MISSGUIDED BEGAN LIFE as an online fashion brand for women, aimed predominantly at the 16-35 year-old market.
They’ve since launched stores in the UK and beyond – and it was in one of these shops that a controversy brewed over the weekend.
On Saturday, Rachel Gardner spotted this neon ‘send me nudes’ wall sign in a Missguided in Kent
The tweet went viral from there, with other parents agreeing that it was inappropriate in a shop catering to young girls
On Sunday, a petition was launched that saw over 8000 signatures garnered in less than 24 hours – as The Independent reports.
It read:
Teenage girls feel under increasing pressure to create and send nude pictures of themselves. Once online, these nude images can be seen and used by anyone, making girls and vulnerable young women the victims of bullying, revenge porn and exploitation.
It is illegal in the UK for nude images of under 18’s to be created, sent and shared.
Send me Nudes’ legitimises the culture of sexual coercion that teenage girls and young women experience daily.
Rachel explained why she thought it was inappropriate – and it was nothing to do with “telling girls what to do with their bodies”
Rachel outlined her position further to Buzzfeed:
This is not about gunning for Missguided, but it’s about saying ‘no, actually a line has been crossed. Putting on your wall ‘send me nudes’ is quite a clever play on the nude colours of lipstick, but actually there’s a cynical undertone.
I work with a lot of girls who feel under immense pressure to share naked images of themselves, and not just naked images, perfect naked images, or perfect bodies, hairless, and massive boobs. It just legitimises the pressure that many teenage girls feel under to be who they’re not, and to always be sex-ready.
The story gathered pace on Monday, as more and more international outlets covered it. First, the sign was covered up from view
And the shopping centre later confirmed on Twitter that the sign had been removed permanently. The petition had won out in the end
