#BOYCOTTDOLCEGABBANA
Melania Trump
Normally brands would jump at the chance to dress the first family as it could make their brand thrive and increase publicity and sales, however many brands have spoken against dressing the First Lady Melania Trump. Many top fashion designers are turning down money and exposure by refusing to make outfits fro Ivanka and Melania Trump. Many designers are scared of the backlash they will receive on social media even if they are not 'Trump - haters ' themselves. however Dolce & Gabbana have been very vocal about supporting her.
" We are Italian and we don't care about politics and mostly neither about the American one, we make dresses and if you think about doing politics with a post it's simply ignorant. We don't need your posts or comments so next time please ignore us!!" he added a series of crying laughing emojis and added the hashtag #bocottdolcegabbana.
In reaction to the public outrage and people boycotting the brand. Dolce & Gabbana launched a T-shirt that was priced at $245 and they read "#BoycottDolceGabbana".
Along with the t shirt they also made a commercial which includes young people in a fake 'protest' and also has both Stefano and Domenico joining in with the protesters.
This video just added fuel to the fire and continued to make people offended and user and the hashtag was still used heavily over social media. This campaign was seen as a mockery to the people who were actually offended by the brand dressing the First Lady.
Miley Cyrus was not the only celebrity to stand back to the brand. At the same Spring Summer 18 catwalk that Braison Cyrus walked at the rapper Raury who is known for his singing and rapping and has collaborated with people such as chance the rapper. He was also walking the catwalk and used this as a platform to protest against Dolce & Gabbana. In the finale of the show Raury took his top off to reveal dissaprovi g messages written on his torso. These messages included "Protest Dolce & Gabbana", "Give me freedom" and " I am not your scapegoat".
He then stood and raised his fist in the air whilst the models continued to walk around him. This occurred in Dolce & Gabbana's millennial themed runway show in 2017 and he was one of many young influencers to walk to show. The brand never responded to his protest but it all goes back to Stefano's response to Miley Cyrus when he said that they are designers and have nothing to do with politics. However Raury says he strongly disagrees with this as he thin ks polictics is impossible to avoid or ignore; " Honestly, fashion, music, movies, art people, construction workers, human beings, everyone mingles with politics at work. Thats life. If your message is cool, then its cool, but if it ain't then millennials are going to come and let you know and we won't let go."
Raury says " The Boycott Dolce & Gabbana T-shirt makes a complete mockery of what boycotting is. boycotting is the peoples voice, it has power." he added that the commercials dolce and Gabbana had released seemed like a "joke" and a "troll". Raury only found out about the t shirt a day before the fashion show but he felt personally moved to say something. "I know that if I walk out there and support or endorse anything that sits next to trump- or support someone who makes dinner for trump or whatever - then that means that I support trump as well." He later added "I do not support Trump".
Dolce told Vogue that the whole Boycott campaign was a joke, he said "its a joke! people use heavy words very easily these days. there is too much agression."
Here you can see Raury's interview with GQ magazine and see why he did what he did and what he feels in his own words:
Twitter went wild after Raury's protest and gave him lots of respect and gratitude.
The whole "Boycott" campaign by Dolce and Gabbana was said to be influenced by Beyonce's campaign after her 2016 super bowl performance, she trolled her haters by selling boycott Beyonce march on her tour.
I think this could be very damaging towards Dolce and Gabbana as it is targeting the younger millennial generation which is a whole new consumer demographic for the brand. The fact that influencers of the generation such as Miley Cyrus and Raury will lead them to be influenced to have the same opinion and also boycott the brand. This can be very damaging and loose them their next generation of consumers. I think Dolce and Gabbana created the T-shirts and campaigns to make a light hearted joke out of the hashtag without realising how serious Trump haters were. Perhaps Dolce and Gabbana need to be more aware of what other brands are doing and how they are avoiding the first family, wether this is because they disagree with Trump or wether they are afraid of the back ash on social media, Dolce and Gabbana seem to be oblivious to what they were doing or the consequences of it would be. Although I think it could be seen as a good thing that Dolce and Gabbana dared to do something that other brands would not, it sets them apart from the crowd and shows they dare to be different or lead other brands. Although dressing the first lady had a lot of negative effects for the brand as was potentially more damaging than beneficial to the brand, the First Lady and all of this controversy is definitely putting the brand in the headlight, the First Lady wearing their clothes increases their exposure and therefore their sales, and with their name constantly in the headlines and plastered all over social media it is making the b rand be heard of for a lot more people than normal. I think Stefano's point about them just designing dresses has a valid point as they will always sell their clothes to people who want it in order to promote the brand and make as much money as possible. However his point about not caring about politics I think was damaging for the brand. Consumers like to know that the brand they are buying from has thought about politics/ ethics before buying. This will influence peoples decisions to buy from the brand. I feel as though it is a very old fashioned point of view to have from Stefano claiming they just make clothes and don't have a say about politics as this is potentially why so many controversies have been caused by Dolce and Gabbana and they need to think about external factors in everything they do such as politics.
Links:
- https://www.foxnews.com/entertainment/dolce-gabbana-launches-boycott-campaign-aimed-at-melania-trump-haters
- https://www.elle.com/fashion/news/a46002/boycott-dolce-gabbana-shirt/
- https://www.gq.com/story/raury-protest-dolce-gabbana-milan-fashion-week
- https://www.harpersbazaar.com/fashion/designers/a10197079/raury-dolce-gabbana-protest/
- https://www.harpersbazaar.com/celebrity/latest/a10041520/miley-cyrus-dolce-and-gabbana-fight/
- http://time.com/4823473/miley-cyrus-dolce-gabbana-politics/
- http://knowledge.wharton.upenn.edu/article/why-is-the-fashion-industry-giving-the-trumps-a-dressing-down/
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