Gap striped shirt forced offline due to political correctness. At what point does an image or an association continue to dictate what is palatable and should brands have to abide?
At what point is a retailer able to create and sell what the public desires without having to appease political correctness?
A fashion retailer has been forced to cow-tow to social media dissenters after being accused of making a shirt that resembled the famed striped shirt that prisoners wore in Nazi concentration camps during WW over 75 years ago.
The Gap found itself under the microscope after its ‘camp shirt’ appeared online, with the retailer’s webpage now reading, ‘This was so wanted, it sold out.’
Disconcert came to the fore after the pale but and white striped cotton shirt reminded some of the uniforms worn at Auschwitz and other concentration camps during the holocaust.
‘So @Gap made a white-and-grey wide-striped shirt that reminded me of concentration camp uniforms even before they called it a “Camp Shirt.” I don’t know if there’s something I’m missing here, but this reads extremely wrong to me,’ tweeted @ninastoessinger.
Clueless?
The GAP has offered for sale a striped shirt that many have pointed out has distinct similarities to the shirt issued to concentration camp prisoners.
And just to frost the stupidity they called it a ‘camp shirt’ pic.twitter.com/3vWkMh0Dsl
— Pitt Griffin (@pittgriffin) May 15, 2020
Since when did a striped shirt become the loaded metaphor of a collective’s suffering?
Gap appeared at first to have changed the name from ‘camp shirt’ to ‘striped shirt’ on some online store after the backlash.
On Friday, the shirt was no longer for sale on Gap.com and the brand’s Canadian site – but the black-and-white ‘camp shirt‘ was still available Friday on its UK site, the nypost reports.
Gap still offered the short-sleeved “camp shirts” on its site, including other variations of the same black-and-white-striped shirt in different prints.
A Gap rep told Fox News on Friday morning that the shirt was being pulled from its online shops.
‘We are deeply sorry for this oversight,’ the spokesperson said in an emailed statement.
‘It was never our intention to design a shirt that could be interpreted or associated in this way, and thus inconsistent with the beliefs and values of our company. We immediately responded and are having the item removed from our site.’
Which is to wonder at what point is a creative, content creator, fashion brand no longer held captive to the tastes and dialectics of some members of the public?
Whatever happened to boycotting what one deems offensive by simply choosing not to wear or buy such items? And why must it be that an image must for eternity carry the burden of a loaded story line and history – especially when so many of the Gap’s teen constituency were no where near Auschwitz or the horror and carnage of WW2?
