Beyoncé’s “Flawless” played in the background as the model walked out onto the runway. The shirt she was showcasing was plain—a standard white tee—but the slogan on the front of it caught people’s attention: “We should all be feminists.” The T-shirt was the brainchild of designer Maria Grazia Chiuri, the first female artistic director of Dior in its 70-year history. Drawing inspiration from author Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie’s TEDx talk of the same name, Chiuri wanted to make a bold promise that this new chapter of Dior would be unlike any other. The problem with the T-shirt? Its whopping retail price of $860.
This episode reflects a shocking discrepancy between the core values of the intersectional feminist movement and fashion’s interpretation of it. Such a divide is nothing new. While fashion is often disregarded as trivial, clothing choices can serve as an extension of one’s internal cultural and political beliefs. To dissect whether Chiuri’s intentions were good or bad is reductionist and misses the larger discussion of fashion’s role in political movements. The dialogue, then, should revolve around the purpose and political implications of clothing. From this perspective, I argue that the fashion industry’s commodification of political movements not only dilutes the message of the issues but also reinforces the inequitable socio-political conditions that inspire their products.
In an interview with Elle magazine, Adichie explained that lending her slogan to Chiuri gave young women “a language to talk about things they have already experienced.” However, the unintended message Dior’s shirt sends is that one can only be a feminist if they can afford the shirt. The top exemplifies historical amnesia: It forgets the shoulders upon which modern feminism stands. From Sojourner Truth’s rousing “Ain’t I a Woman?” speech in 1851 to Audre Lorde’s 1979 publication, The Master’s Tools Will Never Dismantle the Master’s House, intersectional feminism has paved the path to include women of all colors, sexual orientations, and backgrounds. Given that women of color often already bear disproportionate financial burdens, the shirt’s cost contradicts its purpose.
Of course, fashion isn’t alone in stripping meaningful movements into bite-sized popular culture. Marxist culture theorists Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer argued that the economic forces of capitalism strip cultural experiences of their meaning and authenticity. High fashion operates in a similar manner: The distance between designers and the problems they attempt to highlight leads to the creation of trendy but confusing political aesthetics. In this context, trendsetters opt for performative appearances of activism that reduce advocacy to putting a slogan on a T-shirt. As such statements conveniently reduce the exhaustive labor of explaining one’s opinions, they inadvertently replace meaningful dialogue.
It is also worth noting that aesthetics come with an expiration date. One season, cargo pants are in mode; next season, they are out. On the flip side, political issues cannot be quickly solved in the time between fall and spring fashion weeks. These drastically different timelines present serious consequences: Once a fashion season ends, the momentum that these cultural products lend to important political movement dissipates before the issue has even been rectified. When a shirt with the words “We are all feminists” inevitably goes out of style, it may give the illusion that feminism and women’s rights are an oversaturated topic of the past.
Even when high fashion tries to aim for the most controversial and current issues, it often misses the mark. Take, for example, actress Priyanka Chopra’s appearance in the sixth anniversary cover of Condé Nast Traveller India’s edition. She is dressed in a shirt with the words “Refugee,” “Immigrant,” and “Outsider” crossed out in red, suggesting instead that the final label of “Traveller” is the most accurate. Beyond fetishizing forced transnational migration, the shirt attempts to strip meaning from labels which are all too relevant; as of May 2019, nearly 71 million people have been forcibly displaced worldwide. The crossed-out labels should not be seen as derogatory insults; they are simply reflective of life for a growing percentage of the global population. “Traveller” implies vacations and economic capital, luxuries that are far from reality for the many refugees and immigrants who instead seek political or socioeconomic stability.
From a cynical perspective, fashion houses are, in many ways, making money from people’s genuine struggles. Without the hardships of refugees and disenfranchised women, there would be no flashy slogans on “statement” T-shirts from which high fashion can turn a profit. But even if they aren’t profiting from co-opting social issues, political aesthetics can be inappropriate and fraught with controversy. For example, in Bstroy’s Spring 2020 menswear collection, models donned hoodies riddled with bullet-like holes and the names of American high schools and universities that were sites of infamous mass shootings. Amid the backlash, Bstroy founder Brick Owens noted, “Sometimes life can be painfully ironic. Like the irony of dying violently in a place you considered to be a safe, controlled environment…” However, Owens seemed to miss how his ill-conceived designs trivialized the pain and suffering of the hundreds of students who lived through these events. The brand’s attempts to spark dialogue about the pervasiveness of gun violence represent another instance of fashion’s attempts to wade blindly into politics.
Bstroy, Dior, and Conde Nast have all tried and failed to meet the same goal—to associate their respective political messages with the lives of people who first voiced them. Indeed, Adorno and Horkheimer were distressed by the fact that mass culture removes “the layer of experience which made words human like those who spoke them.” Does fashion not do the same thing by taking the narrative away from those to whom it ought to belong? The very words “refugee” and “feminist” lose their meaning when they are separated from their embodied, messy histories.
To an extent, any altruistic intention of these designers can be seen as an attempt to sensationalize and dramatize important dialogue. Gun violence has plagued the American people for decades, with little political change enacted to end the problem. Similarly, gender-based discrimination and xenophobia are longstanding global issues. This begs the question: Can fashion adopt political mantras and beliefs without reducing the power and authenticity of the movements? Perhaps it can—if those with visibility can lend their voice to the people who own the narratives of social change. Only by serving as allies who promote the original voices of political movements can the fashion industry work toward resolving this divide.
There is a model for this form of allyship: At the 2018 Golden Globes, many performers wore black to support the #TimesUp movement for gender equality. These same performers also invited local grassroots activists from various organizations. By using their platform to amplify marginalized voices, the actresses were able to transcend a political aesthetic and, above all, foster solidarity with the movement.
Imperative to the success of fashion’s political discourse is a commitment to highlighting the anxieties and tensions of the human condition. Although this strategy has the potential to spark social change, high fashion designers are currently taking an insensitive, ignorant approach. What is certain, however, is that the show must go on—hopefully with fewer political mishaps along the way.
Illustration by Kalyani Kastor ’20: instagram.com/_kauliflower_/