Send Nudes?
My group chat got into a heated discussion this week about Garage’s new sleepwear campaign. The clothing brand sent an email to their followers with the headline "Send Nudes" to highlight a new line of skin-toned lounge sets.
For those not familiar with the brand, Garage is a clothing company frequented by tweens, teens….and also me.
I'm outing myself a little by saying I was a recipient of this campaign. I've been shopping at Garage since I was twelve, and the company has aged with me. I wouldn't call it an adult store, but I’m definitely still within the high end of their age range. I represent the sad millennial portion still shopping there for nostalgia and the select few amazing finds.
As a grown woman, the "Send Nudes" email heading made me chuckle. Unsurprisingly, the parents of their younger demographic didn't find it funny.
Seeing the backlash from this campaign has been interesting. I forgot how young their audience can skew. I also didn't realize so many 10-year-olds were opting in to company email blasts....
So, is this campaign harmful, or cheeky?
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On one hand the range of nude clothes is cute and I loved the punny slogan. On the other, this brand was initially built for tweens. Normalizing the idea of sending naked photos to an audience of children isn't a great look...
Garage has since stated that they've moved to an 18-plus demographic. Personally I buy that, and not just because it makes me look better for being on their distribution list. In the last few years I've found great office pieces at Garage that don't fit the aesthetic of school children. While still youthful, they have matured their brand to some degree.
That said, the model they chose looks disturbingly young:
Yikes
This debate is a tough line for me. Last week I wrote about how harmful sexualization can be, but I personally saw this campaign as a fun play on words. It also got me to open the email.
As a general rule, I think sex should be talked about more openly, and it would be naive to assume that teens aren't familiar with nudes as a concept. If anything, this campaign should be sparking a dialogue between parents and adolescents.
I just don't know that Garage should be the one facilitating that conversation.
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Parental Supervision Required
Evidently the biggest concern with this campaign is the target demographic. While Garage claims to be a more mature brand, the fact of the matter is that tweens are still shopping there. Pre-covid it was common to see girls as young as ten strutting into the store front.
Again, I know because I was shopping alongside them...
The argument is that "Send Nudes" encourages sexual behaviour among minors. Not only is that a tone-deaf message from Garage, but it's coming at a time where all our interactions - sexual or otherwise - take place online. The Canadian Centre for Child Protection warns that reports of sextortion (blackmailing someone online using their nude photos)h as increased by 88% during the pandemic.
Probably not the best year to focus a campaign around disseminating child porn.... If there ever is a good year for that?
As one parent aptly said “I have started teaching my girls at a young age to love and respect themselves. It’s a huge step back to see this kind of campaign objectifying them and normalizing sending nudes by text.”
She makes a decent point. And she's not the only one.
A similar campaign made by Boohoo in 2019 was deemed “socially irresponsible” by the UK Advertising Standards Authority.
Kraft Dinner tried their luck with a "send noods" version that was recalled after social backlash from parents claiming the family-oriented brand had sexualized noodles.
Moreover, Garage has been in hot water before for over-sexualizing their young women in an oiled-up photoshoot that parents said made the models look like "escorts."
Similarly La Senza Girl (R.IP.) got in trouble for pushing out a line geared toward 5-12-year-olds with the slogan "Why should grown-ups have all the fun?".
Honestly I think that's adorable, but I guess I like a risky ad...
What's interesting to me is that these brands are under fire because of the adolescent eyeballs they're reaching. We can tolerate a certain level of sexualization from our woman-focused underwear companies, but the second minors are involved it's no bueno.
I know what you're thinking, "no shit Jamie you can't sell sex to children," but at what age does sex stop being taboo? Does a veil lift at age 18 and we're suddenly all able to fully comprehend innuendo and intimacy?
On average Canadians lose their virginity at age 15, so those in-between years are hella awkward. Places like Garage and La Senza Girl have to market to teens who, by all statistical evidence, are already having sex and are prohibited from mentioning it.
It's the 'not a girl, not yet a woman' paradox, only they all have allowance money to burn....These girls are in a shopping purgatory before they're fully allowed to parade through Spencers or Victoria Secret.
