DIESEL’s Dangerously Tone-Deaf Approach to Addressing Hate

It’s only been six months since a $39 “I Really Don’t Care, Do U?” jacket earned plenty of attention – though maybe not the right kind – for fast fashion house Zara. The ensuing collective revulsion at a public display of passive-aggressive messaging, especially at the expense of already-marginalized people, seems to have been lost on European brand DIESEL, which remains under fire for its own boldly-worded outerwear. 

Released in September, the Italian retailer’s “Hate Couture” line (oh, the puns!) is under new scrutiny following an article in today’s Independent. The “Hate” part of this product series is on display nowhere more prominently than its limited-edition “faggot” bomber jacket, inspired by slurs hurled at actor Tommy Dorfman and retailing for about $450. 

What could possibly justify scrawling heated language – so loathsome that even the press won’t print it in their analysis – on the back of a jacket? In an official statement to the Independent, DIESEL says that they “strongly [feel] that bullying is one of the critical issues of our times. Bullying in all forms effects [sic] millions worldwide and we are committed to using our platform to raise awareness for this issue. Creating Hate Couture our aim has always been to disempower those that create the hate and manifest negativity.” 

Perhaps the effort was a play for press (it worked), a plea for understanding (it didn’t), or genuine cluelessness on their part (who knows). Either way, DIESEL’s ostensibly positive intent aside, the impact of this line is abysmal. And let’s be real: if Diesel wasn’t extra mindful of thinking about the impact of their word choices on their consumers and other stakeholders, they likely wouldn’t have ended up with a marginally-clever play on words as the name of the entire line.

What should brands and their leaders consider when debating the relative value of provocation over compassion for their customers and employees? 

For starters, think about whether benefiting financially or in media exposure from others’ pain will cost as much – or more – in goodwill as it earns in revenue. Ask yourself and your team sincerely whether your approach to using controversial content benefiting or improving conditions for those with marginalized experiences – who are also consumers – or is it merely exploiting them?

Consider the effect on your employees, especially those with marginalized identities and experiences, of distributing marketplace messages with violent language, remembering that such language may have even been used against them internally at your company.   

Ask whether your likely impact will match your intent. Just because we may think we know what we want to say doesn’t mean others will interpret our messages in that same spirit. How might someone with a different perspective experience our language and positioning? And finally, remember that – however noble your intent – you can’t reclaim something that wasn’t yours to begin with. Individuals and groups reclaiming language that’s been used against them as a strategy for survival is far different from a private-sector company profiting from that language. 

To individuals, groups, and companies that lead with dominant identities, provocative language might feel edgy, controversial, or exciting; for individuals and groups with marginalized identities, though, that same language can literally mean the difference between life and death. To a company that has staked a claim in the space of diversity (see Fashion Week 2016; gender-neutral billboards; a campaign with disabled model Jillian Mercado; etc.), that distinction should matter. To those aware of hate crimes in America, having an anti-gay slur on one’s back is more heavily-laden than DIESEL hopefully realized when greenlighting this ill-considered product line: shortly after the 1998 murder of Matthew Shepard, a 17 year-old high school junior at Massachusetts’ elite Northfield Mount Hermon School had the word “HOMO” carved into the flesh of his back with a pocketknife after openly sharing his admiration for the band Queen. 

In response, theater artist and NYU professor Joe Salvatore (now of the highly-acclaimed Verbatim Performance Lab) and playwright Julie Marie Myatt co-created transfigured, a fictionalization of the Northfield Mount Hermon hate crime, with seven students from the NYU Steinhardt Program in Educational Theatre. (The performance was later presented at the 2006 Pedagogy and Theatre of the Oppressed conference at UNC-Chapel Hill and then at the 2006 American Alliance for Theatre and Education National Conference in Bethesda, MD.) In the final scene of Salvatore and Myatt’s imagining of these events, the targeted student’s recovery includes enthusiastic dancing to his favorite band in a jacket boldly emblazoned with the word “HOMO” across the back. 

That is reclaiming hate and using a platform to raise awareness of bullying and harassment. A $500 celebrity stunt jacket from a cynical European retailer? No way.