Balenciaga screwed it up
Last November, Balenciaga launched a holiday ad campaign featuring children holding teddy bears in bondage harnesses and costumes. The BDSM accessories were also on the runway at Balenciaga’s show at Paris Fashion Week.
Several photos from the campaign also showcased the two young children standing on beds, with one photo reportedly featuring court documents from a child sexual abuse case. The backlash against the images was swift, with the hashtag #cancelBalenciaga trending across Twitter and TikTok and many accusing the brand and its creative director, Demna, of condoning pedophilia and child exploitation.
This was the first response Balenciaga gave online.
“We sincerely apologize for any offense our holiday campaign may cause. Our bear bags should not have been featured with children in this campaign. We immediately removed the campaign from all platforms.”
Although they recognized their mistake and took all away, they cannot deny the action of putting children with bad elements together. The public apparently couldn’t give them a chance to survive in this situation, people who made mistakes have to take responsibility to deal with all bad outcomes. So more sincere apologies are needed from Balenciaga.
These are the comments from Twitter right after the campaign, it is a huge mistake for a famous luxury brand. I don’t think they could cover this mistake in some words and sentences. Because the public doesn’t wish to see this kind of campaign anymore, the only thing to ease this scandal on social media is doing more grateful campaigns and waiting for the fading of the public’s memory.
Balenciaga has apologized for the ads featuring teddy sincerely
After weeks of silence, in February 2023, Balenciaga’s controversial creative director Demna finally addressed the BDSM ad scandal torched online for incorporating children with bondage gear and allegations of normalizing sexual fetishization and abuse of children.
“I apologize to anyone offended by the visuals and Balenciaga has guaranteed that adequate measures will be taken not only to avoid similar mistakes in the future but also to take accountability in protecting child welfare in every way we can,” he concluded.
From my perspective, Balenciaga would avoid this scandal if they have the correct moral value standards. Never lead children to something bad or probably hurt them. This is all Balenciaga’s fault, nothing with the circumstances, I could understand angry audiences’ minds, it is always improper to have a campaign in this way.
This crisis does nothing meaningful related to their brand image. As we all know Balenciaga is cool, but they still cannot use anything cool in their minds without caring about others.