One of my friends put it best, La Senza Girl was "A total right of passage [for] graduating from a training bra to a “real” bra.” Those in-between stores are a trial for womanhood. Girls love them because they speak their language with a glimmer of how they can grow into their sexiness and femininity. In essence, these brands are successful because they don't talk down to their customers.
For parents, the expectation is that stores keep it PG-13. Maybe you'll find some bratty t-shirt slogans that wouldn't be at OshKosh, but the thongs and garters are reserved for the 18-plus crowd. Alas, a "Send Nudes" directive isn't keeping it clean.
We should remember that, even with those spaces available, teens and tweens shop at adult stores too. I was going into La Senza (the regular one) by age 13. Unfortunately, you don't get to choose when you're boobs come in. Walking past lingerie and "Give him what he really wants!" ads is part of the bra-shopping experience - there's no set age for that.
You can shelter kids as much as you want, but eventually we all end up in a bra change room wondering how much push-up is too much. In this text-focused world we all deal with sexting too. Eventually someone is going to ask that teenage girl for nudes, and chances are it will happen before they turn 18.
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Sexy Corporate Responsibility
I believe that companies are responsible for their influence; however, is it a company’s job to be entirely inoffensive? No. Is it their job to educate children? Also no. Especially when that company is trying to shift to an older audience.
How can Garage help if 10-year-olds are coming in and out of the store? How and why do those children have email addresses on the distribution list in the first place? The Canadian Anti-Spam Regulations don't explicitly mention age in their overview for emailing., though it's safe to assume that consent can only be given by someone who is the age of majority.
On that note, if any 10-year-olds are on this distribution list, can you please let me know?!
Here's how Garage defines itself in 2021:
"We’re a casual clothing brand for young women who are fun and effortlessly sexy. With a spotlight on denim, our everyday basics and ‘gram-worthy trends are made to inspire confidence. Created in Montreal, our mission is to empower each other to be confident, authentic and unapologetic in our own style, because at Garage we believe that fashion is fun and a way to celebrate life."
To me, "Send Nudes" is completely on brand, and their description rings true for an older audience. For example, I wasn't focused on being 'effortlessly sexy' as a tween. Call it irresponsible, but this campaign was a cheeky attempt to stay on-trend. And it's most definitely unapologetic.
Let's remember that the term 'Send Nudes’ is ubiquitous. It’s practically a Gen Z slogan for “I’m bored.” As such it’s an ‘instantly recognizable’ way for Garage to relate to the young women in their demographic.
Ads mirror the world around them. Garage didn't come up with "Send Nudes", they merely reacted to it. The brand is opening a window into the world of their audience, not telling them to do something. As such, the real problem isn't a racy email heading, it's the secrecy of teen intimacy.
My biggest issue with the outrage around this campaign is that implies we should be talking down to teenage girls. Even though we know sex is a reality for teenagers, we are opting for censorship and ignoring the consequences of shutting down that dialogue.
Here’s a question a lot of you aren't going to like: is talking about sex worse than glorifying skinny bodies? Is this ad any more harmful than the stick figure Victoria Secret Fashion Show that’s shoved down our throats year after year?
Not to say that Garage hasn’t done both (they aren't the hero in this story), but should we be more upset about a discussion around sexual intimacy, or one about body image? There's no right answer, but we've created a world where it's more taboo to discuss sex with teenagers (who are having sex) than it is to encourage unrealistic beauty standards and eating disorders.
Think about that for a second.
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The Art of the Nude
If we take age out of it, the message is still polarizing. Depending on who you are, sending and receiving nudes can be demeaning or empowering.
For proof of that dichotomy, look no further than your most recent dick pic. Was it solicited? Did you enjoy it? How crude is the photo? In the world of nudes, all of these elements matter.
The Cut has a podcast episode exploring the distinction between a nude and a dick pic. Even in language they are different. A nude sounds like art. A dick pic sounds grotesque.
And often they are.
The episode spends time diving into why men think it’s appropriate to send photos with cluttered floors and toilets in the background. One interviewee had this to say about sending her own nudes: “I artfully compose myself and I check the lighting and I check the mirror. I want to look as good as possible.”
