Something I wrote a couple of years ago on Facebook :

I keep seeing posts, don’t use this, don’t eat that, they are full of toxic, carcinogenic, genetically modified ingredients. BUT does anyone ever question where this information comes from? There does not seem to be scrutiny of whether things are FACT or FICTION.
Firstly everything is made of chemicals..because they are made of atoms or molecules of various elements. Even the wind is made if chemicals, because it is in fact gases like Nitrogen, Oxygen, Carbon Dioxide and other elements. The only thing that us not chemical is energy, like light (photons) and energy on the electromagnetic spectrum.
So when someone writes there are chemicals in something that is FACT.
Some are harmful and some are good, it can depend on the amount of something in it. That seems to be where the problem lies. Especially where people believe in homeopathic remedies, where the original active ingredient is so diffuse it sometimes can not be measured any more but people still believe in its effectivness (the placebo effect).
There seems to be an idea that even trace amounts of chemicals can do harm, in some cases that is true, we have all seen films where terrorists plan to put nerve agents in water supplies, and they show a tiny phial of stuff and say this thing can kill a million people. But it is not true that all things in trace amounts can be harmful. It’s these scare stories that worry me. I love science and finding out things. I am not an expert, so I tend to ask people who know or look up things on Wikipedia or Snopes to see what the facts are.
I think we should all question things, but try and follow the facts, not being scared to seek the truth. Certain newspapers will say something is poisonous one day, and then say it is a cure for everything the next. Sometimes you can’t take things at face value.
Science is important, without it we would be back in the stone age.