Hold my Bud Light: Anthropologie debuts dancing dude in red dress

Eric Gay

Well…my goodness. Never did I think I would see so many corporations trying to out-woke each other (including the U.S. Navy) by following one daffy fake woman and her beercan portraiture off a cultural and sometimes financial cliff.

Advertisement

It’s almost as if the woke trans advertising disease, while usually deadly, is so seductive they can’t wait to catch it, be damned the possible consequences. Like a crack addiction.

Anthropologie, that quirky, expensive niche purveyor of odd furnishings and eclectic WOMEN’S clothing has always been a progressive, vintage-y/groovy/peacenik, woke (before there was such a thing) enterprise. That’s their schtick and it’s worked on and off for them – they’ve had their rocky years much like any higher-end retailer in the garment industry, but they have survived.

I’m assuming they wanted to lay their marker down in the current climate, so they suddenly decided to…hire a guy to high-kick in a red dress and heels for their Instagram feed. I mean, they didn’t even pretend for a second it was a pretend female.

Straight up, he’s a guy. That was their angle.

Oooh. Edgy (although he does have killer calves).

[INSERT: eyeball roll]

Mind you, this appeared only on Instagram, not any other advertising platform, which tells you it was merely a tepid toe-in-the-water effort to begin with. In any case, if ever any clientele was going to either eat a man in a red dress up or simply ignore the entire thing, I am sure Anthropologie knew their base well enough to figure it was their ladies. No worries – pain-free way to add another slash of cool cachet to the brand.

Advertisement

So, corporate. How’d that work out for you?

YOICKS

I first heard about it yesterday on Facebook. A dear friend of mine who shops there occasionally put up a post that basically said “Hasta la vista.” Now, she’s my age and has the wherewithal to get what she feels like, and I thought “YEESH. Whud they do?” This is not the customer you want to lose because they save your butt when the 20-somethings who shop your sales are broke. A spirited discussion commenced with the women in the comments, most of whom were pretty ardently on the “GIVE IT A REST ALREADY” side, with one younger girl (30-ish) counted as a “meh.” The consensus among the group was that they won’t darken Anthropologie’s doors again. They don’t have to and Anthropologie just made sure they wouldn’t.

It turns out that reaction seems to have been pretty universal in most quarters, not the least of which was on the Instagram post itself. Anthropologie followers lit. Them. UP.

Screencap EvieMagazine.com

A virulent adverse reaction that apparently caught whoever runs the Instagram feed by surprise.

…On Wednesday, Anthropologie posted a reel on Instagram featuring a tall man with a shaved haircut who was dancing while trying on a variety of women’s clothing. He started with a pair of light-wash jeans and black tank top, then changed into a few different pink or red dresses. The man’s genitals were bulging out of his small underwear as he danced and the skirt flew up. Within minutes, the comment section was full of backlash. Many women criticized the brand for promoting a gender-neutral agenda while they sell clothes for women, and others felt that the use of a male model was simply a publicity stunt to fit in with the progressive agenda.

Allie Beth Stuckey, a conservative commentator and podcast host, wrote a comment about how the man wasn’t even able to zip up one of the dresses all the way. This was visible in the video when he twirled around. She pointed out that this was because the dress was made for women, and women’s bodies are built much differently than men’s. Her comment was just one of thousands. Many women expressed disappointment, anger, and even disgust at Anthropologie, making it very clear that they weren’t going to buy from the brand ever again.

Not surprisingly, Anthropologie disabled the comments and they are no longer visible. But women kept commenting on other Anthropologie posts, refusing to give up the fight and demanding that the brand apologize.

Advertisement

One of my friend’s commenters snagged a screencap of a comment, which I promptly stole.

Oh, yeah. I’d say the Anthropologie ladies are pissed about the fella in the dress.

Screencap Facebook

Here’s another sample.

Screencap Twitter @FlorioGina

Their ire runs the gamut from merely “Why is a man is our clothes?” to “I guess all my stuff is coming back to the store and I’m never buying another thing” to many, many calls for Anthro-apologies.

Good luck with that. I mean, Anheuser-Busch has literally lost their beer butts over the Bud Light brouhaha and to this day have uttered not a single “SORRY.”

Nah. Not getting a mea culpa out of this bunch, either.

What is absolutely the most heartening thing about the entire high-kickin-dude-in-a-red-dress-twirling-his-nether-regions-in-the-breeze promo HAS to be the reaction from Anthropologie’s predominantly lefty, liberal base.

They hated it. Because of what it said to WOMEN.

If the trans-admiration society gained no gushing, groveling followers in this bastion of groupthink and virtue-signaling consumers? In fact, the opposite?

OMG. I almost feel hopeful some of them are awakening.

Please don’t crush my dream of a new day before the weekend…please.

Advertisement

Join the conversation as a VIP Member

Trending on HotAir Videos

Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement
Advertisement