moonvoice (ravenari)

Oh, dear. It’s happened again. Abercrombie & Fitch has caused a stir and an uproar (1 & 2). This time, the uproar has resulted in a petition for the massive retailer to include plus-sizes (3).

In summary, CEO Mike Jeffries made comments saying he only intended for the “cool kids” to shop at his stores. Meanwhile, the “uncool kids” are simply incapable of fitting in his retail chain’s clothing, much less fitting into the culture/atmosphere of Abercrombie & Fitch. This was in a 2006 interview and, since, he has given a…non-apology. Or at least, that’s how many interpret it (2).

As a response, the petition occurred. One man has even suggested that people give any clothes that they own from the giant store chain to homeless people.

*Derail Commence*

…Give the clothing to homeless people. I’m not sure of…the Unfortunate Implication of this. Now, perhaps I could get behind the idea if it was given to homeless people in a more indirect, traditional way-such as the Salvation Army or Goodwill. In that way, perhaps, it could be said that the people hurt by the store (and are permanently declaring themselves former customers) are taking something negative for them and turning it into something positive for others. That would be a good thing.

But the context of this doesn’t make that explanation ring true. To begin with, the context is more that people want to get rid of anything of Abercrombie & Fitch’s than anything else. If this was really about giving for the sake of turning a negative (“This store has hurt my body image and wasted my money!”) into a positive (“Here are people that truly need clothes, no matter what the brand/label is!”), then the clothing’s label would have to have a positive meaning for the giver in order for it to have a positive connotation for the receiver. This is the problem: the meaning of the clothing is negative for these people and, therefore, is odious as a gift to those that truly need it. So you’re left with the Unfortunate Implication that to give the clothes to the homeless-rather than selling it at a high price to the Cool Kids-is to demote and degrade the clothing by way of the very people that are receiving it. Trash gets trash. Dust collects dust.

I wonder if they would’ve felt they were doing any differently than if they had simply burned the clothes and/or tossed them into a dumpster.

So here’s my note to finish this derail: If you are going to give anything at all to the homeless/needy, then please (read that: Please) be sure that you give in a positive connotation that is not born of-to begin with-an intent to punish a corporation.

*Derail Finis*

Now! Onto the issue I actually wanted to talk about: the pervading culture of Abercrombie & Fitch and the petition/outrage.

Mike Jeffries noted that his target audience is a very, very specific audience: white, preferably male, heterosexual, thin, young, exclusive, and of an upper socioeconomic class. In turn, he has noted that those outside the realm of his target audience include: non-whites, preferably females, homosexuals, non-thin, older, inclusive, and of a lower socioeconomic class. And here’s the main thing: he’s right. He is absolutely, one-hundred percent right. His store has made it very, very clear who is welcome and who is unwelcome. He has touted that horn for quite a while and his business has remained successful throughout the years.

But to soften the blow, I’d very much like to introduce the Wonder Woman for today, a Ms. Amy Taylor from the Huffington post. She has penned a letter to Mike Jeffries named An Open Letter from a ‘Fat Chick’ to Mike Jeffries, CEO of Abercrombie & Fitch (4).

In the letter, Ms. Amy Taylor says quite a lot of Awesome Sauce things, but I will quote some of what I feel are her most pivotal parts. The first, if you will, highlights why I don’t generally agree with the petition:

You got me, Mike! I don't wear a size 4. You should probably also know that my middle fingers curve ever-so-slightly outward and I have a Morton's toe. I'm terrible at long division and I'm not that great at parallel parking. But I'm a good person.

This.

This is the core of why I don’t believe in petitioning or suing or boycotting corporations like Abercrombie & Fitch: if you do not see that the value of a person lies in their explicit and unique personhood rather than aesthetics they may or may not be able to help, then you have already lost much, much more than you could ever hope to gain. You have already burned yourself far hotter than any petition ever could.

In other words, if you do not see people as human beings worthy of basic respect and dignity and, instead irrevocably categorize them into Acceptable and Unacceptable castes, then you are philosophically beyond help.

