Lovelyish

Why do people always look at things so negatively? Why is this so offensive? When I see stuff like this I look at it as a designer was inspired and admires that culture. I look at it as their way of honoring a certain type of people. 

I think some people may be more upset about the context in which the items were used, or lack of authenticity.  I think people would love to have their particular culture highlighted and embraced if Victoria’s Secret commissioned the goods from local artisans, made by real Native Americans (substitute other artists for other cultures) not some cheap imitation.  Also, the animal print is not something Native Americans would have worn as it is not native to the area.

My computer flipped out and ate my answer. I’ll summarize.  People who are concerned about the exploitation of Native American or any other woman should put their effort in doing something that will help these women, not flipping out about overpriced underwear.

I personally don’t see how this is “offensive”.  They want to show different cultures, then let them. I guess I just don’t get it. 

In terms of aesthetics though, the headdress is very appealing. I love the shape. 

Honestly, what do people expect from Victoria Secret? It’s a lingerie line, so they’re going to sell lingerie based merchandise. I agree with Erika Steele, flipping out on them isn’t going to get them anywhere.

i just don’t even see why it matters… :/

@Foodhog@xanga - A lot of Native Americans see it as sexualizing their traditions and using them for personal, monetary gain and publicity, which they find offensive.

@samescobar - So pretty much looking at things on the negative side instead of the positive side. It is sad.

I’m sorry, why is it perfectly fine to dress up as a sexy geisha or sexy Indiana for Halloween, but this is  completely outrageous?  I don’t get it.

Apparently anything non-white is offensive. Personally, I see a problem with that, if anything.

I wish these companies would grow some balls and quit apologizing to these babies. My bad for insulting infants, actually. They can’t exactly help that they cry so much.

I don’t see the big deal here (or with the geisha outfit). It’s VS, of course they’re going to sexualize everything. I can sort of see why individuals of the ethnicity group that designers are borrowing stereotypical designs from are angry, but no one is going to look at a white model in a skimpy outfit inspired loosely by cultural stereotypes and directly relate it straight back to sexualization of that particular culture. They’re most likely just going to think, oh another crazy Victoria Secret bimbo outfit, go figure. 

I don’t see anything offensive about it. -___- It’s a great costume…it’s a fashion show! Did anyone get on Lana Del Rey’s ass for wearing the headpiece?

I think the model and the outfit are both gorgeous. How is anybody supposed to put on a fashion show without offending someone anymore? I thought fashion was like art….

And what of the oodles of culturally inspired Halloween costumes that are out there? I know I have seen my fair share of Native Americans, ninjas and sumo wrestlers, geishas, and everything else under the sun in terms of costumes both sexy and not. 

@Foodhog@xanga - they don’t need you to admire their culture especially a ‘pretty’ white girl using it to look ‘cute’ etc. that isn’t what it was ever used for so it shouldn’t be used that way at all.

i’m glad they apologized.

@bAbiiExxPiNay@xanga - yes.

I’m mixed race,so about every single Halloween costume could potentially offend me,but they don’t. People need to worry about real issues and stop being so concerned with silly flubs. 

why can’t people just get over it? they just want attention

@blowingmoney@xanga - Come  talk to me when you have something intelligent to say and stop being racist. Till then fuck off!

If you don’t find this offensive, you don’t understand the culture that they are appropriating. That style of headdress is an incredibly sacred and important symbol to native americans that is painstakingly earned, and it’s being worn by a dumb model in underwear that probably doesn’t even know how thanksgiving originated.

How is imitating sacred symbolic items from cultures and sticking them on unclothed women not offensive? It completely demeans and devalues the items.

It’s not culturally inspired. It’s cultural theft. They might as well have took that headdress off of a native american elder and took a dump on it.

If a certain culture says that using their items in such a way(or anyway) is offensive, who are you to tell them that their feelings are invalid and it’s not offensive?

I’m glad VS apologized. Their underwear sucks anyway. They seem to think women above a DD cup and/or below a 32 band size don’t exist.

It has NOTHING to do the with sexualization of the first nation peoples. It has to do with the appropriation and white washing of first nation’s culture. These symbols and images are so important to their spiritual and cultural belief system. Not only that, there is a long and bloody history between the government and First Nation peoples. Native people have been told that their culture, language, and beliefs were not acceptable to be considered part of “American Culture.” All of a sudden these important and meaningful symbols have been appropriated for the monetary gain of some faceless corporation. It just seems wrong on all accounts. This also has nothing to with negativity, but the understanding of the bloody history of our first nation peoples.

I can see the outrage about the Geisha outfits as a concern about the sexualization of the culture, because historically that is what the Western public has done. They see an Asian woman (particularly Geisha) as this mysterious sexualized entity.

What irks me even more is that they decided to use white women in both of the ads/shows potentially because it allows the mystique of dressing as a geisha or in native symbols as “safe”. If it’s a white woman donning the clothes, then it gives just enough safety to the whole ensemble. 
Victoria’s Secret need to figure their stuff out.

@samescobar - Who cares? The theme was Thanksgiving. Do you not equate ‘Natives’ with Thanksgiving? The so-called ‘Natives’ need to get lives, and shut the fuck up.

If they are going to be like this, then we as Whites should scream every time we see a non-White with dyed blonde hair (since no other race can have blonde hair, it is in fact part of us), wearing blue contacts (again, only Whites). We should scream when the non-White women wear tight blue jeans? When they wear business suits? I could go on, but surely the rest of you catch my drift. 

I don’t see why they’re so offended. First graders all around the world dress up as native americans and act like “savages” for those thanksgiving mini class plays and whatnot. The things some of those kids do while playing the part should be offensive. Just saying.

