Why I Won’t Apply Conventional Sunscreen

The Top 10 sunscreen giants I personally scrutinize before I put anything on my skin: Kenvue/Neutrogena/Aveeno, Edgewell/Banana Boat/Hawaiian Tropic, Beiersdorf/Coppertone/Nivea Sun, L’Oréal/La Roche-Posay/CeraVe/Vichy/Garnier, SC Johnson/Sun Bum, Shiseido, Unilever, CVS Health private-label SPF, Walgreens private-label SPF, and Walmart Equate SPF. If the formula relies on chemical filters, aerosol delivery, fragrance, or ingredients I would not knowingly absorb into my body, I am not interested.

I live in Florida. I am not hiding from the sun.

I swim. I snorkel. I walk outside. I love the ocean, the heat, the early light, the feeling of being alive under the sky. But I also refuse to be bullied into believing that the only way to protect myself from the sun is to smear a chemical cocktail over my entire body and call that “health.”

That is where I draw the line.

I am not anti-sunscreen. I am anti-toxic sunscreen.

I use sunscreen when I need it, especially when I am in the ocean, on the water, or exposed for longer periods of time. But it has to be mineral-based. It has to be clean. It has to make sense. Zinc oxide and titanium dioxide are the only sunscreen active ingredients the FDA has proposed as generally recognized as safe and effective, while many common chemical filters still need more safety data, including avobenzone, oxybenzone, octinoxate, octocrylene, homosalate, octisalate, and others.

That alone should make people stop and think.

Because for decades we were told: “Just apply sunscreen. Reapply sunscreen. Wear sunscreen every day. Fear the sun.”

But the conversation almost never goes deeper.

What sunscreen?
Which ingredients?
How often?
How much is absorbed?
What happens when those chemicals sit on hot skin for hours?
What happens when they are sprayed into the air and inhaled?
What happens when people apply them daily for years?

Those questions matter.

And they matter even more because the FDA itself has acknowledged that sunscreen use and exposure have increased dramatically over time, and that additional data is needed to properly evaluate several sunscreen ingredients under modern usage conditions.

So no, I am not going to blindly trust the same mass-market machine that sells fear in May, sunscreen in June, after-sun repair in July, and anti-aging products in August.

That machine is not health.

That is commerce.

The real common-sense answer is simple: do not bake in the sun.

Wear protective clothing. Wear cotton. Wear a white wide-brimmed hat. Wear sunglasses. Avoid direct peak-hour exposure when the sun is brutal. Use shade intelligently. Respect the sun instead of worshipping it or fearing it.

And when you actually need sunscreen, read the label.

Not the front label. The ingredient label.

There is a difference.

The front label says “dermatologist recommended,” “invisible,” “sport,” “reef friendly,” “healthy glow,” and “broad spectrum.” The back label tells you what you are putting into your bloodstream, onto your skin, into the ocean, and sometimes into your lungs if you are spraying it.

We already had a major warning shot.

In 2021, Valisure filed a citizen petition with the FDA after testing sunscreen and after-sun products and reporting benzene contamination in multiple batches. Benzene is not a sunscreen ingredient. It is a known carcinogenic contaminant. After that, Johnson & Johnson voluntarily recalled several Neutrogena and Aveeno aerosol sunscreens, and major retailers began pulling affected products from shelves.

That should have been a much bigger cultural moment.

Instead, the public was quickly pushed back into the same lazy message: keep applying sunscreen.

Again, which sunscreen?

Because “sunscreen” is not one thing. A clean mineral sunscreen is not the same as a fragrance-loaded chemical aerosol. A zinc-based formula you apply when you actually need protection is not the same as spraying a mist of questionable ingredients over your child at the beach and calling yourself responsible.

I am also not buying the idea that the sun is the enemy.

The sun is not the enemy. Ignorance is the enemy.

Overexposure is a problem. Burning is a problem. Tanning until your skin is damaged is a problem. But moderate sunlight is not some villain we need to erase from human life.

Vitamin D is not a cute wellness trend. It is a hormone-like substance involved in immune function, calcium balance, cellular communication, and gene expression. Research has found that vitamin D directly influences more than 200 genes, and other research describes vitamin D receptor activity across a wide range of human cells.

So when I hear the blanket message “avoid the sun,” I hear another half-truth.

And half-truths are dangerous.

My approach is not complicated. Early morning sun, yes. Late afternoon sun, yes. Direct Florida midday sun for hours without protection, no. Protective clothing, yes. A white brimmed hat, yes. Sunglasses, yes. Shade, yes. Mineral sunscreen when needed, yes.

Chemical sunscreen sprayed all over my body because a fear-driven campaign told me to?

No.

Absolutely not.

The sunscreen industry does what many industries do. It turns a real concern into a mass-market product dependency. Then it wraps that dependency in medical language, celebrity dermatology, pastel packaging, and public health messaging.

And people stop thinking.

That is the part that bothers me most.

We have become so conditioned to outsource common sense that we forget the obvious. If the sun is strongest at noon, maybe do not lie in it for three hours. If your skin is burning, move. If you are going into the ocean, choose a mineral sunscreen that makes sense for your body and the water. If you are walking in Florida, wear clothing that protects you instead of depending on a chemical formula to do all the work.

This is not radical.

This is adult thinking.

The real message should not be: fear the sun.

The real message should be: respect the sun, protect your skin intelligently, and stop trusting every chemical formula just because it is sold under a familiar brand name.

I want sunlight in my life.

I want vitamin D.

I want the ocean.

I want movement, nature, clean food, clean products, clean skin, and a body that functions the way it was designed to function.

What I do not want is fear dressed up as science.

And I definitely do not want conventional sunscreen marketed as the only responsible choice when the ingredient conversation is far from settled.

So yes, I use sunscreen.

But not blindly.

Not chemically.

Not because a giant manufacturer tells me to.

I use mineral-based protection when I need it, clothing when I can, shade when it makes sense, and my brain every single day.

That is my sun strategy.

And frankly, it is the one more people should be talking about.

Written by Alexander Brosda
CEO – Sokörpe Laboratories
Skincare formulation researcher and skincare science educator.