I say ‘philosophically’ simply because I do not know the mind of Mike Jeffries and/or the employees of the store; I do not know if the correct adjective would actually by ‘psychopathically’. I do not know what drove this CEO to say such horrendous things and without any sugarcoating, either. Miserable? Psychopath? Sociopath? Insecure? Egotistical? Avaricious? Vicious?

Maybe all of those or maybe none of those. Maybe it depends on the day of the week or on how sweet his coffee is. I don’t know and I don’t care.

For the side that cries foul against Abercrombie & Fitch, this rings of a personal matter to me. Because, seriously? I understand this. I get it. So does Ms. Amy Taylor:

I have always struggled with my weight. Big-boned. Plus-size. Thick. Curvy. Voluptuous. Padded. Pick your adjective. Over the years I learned to deal with it in different ways. I learned to ignore it. Compensate for it. Deny it. Dress it up. Cover it over. Like everyone who struggles with something physical, I wear my battle on the outside for the world to see. There's no running from it, because there is no hiding it.

Mike (can I call you Mike?), I'm not only a fat chick, I'm also a "not-so-cool" kid. Always have been, always will be. I've had 31.5 years to come to terms with that. Along the way I have been bullied, tortured, teased and harassed. Somehow I came out the other end better for it.

There are quite a few Great Hurts in this world, and one of those Great Hurts can be explicit and/or implicit exclusion and oppression. Children can be cruel and whoever said “Sticks and stones may break my bones, but words will never hurt me” has not yet been born and I wish them and their mother a safe journey through the birth.

It’s especially worse when, as a child, you have neither the resources to permanently get away from the abuse nor the mental capacity to see through the bully’s message and understand that there’s nothing wrong with you and everything wrong with the bully.

I, too, am a plus-sized female-a size 18/20 or 2X, to be exact. I am also black. As such, I have “two strikes against me” and the world has made sure I don’t forget it. Though I have healed and learned to see myself as a whole person rather than an [sexualized] object to be criticized, ostracized and physically policed as Public Property Gone Wayward (5).

So I completely understand where the people petitioning and suing and boycotting Abercrombie & Fitch are coming from. I do. People have been through hell and back; they have struggled with anorexia and bulimia and depression and suicide and low/lack of self-esteem. Girls are struggling to fit into a narrow definition of attractiveness and boys are struggling to fit into a narrow definition of [adult] manhood. Even now as I type this, there is someone considering dangerous body manipulation in order to fit into one of the tiny shirts or one of the skinny jeans.

Yes. Right now, that’s happening.

Abercrombie & Fitch has caused serious harm to America-particularly its youth. So what better way to invite deadly backlash than to try to deal a significant blow to the company?

And now to play Devil’s Advocate to Abercrombie & Fitch. For this, I only have one thing to say: what exactly is the point of marketing to a broader audience if our current, specifically-targeted audience more than keeps us afloat? If it’s not broken, don’t fix it. Besides! Why is this store chain being singled out? They’re not the only ones that do this: look at Victoria’s Secret, Hollister, American Eagle, and Sephora, to name a few.

But now onto my actual argument, lovelies.

I do not believe that taking legislative/financial action against Mike Jeffries’ clothing chain because, again: the philosophy is simply beyond help. To believe in and advocate for the concept that human beings should be seen in a ranked caste system (based on appearance, no less) is embarrassingly juvenile at best and Neo-Nazi at worst.

So what do I propose? What do I suggest?

Firstly, I think we need to understand and acknowledge that this is not simply one company’s problem. Rather, this is an entire cultural problem. There is an entire cultural narrative that Body Polices and Fat Shames and Exclusively Excludes among other things. It has been around since before the time of corsets and after the time of skin bleaching. Both genders have been targeted, but women more so than men have shouldered the burden of being seen as a Public Ornament That Must Conform or Else.

