Yes, this is about the woman who bought all the Pac-Sun T-shirts.
First of all, I should point out that it is not just her. With last week's post, yes, there was mainly one person who inspired it, who is LDS, but the other three people are not. With this week, while I do think her actions are stupid, it is hard finding a good link to post, because they all have such nasty and ignorant comments. On one page, they were even making comments about her based on a picture that appeared with the article, except that it was clearly a stock photo. There is stupidity among all creeds and in the secular world. But I take it more personally when they are Mormon, because I want us to look good.
That may initially make it seem like I am part of the problem by worrying more about whether we look good to the world than about righteousness. We will get into this more next week, with Stupid Creationist Tricks, but the validity of my concern is that I do believe that people need the Gospel, and they are less likely to investigate that if it looks ridiculous and stupid. This is not just their problem, because we love them and care about them if we are doing it right.
Some of that can't be avoided, because there are people who will find very basic things like angels and prophets implausible. Still, if you do find it possible to believe that I am intelligent and fair and admirable, it may be easier to accept that my faith has some credibility. Being a reactionary usually doesn't help the cause.
So, this store has shirts that are offensive. The sales clerk can forward the complaint to management, and there may be some room in the city ordinances to get them banned, but those things take time, so the plan is to buy the shirts, hold them to the end of the return period, and then return them for a refund. What are possible objections to this plan?
The one that people object to the most is that it's a narrow-minded thing to dictate what the people around you are allowed to wear, quickly followed up with how futile it is. First of all, those shirts sold out. This will make them look quite popular, where they may be reordered and restocked. Okay, they are going to have to refund that money when you return the shirts, but then they can just sell them again, and you have made the shirts famous. Those shirts are probably selling quite well in other stores, and people may be excited about buying the returned shirts when they come back in. That would be very contrary, but since the market is teens, they do tend to be contrary at times.
I am reminded of a couple of clothing campaigns. One was giving homeless people used Abercrombie & Fitch clothes after the CFO talked about only wanting the cool kids to wear their clothes. I am not linking to that, because it involved dehumanizing the homeless. The truth is, plenty of people were turned off by the CFO, where simply sharing his comments may have been enough. (There are opportunities here with LuluLemon also.)
The better one can be found here: http://business.time.com/2014/01/06/urban-outfitters-withdraws-yet-another-offensive-shirt/
That shirt was pulled. It happened without money being spent by those who were against the shirt, or earning money for the company. There may have been some people who thought those protesting were being oversensitive and bought it, because that happens, but overall the campaign was a success.
Could something similar have worked for the Pac-Sun shirts? I don't know. There is growing awareness now that mocking mental illness is wrong, but there is still a long way to go toward making objectification of the female body not okay, which is the issue here.
The shirts themselves are modest, in that the wearer's body will be covered up. There are some creepy things in wearing someone else's body on yours, especially just parts of the body.
I think this is where I need to be unsatisfactory, in that you need to let people wear the shirts. There are good discussions to have with your children, or with the school, or somewhere, on what some clothing choices say about you, and what might be wrong with them, but the wrong discussions have been going on for a while.
I hate the slogan "Modest is hottest." I know what they're trying to say, but they are still making hotness the goal, where you still need to attract or you are doing it wrong, and where it still places all responsibility for controlling the male gaze on the females, because men are thoughtless animals.
That is a complex discussion, and I don't have any solutions on it. It is probable that at some point, possibly here but possibly on the main blog, there will be a post on how it needs to be about chastity, not virginity, but I am not there yet.
What I can say now is that we need to be ready to have complex thoughts, and hard discussions, and to let people make bad choices while still giving compelling reasons for them to make better choices. I just don't think that happened here.
It does sound like the mall owner would have been responsive. Corporate might have been responsive, but those things take thought, and some patience. Both of those qualities are useful.
I will say that you should never expect reaching out to Abercrombie & Fitch to be helpful. They like being that way.
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