California Lutheran University's Student Newspaper Since 1961

The Echo

California Lutheran University's Student Newspaper Since 1961

The Echo

California Lutheran University's Student Newspaper Since 1961

The Echo

    Dolce & Gabbana is ‘Canceled’

    It is time to stop giving designer brands a break when it comes to racial stereotyping, especially in global advertisements.    

    In mid-November, Dolce & Gabbana released three racist ads to promote an upcoming Shanghai runway show. The videos show an Asian woman dressed in Dolce & Gabbana attempting to eat foods like pizza and spaghetti using chopsticks. The voiceover also purposely mispronounces the brand’s name to mock Chinese speech.

    Along with the horrendous decision from Dolce & Gabbana’s marketing team to run these ads, a leaked conversation from one of their founders resulted in their fashion show getting cancelled and their products being pulled from online and physical stores.

    Stefano Gabbana’s Instagram account, allegedly because of hacking, responded to a direct message from fashion blogger Michaela Tranova, saying, “And from now on in all the interviews that I will do international I will say that the country of [poop emojis] is China…China ignorant dirty smelling mafia.”

    Shoppers should follow the example of the Chinese market and boycott the brand indefinitely. When celebrities or companies have said or done something insensitive in the past few years, outraged people often respond with ‘you’re cancelled.’ Since we are living in this ‘it’s cancelled’ culture, we should actually stand by our words and ‘cancel’ Dolce & Gabbana, at least until Stefano steps down and is no longer associated with the brand.

    His comments were egregious toward the Chinese people and the video showed what Dolce & Gabbana think of people not from the western world. The video portrays Chinese people as uncultured and ignorant of any other culture besides their own.

    Dolce & Gabbana are actively cultivating hate by mocking entire groups of people such as the Chinese for the purpose of advertising their clothes, and it is simply unnecessary.

    If people continue to buy and support Dolce & Gabbana, they will never change management nor learn their lesson. It is apparent from the past that if people continue to buy products from this malevolent machine of a fashion house, they will continue to spread their racist opinions.

    Christian Ahn
    Reporter