Once we acknowledge that bigger, painfully problematic cultural narrative, then we may begin to have an honest conversation on it. And, preferably, that conversation will be headed by the people most hurt by this culture-the people made to feel ousted and subhuman. This is the core of why I don’t think that forcing the store chain to put in plus-sizes would work; just because clothing my size would be available does not mean that I would be treated with respect. I would actually put good money on the bet that my sizes would either be, a) towards the back and/or b) always suspiciously on backorder from the main warehouse. And heaven knows if I would even get any eye contact, much less a welcoming smile. By the way? These are all hypothetical situations assuming that I would even want to go into Abercrombie & Fitch.

Secondly, I think we need to understand that the culture and attitudes that Abercrombie & Fitch and co. advocate can be summed up in one word: toxic. Absolutely toxic.

Now, is this to say that all Abercrombie & Fitch employees and employers share this toxic attitude? Of course not. There are certainly those that merely needed a job and the store happened to have an opening. Hell, there may even be employees that have been fighting tooth and nail from the beginning for the place to have a broader market.

But the fact of the matter is (again, without attacking specific groups of people) that the overall cultural attitude of the store chain is simply toxic.

What do we do with people and concepts and expectations and paradigms that are toxic? I believe that we do only one thing:

We leave them behind.

We ignore them. We forget them. We avoid them. We disassociate from them.

Because they are toxic and that which is toxic is mutually exclusive with the life of a healthy individual. They have no place in the life of someone that wishes to have self-acceptance.

They are toxic. And so we must leave them behind.

In their place, I believe we must work to surround ourselves with people that will uplift us. Ms. Amy Taylor says it best once again:

Funny thing about wearing your struggle on the outside: it makes you stronger. It teaches you how to adapt. It forces you to dig deep and do more. And while people like you are sitting at the cool kids table intent on holding others down, the ragtag team of not-so-cool kids is busy pulling others up...and we've become an unstoppable force driving the world forward.

Now, surely grade school is a world that is much, much smaller than the “real/adult” world. Therefore, it is much, much more difficult to pick and choose the people that will help to enrich your life, rather than to degrade your life. But as Amy Taylor says, those battle scars can help to make you a stronger, smarter and savvier person. Those battle scars allow you to see other people as people and always remember how much all you ever wanted was for someone to be kind to you-and not for the way you look, but for the simple fact that you are a fellow human being.

When you do get out into the world, you surround yourself with people that uplift you and, in turn, people that you will uplift. Yes, these will include the blacks and the lesbians and the Muslims and the plus-sized and the Hispanics and the disabled and the impaired and Everyone Else That Can’t Belong. You know what else? The people that would usually be in Mike Jeffries’ target group should be included too because not all of them advocate for the same things that he does; they, too, can be allies and supporters. They, too, are scarred with the expectation to see their fellow human beings in such a horrible and shallow light and they are not sheep. With the increased system of support and acceptance, we then decrease the system of degradation and exclusion.

And that, more than anything, rings more true and useful than any lawsuit or boycott or petition ever could. It involves healing and maturity and the discrediting of those that would seek to obstruct that healing and infantilize that maturity.

So I say that we shouldn’t give Abercrombie & Fitch any more of our time and attention by any means at all. Instead, we should be leaving behind their toxic culture to muddle in their own toxicity and focus on bringing other people and ourselves up.

Because that’s just what the Real Cool Kids do.



http://shine.yahoo.com/fashion/petition-launches-urging-abercrombie---fitch-to-change-it-s-anti-plus-size-stance-190830257.html (1)

http://omg.yahoo.com/news/abercrombie-fitch-ceo-mike-jeffries-apologizes-cool-kids-214000187-us-weekly.html (2)

http://www.salon.com/2006/01/24/jeffries/ (3)

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/amy-taylor/open-letter-fat-chick-mike-jeffries-ceo-abercombie-fitch_b_3249798.html (4)

http://targetingteens.blogspot.com/2012/08/women-and-girls-arent-public-property.html (5)