecked global deployment of novel chemicals without fully understanding their biospheric impact could function as a kind of “great filter” for technological civilizations.