Marc Jacobs Caught Heat For Using Dreadlocks In A NY Fashion Week Show, Did Not Make Friends When He Tried To Defend It On Instagram
The Grio – Marc Jacobs ended New York Fashion Week with a little bit of controversy.
This time, instead of getting people talking with the designs of his clothing, it was the hairstyles by Guido Palau that really got tongues wagging.
His crop of mostly white models, Kendall Jenner, Bella and Gigi Hadid, and Karlie Kloss, among others, sported pastel-colored dreadlocks that many on social media claim smacks of cultural appropriation.
Jacobs responded to the controversy on Instagram. Unfortunately for him, he may not have done himself any favors with his reply:
“@radical.lizeth @emmelephant and all who cry ‘cultural appropriation’ or whatever nonsense about any race or skin color wearing their hair in any particular style or manner — funny how you don’t criticize women of color for straightening their hair,” Jacobs wrote. “I respect and am inspired by people and how they look. I don’t see color or race — I see people. I’m sorry to read that so many people are so narrow-minded … Love is the answer. Appreciation of all and inspiration from anywhere is a beautiful thing. Think about it.”
Ever since that girl at a San Francisco college went off on a hippie white kid for having dreadlocks, in the back of my head I made a mental note of never wearing dreadlocks. Just seems like a headache I don’t need no matter how great I would look in them. But I kind of feel like I’m firmly on Marc Jacobs’ side here. I mean someone in his organization probably should have told him “Hey man we have a super white runaway show and people are incredibly sensitive about stuff like this, maybe we should ditch the dreadlocks,” I’ll give the people complaining that much. In 2016 if you’re a major company and not at least aware of how people will both perceive what you’re doing and get immediately offended by it (and then top it all off by bashing ANOTHER black hair thing they’re sensitive about in response), you’re not doing your job as businesspeople.
But I’m mostly on Marc Jacobs’ side because it’s NY Fashion Week, a time of year that isn’t representative of real fashions or looks or cultural appropriation. It’s just this canvas that fashion companies and designers are painting of 5’11 100 pound women and jacked homosexual men wearing absurd things. You see people dressed like hobos, people wearing dumb hats no one would wear in real life, chicks walking down runways with their tits popping out because the stuff they’re wearing isn’t meant really to be worn by a person moving like a real person, just a living work of art for that moment in time. Bringing real life shit into this absurd world of people prancing around like idiots in outlandish attire not rooted in reality seems totally unnecessary. Let Marc Jacobs live and make overpriced bags that girls would kill each other over like Jordans if it were socially acceptable and focus on the real issues like white stoner kids with dreadlocks instead. Those kids usually smell bad and hog up all the weed anyways, we can sacrifice them at the altar so Marc Jacobs can live and create.