Is "All-American" un-American?

[mburbank]

I agree. The lawsuit may well fail on the legal merits, but it has certainly gotten the word out that A&F promotes the idea that All American equals white.

The lawsuit may well fail on the merits, but how much do you want to bet that the publicity their Whitey image gets is damaging to their sales and forces them to make changes?

Once a strategy like this is dragged into the light of day, a certain percentage of folks who may like their product will be put off enough by their tactics to stop shopping their. I personally think that's good. It's also a perfectly fair function of the free market.

Now, maybe A&F are totally innocent. If the case against them is obviously frivolous they won't be harmed. Does anyone think Hooters attendance went down when a lawsuit revealed their anti-male hiring bias?

If the article's authir likes A&F fashions, and if he finds nothing wrong with them ethically, I strongly recomend he patronize them. Me? I syopped shopping their when the local outlet featured a wall sized poster of two girls and boy under a flanel comforter. One of the girls was holding up a pair of boxer shorts and smiling. I'm sure the models were legally of age, but the photographer and make up artists had worked pretty hard to make them look to be about thirteen or fourteen. Then they marketed thomng underwear for preteen girls. I think they're something pretty gross about their marketing strategy.