I love the movie Mean Girls - because it shows an hilarious and true (albeit exaggerated) representation of how psychologically evil people (read: girls) can be.
Not so funny, when it happens in real life - especially when it is done by a company that has in the past been praised by it's multi faceted fan base for being so community driven.
Let me begin with saying - I have been a big fan of Black Milk Clothing (BMC), I own quite a few pieces that were bought because of "I need it to live" situations. I even made a small comic when they revealed their "Glitterpuke" collection featuring a Unicorn fighting a T-Rex that was actually posted on their facebook fan site.
The idea behind their image is cool : A Lycra clothing online shop that pioneered street fashion in Australia.
They have been praised for their use of social media, personalisation of service and community but that's the thing isn't it? When people start being told that they are awesome all the time and that they can do no wrong - they start to get cocky.
The picture that caused the incident is somewhat amusing in it's own self deprecating way however it obviously offended some users if it sparked all of this :
The image at its base level is a Win/Fail scenario - insinuating that when you attempt cosplay, you imagine you're going to look all hot and sultry and more often than not, end up looking frumpy and geeky. When some fans/customers pointed that this sort of image may be a bit offensive to some girls who take BMC's "love thy body" and "be excellent to each other" philosophy very seriously - the Black Milk media team took it upon themselves to imply that maybe the complainers were the ones that took the meme in the wrong way and that the image was not supposed to be offensive. If they would have stopped there and cut their losses - we wouldn't even be here.
BMC admins then began to delete any posts that had an opposing view to their own and even went as far as to block girls from the facebook fansite who had posted opposing views, liked opposing comments and apparently even girls that were friends with other girls who had commented or liked opposing comments. They even blocked sweet and geeky cosplayer Rae Johnston for posting a Black Milk video about how their social media marketing is one of their strongest cards, presumably to remind them where a lot of their success has come from. However, years of loyalty, and free advertisement from Rae was not enough to protect her from the censorship wrath, which is sad because she is nothing but sweet and adorable.
This is when people really started to get angry -
Post something that may be interpreted multiple ways : unavoidable on the Internet.
Argue your point of view to demonstrate innocence : acceptable.
Censor anyone with an opposing view : unacceptable and swimming in monomaniac waters.
An eloquent apology was issued by the head of Marketing Cameron Parker, a day or so later - for most who had been involved - it was too little too late. Apology can be found here.
Here are the legitimate points of views of the issue that I have seen during this debacle :
People offended by the original image - for a company that promotes confidence and loving your own skin, posting a sexy (win) vs geeky (fail) meme was not the smartest of choices. Not to mention the multiple women who really do have body image issues who were genuinely offended by the image. What make this even more bizarre is the fact that the BMC girl who posted it - is trained and educated in Media and Marketing. . .
People offended by the blatant censorship under the pretence of keeping the environment "positive and happy". Taking away someone's voice is a dangerous road to go down - if we've gotten to a point where a generation doesn't understand that - The future is scarier than ever.
People offended by the Mean Girl tactics of the Black Milk media team (was it just one or a group of them riling each other up?). The mentality of "if you don't like what we post - unlike the page and shop elsewhere" read :
What most people have forgotten or never knew is that this type of behaviour has happened before :
Granted the tumblr this was taken from is a site dedicated to girls (and one or 2 guys) who have been victimised, humiliated and rejected by Black Milk Clothing - so do take it with a grain of salt because a one sided story is never a true story as we have been not so kindly reminded this week.
People that weren't offended by the image or the censorship and are just in the kerfuffle to call people names. If you know me, you'll know - I'm no stranger to sailor mouth but wow chicks dropping the C bomb casually in comments was an eye opener.
People who have not been offended by anything to do with this whole thing except that it's interrupting their precious community and shopping experience. "Who cares if other people were offended? I wasn't so everyone should get over it because there has been an apology issued by the head of BMC marketing" some girls have even tried to make people feel worse by implying that everyone is so sensitive these days and that maybe people should not go on the Internet at all because the internet is full of ideas and images that people will be offended by. However what they fail to realise is that this is circular logic - if they themselves have taken offence by an opposing view to their own, should they be told to not be on the Internet either? This group also has the added bonus of being Grade A kiss asses "I will always love you BM, when's the next sale?"
I decided not to post anything on the Facebook page because the comments section was quite the cluster fuck. I unfollowed Black Milk Clothing not because I think it will make a difference to them but because I left high school bitchery 10 years ago and I plan to keep it that way.
