So I recently got a gift card to Forever 21 for Christmas and I decided to spend it last weekend. The Forever 21 was on Michigan Ave (the Magnificent Mile portion, that is) so of course it's on one of those streets in the country that's a bastion of capitalism and consumerism. In other words, it's so mainstream it's kind of painful so I should have expected something to tick off my feminist sensibilities. However, I went in there salivating over the fact that big ballerina tulle skirts are somehow in vogue. Every glittery, cheap looking shirt was a revelation. I was in shopping heaven. At one point, I literally looked at the vast store and all of its many offerings and thought "Oh, the Joys of Capitalism!!!" It's rare that I have a shopping ecstatic state, but I definitely had it that day. Until I got in line to purchase my fare.
That is when I saw the sign on the wall that I've posted above. I should probably explain that I was in the store without having bathed in like, three days, and my hair dye is all washed out right now and I was wearing one of those big North Face winter coats that makes me want to die because it's so unfashionable but it's January here in Chicago and that sucks. The point I'm trying to get across: I did not have my hair done and I wasn't about to go back to the train and sit around with my knees crossed. When I saw a sign on the wall telling me that this franchise not only encouraged me to always look immaculate, it in fact COMMANDED me to do so, I was outraged. I wish I could say I turned around and left the store without buying anything and I never plan to go back--but I really wanted that 11.50 floral shirt. I'm human.
What I did instead was whip out my camera and take an illicit photo before the women of the store could stop me. Then I decided to come home and write a blog post about it. Because damn, is this shit fucked up. Forever 21's demographic ranges from the early teens to the mid twenties, and I think it's pathetic that the decorator of the store would participate in reinforcing such stereotypical gender hierarchy. I know I'm getting what I paid for when it comes to this store. People who shop at Forever 21 typically want clothes that fit neatly into the gender binary, but I just don't think that this society understands the fact that there is little that is "innate" about the genders. Women don't wear their hair perfect and cross their legs at the knee because it's natural to do so--they do it because they grew up in a time and place that told them they were expected to do so. A society that, in fact, might punish them severely if they did not perform these "feminine" duties. So we all thoughtlessly whip around, espousing ideas about how guys are this way and girls are that way, and then paste a sign on a wall in clothing store that dictates that women have perfect hair without thinking about why there is so much violence against transgendered people. FUCK THAT!
I would like to end this post by stating that I will not abide this shit any longer: if I see anything that commands me to live a certain way just because I was born with a vagina, I'm taking a picture of it and ripping the institution a new one!!!!
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