"I'm too pretty to do homework" T-shirt yanked
The power of social media was proven once again this week when it took only hours for an online petition drive to prompt JC Penney to stop selling a T-shirt targeted to young girls that had a message some feminist activists and others found objectionable.
The controversial shirt, which sold for $10, said, "I'm too pretty to do homework, so my brother has to do it for me," was sold on the retail giant's website.
It caught the attention of Lauren Todd, a user of Change.org, who promptly posted the petition demanding that the store stop selling the shirt.
Change.org women's rights organizer Shelby Knox spread word of the petition on Twitter and Facebook -- and the message quickly went viral.
By noon Wednesday -- four hours after Knox began tweeting about the shirt to her 10,000 followers, writing about it on Facebook and spreading the word through the feminist blogosphere -- JC Penney apologized and took the shirt off its site.
The petition had 1,600 signatures. With each one, change.org automatically sent an e-mail to JC Penney's CEO.
Penney issued a statement saying, "We agree that the "Too pretty" t-shirt does not deliver an appropriate message, and we have immediately discontinued its sale. Our merchandise is intended to appeal to a broad customer base, not to offend them. We would like to apologize to our customers and are taking action to ensure that we continue to uphold the integrity of our merchandise that they have come to expect."
Todd and Knox discussed the shirt, its message, the uproar it caused and Penney's response on "The Early Show" Thursday with co-anchor Erica Hill.
To see the interview, click on the video at the top of this story.
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Just hide and watch... Some enterprising entrepreneur will buy the whole batch, cross out "pretty" and substitute "stupid" in a backwards, childlike scrawl above it, offer them on eBay and the damned things will sell out. :-)
Anyway, I agree that there are a lot of shirts that are worse but do not get that much attention.
I'm 57 years old, single, and I take care of myself. I frequently, in the summer doing lawn work and gardening, wear a tank-top that has a "jeweled" crown on it (suggesting a princess) and says, "I'm single and lovin' it."
I also have a scatter-cushion on my sofa that has a bunch of frogs on it and the motto, "Just how many do I have to kiss?"
And there's a plaque on my end-table in my living room that says, "A princess lives here."
There's also a frame on the door to my bathroom that has the following on it:
ONCE UPON A TIME
a beautiful, independent, self-assured princess happened upon a frog in a pond. The frog said to the princess, "I was once a handsome prince until an evil witch put a spell on me. One kiss from you and I will turn back into a prince and then we can marry, move into the castle with my mom, and you can prepare my meals, clean my clothes, bear my children and forever feel happy doing so."
That night, as the princess dined on frogs legs in garlic butter, she laughed to herself and thought "I don't f**king think so!"
(Without the asterisks for the missing two letters.)
If I ever decided to go back to school for my Masters, I'd damn straight buy a T-shirt that said, "I'm too pretty to do homework..."
C'mon folks. There are hundreds of babies starving to death in eastern Africa. And THIS is the most "important" thing change.org has to worry about?
I won 9 beauty pageants as a teenager, but I refused to advance to any higher pageants or participate in any pageants that included a swimsuit competition, for this very reason.
The only way T-shirt would be a problem is if the girl wearing it actually believed the message.
Valid commentary on debate is not governed by which set of genitals you possess.
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Depending on the topic, yes it is