I swear people have nothing better to do other than complain about petty things. I would understand being offended if something was done in a tacky manner with intent to be disrespectful, but IC none of that in this or the Geisha pictures. modeling, runways, fashion shows are art. They are a form of expression. There is nothing wrong with that, if you don’t like it look away. Besides, this was done tastefully. there is nothing about this or that that makes a person say hello, Native Americans in geishas are f****** hideous they f****** suck. the Native American theme wasn’t even random, it really does coincide with the holiday. a theme was appropriate, people are being dramatic cry babies. If somebody in Victoria Secret wanted to dress up like a Mexican and make it look sexy, I don’t care, you can rock a poncho all night long just make it look fabulous. Native Americans and geishas should be thankful that the fashion industry even thought of them in the first place.I’d be honored

i was quite surprised at the comments. i had thought a lot of people would be agreeing to this article. 

People of today get offended too easy. Oh I just cant wait for Christmas when some one gets offended by saying Christmas Tree…Its time to grow up and stop being little whinny children on the playground…

Disgusting. This reminds me of Gwen Stefani who put out with all the Native American culture appropriation in her video. And she was called out for it. Why not VS? It’s a ploy to make money off of someone’s culture. It’s not about respect. Where I come from, First Nations, as they are referred to here, the women have been subjected to an extremely high rate of sexual violence and murder than non-Native women . It’s not about some headdress or scanty buckskin lingerie. It’s the meaning. It’s about people failing to understand the importance and historical context behind it. So VS and others like them can suck on that.

How is this offensive in any way? I mean we have girls that dress up as the American flag in the fashion show. I mean if she was carrying herself innapropriately that would be one thing but this is just a stunning costume and a fantastic example of how ridiculous people can be.

@Mind_of_Eplx@xanga - yes.  We live in easily offended times.

@Foodhog@xanga - how the hell was i being racist? your ignorance is mind blowing, it really is. i wasn’t even being rude to you but obviously i don’t care now.

the term ‘white girl’ is not offensive at all, by the way i’m white so shut the hell up to be honest.

@blowingmoney@xanga - Okay so I have asked you not to talk to me so I am now blocking you! Enjoy your day!

^^^lmao soooooo stupid.

Should I, as a Mexican-American, be offended that white women wear sexy Day of the Dead costumes? There’s always going to be things that offend even at least one person. We need to stop trying to please everyone and just express ourselves. Even if that is expressed in an unknowing ignorance. For what is art if not shocking? Honestly, people need to stop getting their panties in a twist over political correctness.

As for the No Doubt video… I wonder if those same Native Americans saw her previous videos… >_>

If the ‘Natives’ are so offended, then perhaps we should remove them from our Thanksgiving traditions, our Thanksgiving culture? Deny them any existence. 

for those of you who think this is a “petty” issue:

http://www.elephantjournal.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/08/Picture-9521.png

http://nativeappropriations.blogspot.com/2010/04/but-why-cant-i-wear-hipster-headdress.html

Honestly, this is sooo American… In Europe, no one would care about petty things like this. Like, stuff happened in history. It was terrible. There are no words to cover what wrong was done to these people. So, I live next to Hitler-country Germany. Should we hate on all Germans? Should they not be allowed to have stars on their clothes, in their hair, in their christmas trees? They should have ALL stars removed from their galaxy! How DARE they have anything star-related, because they put stars on jews and killed them! Oh wait, they didn’t, their ancestors did, and the star-analogue is ridiculous because it is just some symbol we associate with a certain event/culture/race that makes no sense of its own, but surely all Germans must be punished until eternity because they were unfortunate and Hitler rose to power in their country. Honestly, how are things that happened an eternity ago still an issue. No one is denying that wrong was done to the Natives. But part of doing better is starting over. Especially that picture you posted… @sometimesalright@xanga We are not our ancestors.

By the way, did you know that the leaflets you get with medicine or any purchase is like 3 times as big in America as it is in Europe? Because in America there is such a culture of sueing, claims, etc. and people will try to get millions out of a company if they put their cat in a microwave and it didn’t say on the leaflet that you couldn’t do that? I think that is a perfect example of the common sense being gone.

@CanuckFascist@xanga - are you forgetting that we pretty much conquered their lands? They should be kicking us off their lands, since we are all immigrants in america.

@The__Aesthete@xanga - Oh? Then perhaps you should leave too, yes? Gotta love liberals who use that argument.

@sometimesalright@xanga - It IS a petty issue. The Natives need to shut the hell up, and move on. Quit interfering with White businesses.

@The__Aesthete@xanga - I do find it amusing that you use the ‘we’ in your comment, considering you are Chinese. *ROTFLMAO* 

@CanuckFascist@xanga - Sorry, by what I mean ‘we’ I mean by americans. Either way, you are an immigrant as well.

@The__Aesthete@xanga - Not really. My family is British. Now then, who FOUNDED Canada? Oh yes, that would be the *GASP!* BRITISH. Therefore, I am no immigrant. When my grandfather arrived off the shores of Canada with his family from Scotland, his own British passport was all he needed to get in. Why? British dominion, guy. LONG LIVE THE EMPIRE!

@The__Aesthete@xanga - The USA is a nation made up of nothing more than traitorous pieces-of-shit who simply didn’t want to pay their fair share, so they had a silly little rebellion. A shame my British forebears were too busy slapping the other ‘world powers’ around like the bitches they were at the time, otherwise they would not have given up the 13 Colonies.

@TheDeadWhale@xanga - What’s a Mexican-American????????

@TheDeadWhale@xanga - Sweetie, White women cannot be offended, since the females of all non-White races wish to be White.

So now designers can only dress models like a bunch of white girls? What happened to celebrating other culture and drawing inspiration from them? Why is that suddenly a negative thing?

social justice league…has arrived