Fire Burning.

Work in retail long enough and you'll want to watch the whole world burn. I graced American Apparel with my presence for a year, and though the free clothes and 50% discount were sweet, the disorganized corporate structure, female objectification and rampant shoplifting weren't.

Now that I'm gone from the place, have no friends that work there anymore and can only read about Dov Charney's indiscretions instead of hearing them first-hand during weekly conference calls, I haven't bought much; the prices are too obnoxious and my bank account too pathetic to keep purchasing pretty-colored cotton and shiny lamé. I still have a healthy relationship with perusing the store's website, though - especially when items like these keep popping up under the "New Items" category:



But it's hard to lust after U-neck dresses, seersucker Kennedy shorts and foil stripper gear when American Apparel is making stuff like this, too:


No, I'm not gay. But do I still find the placement of the slogan on these unisex briefs wildly offensive, and comparable to the ad with the girl licking a guy's crotch, or see-through panties, or haywire pubic hair, or unnecessary nipples, or unnecessary buttcrack, or unnecessary full-frontal, or that one shot from below so the girl looks like she's on top, or the one with Dov Charney's face and a quote from him that says it's women, not men, who are "perpetuating a victim culture?" Pretty much, yeah.


+ Photos courtesy of American Apparel and Adrants.com, as AA's archives strangely didn't have that one with Dov's misogyny on full display. Weird (insert dripping sarcasm ... all through this post).