We are no longer accepting celebrities’ PR-pampered apology statements at this time, or ever again. It’s time to realize we’re not buying the bedazzled backlash bull-muzzle. Boys will be boys held accountable for their actions. And so will girls who condone said actions, particularly with the unremittingly trite ‘asking for it’ stamp. That’s you Donna Karan, and no takesies backsies.
The designer, who is a Parsons alum and now sits on the school’s board of governors, laid bare her opinions on the Weinstein allegations to the Daily Mail. She defended the Hollywood film producer and claimed women were asking for “trouble,” further enabling the perverted normalization of sexual harassment and assault.
Here’s the thing, women don’t need more women to add onto the pile of men who question our intentions, our integrity and what we’re ‘asking for’ with the way we dress (Hint: The answer is nothing.) Doing so serves as a hall pass for inappropriate behavior. This stands especially true to the woman who designs the clothes that fall under the appointed ‘asking for it’ category, right next to the ‘as a father of daughters’ blame-deferral line.
We don’t need celebrities or dads to tell us what the truth is… and the #MeToo social media movement is proof of just that.
During her red carpet interview at the CinéFashion film awards, Karan primed her snide comments by addressing the mistreatment of women globally. Alas, she faked a left and went the opposite of right: “I also think, How do we display ourselves? How do we present ourselves as women? What are we asking? Are we asking for it by presenting all the sensuality and all the sexuality?” Having the privilege of still asking that question to make public statements on the matter is an out of taste and tried-and-false poor attempt at ‘being one of the boys,’ fully disregarding women’s rights and safety.
She continued by saying, “You look at everything all over the world today and how women are dressing and what they are asking by just presenting themselves the way they do.” Not only do her misogynistic comments add her name to the lengthy list of celebrities who have been perpetuating rape culture behavior from men in power in male-dominated industries, they also raise many a question regarding her own brand, making way for DKNY’s mission as a whole to be under scrutiny. She stepped down from the label in 2015, but still acts as adviser to Donna Karan International, which was sold by LVMH in 2016 to G-III.
Chef Anthony Bourdain was quick to denounce the designer’s hypocrisy on Twitter with a photo of a sensual ad for DKNY. He captioned it: “To @dkny How many seventeen year olds have you dressed like they are, in your words, “asking for it “?”
To @dkny How many seventeen year olds have you dressed like they are, in your words, "asking for it "? https://t.co/oYyO9tfFKz pic.twitter.com/Fck0h5m13R
— Anthony Bourdain (@Bourdain) October 10, 2017
There’s no going from designing sexy clothes that should make women feel empowered in their own bodies to victim-blaming sexual assault victims by cross-examining whether they voluntarily chose to dress a way that would put them in those situations.
In the October 7, 2015 issue of WWD, the magazine published excerpts from Karan’s memoir ‘The Journey’, along with her interview. They wrote: “Then there’s her propensity to go topless. She discloses it wasn’t unusual for her to be topless in the office. (“Just about everyone I’ve worked with has seen my breasts,” she writes) because she doesn’t wear a bra and loves to try everything on.” If you said it, thought it, felt it or all of the above: ”yikes” is right. There’s nothing wrong with her not wearing a bra, women should feel safe everywhere without having to fear assault. But if we’re applying her own logic to this situation, what are you asking for while being topless in your office, Donna?
The answer is still nothing, because regardless of short skirts, baggy pants, no bra or–allegedly the most titillating one–bare shoulders, none of women’s clothing choices are invitations for sexual advances. That’s not how harassment works. Mentioning clothes, although be it her professional field, rather than simply addressing the matter at hand, is beating around the bush.
The issue transcends clothing. Her language insinuates and nods at a much larger social epidemic. Kate Harding, in her book “Asking For It: The Alarming Rise of Rape Culture– And What We Can Do About It,” cites the seven basic rape myths identified by researchers.‘She asked for it’ tops the list and ‘She wanted it’ is at #4. These sound like the direct replies to the implications Karan was odiously alluding to.
Clothing has had a long-standing history of starring as the designated villain in the harassers’ narratives. According to the New York Times, a 1999 rape conviction by the Italian Supreme Court was overturned because the victim was wearing tight jeans, stating that “Certainly it is impossible to pull them off if the victim is fighting against her attacker with all her force.” In 2011, Canadian police officer Michael Sanguinetti advised a group of girls by telling them “women should avoid dressing like sluts in order not to be victimized.” And the list goes on.
Shortly after her statements spilled online and stained, well, everything, her PR puppet-masters were quick to pull her strings back into cruise control, in which they–I mean, she, explained that those comments were “not representative of how [she] feel[s] or what [she] believe[s].” Karan apologized again — profusely — in an October 16 article in WWD. The classic catastrophe countermand: oh, if I had a penny for every single time a celebrity issued an apology that included those exact words. I bet more people would be able to recite this PR formula than the Pythagorean theorem off the top of their head. Reactions speak louder than words and in this case, her initial thoughts were loud and clear.
Moving forward, Donna Karan, please: no more ‘asking for it’ conspiracies. I highly recommend grabbing a copy of Harding’s book for further clarification. If you’re deciding to join in on the conversation, be straightforward about holding the people in question accountable (this most definitely includes your friend Harvey Weinstein) rather than waiting for your PR team to clarify that and try to fix your mess. Finally, if you really are an enabler of harassment culture and wish to remain as such, think twice before outing yourself because, by now, as I hope you’ve realized, there’s really no turning back, PR-splaining or not.
Illustration by Ashlie Juarbe