What she's describing is a sensual experience of admiring herself. Alternatively, she poses that men have never tried to feel sexy while taking their photos. “[I]f you’re coming at it from a place of power where you’ve never been thought of as the sexual object, of course you’re not going to know what looks good. You’re just going to think, Here’s my dick. That’s all you need.”
As women our bodies have been glorified since the dawn of time. Art is filled with naked sculptures and paintings of boobs. Only relatively recently did we decide that female nipples are too horrifying for society to handle (thanks Instagram). From ads to social media to art, the female form is everywhere.
As a result, I think most have us have snapped a picture when we’re feeling our hottest. And, generally, I find that to be empowering.
Fun fact: I have anonymous nudes online that I sent to a friend for an art collection. It was one of the more exciting, confidence-boosting things I’ve done in quarantine.
In listening to the podcast I actually felt bad that men don't get to look at their bodies in a sexualized way. Typing that out makes me feel conflicted. I don't want my existence as a woman to be defined by sex, but feeling sexy is also something to enjoy. Everyone should be allowed to feel hot, empowered, and desirable.
Whether taking naked pictures is a good or a bad thing comes down to how it makes you feel in that moment. And, by extension, where those photos go. I’ve had boudoir photoshoots with friends that live exclusively on a hard drive, and that experience stands as something positive. Had they been disseminated to strangers or exes I would probably have a different opinion.
Garage, though problematic, doubled as a safe space in middle school. It was for girls, and only girls. Sure the models might still be impossibly hot, but it wasn’t an Axe ad with bikini-clad models chasing men or the appalling naked Carls Jr ad I love to bring up as an example of objectification.
In a sense, Garage is pitching women as sex objects to themselves and calling it empowering. And, truthfully, I kind of buy it. If anyone is going to sexualize me, I’d want it to be me.
I want women to feel empowered to take nudes for themselves without any pressure to send them, and I want that confidence and body exploration to start younger. If Canadians are having sex at 15, then 15-year-olds should know how to love themselves.
Simple as that.
Does Garage need to weigh in on that discussion, absolutely not, but it is a discussion worth having.
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Let Me Ring That Up For You
In all of this discussion it's important to remember one simple truth: clothing companies are not role models.
They are businesses.
How much those businesses care about our feelings isn't the point. To date, showing off sexy models and dishing out innuendo has worked as an ad strategy. Why reinvent the wheel?
Places like Garage and La Senza Girl taught me to value personal style, but they also gave me complexes. The pressure to fit in and have the right outfit is huge when there are so few places tween girls are comfortable shopping. Certain styles and stores are traumatic even now.
For me it’s the Aritzia bustier tank top. In high school my friends obsessed over these. I desperately wanted one, but they never hit me right. I’d either explode out of it, or have the cup line dig into my nipple. It shattered my confidence because I wasn’t the thin 13-year-old I thought I should be.
Every woman has a version of this. One TikToker explains the specific trauma of the low-rise jean for millennial women. When ultra low pants were popular, the denim wasn't what was on sale. The appeal was the skinny bodies showing through the super basic clothing. The narrative was that you could only be fashionable if you were a size 2.
Now the thought of having to be proud of our midriffs in jeans is overwhelming. Say it with me everybody - "HIGH WAISTED JEANS FOREVER!"
What's most disappointing about the Garage ad campaign is that it's to be expected. They know "Send Nudes" would be funny to their young demographic, and they don't care about the potential implications. In 2021, I was hoping we'd move to more positive messaging in our ads.
Savage X Fenty, for example, is extremely successful and has fully embraced body positivity (and also nudes - so we’re clear). We keep seeing brands diving into inclusive and uplifting forms of marketing, so it's disheartening to see Garage lean on something so basic and crass.
In those in-between ages we don’t need extra pressure to be sexual. That said, Garage is only reinforcing what already exists in the world. If we recall the "Send Nudes" campaign, we don't fix the relationship tweens have with sex. We only push the conversation under the rug.
Sending naked photos is a reality for young women, and while capitalizing on that is gross, trying to ignore it is almost as bad. This is the time to have frank discussions, not with brands, but with adolescents.
Garage, you can do better.
In summary, I still think the sleepwear is pretty cute. You also know I love a pun. So, please don't be mad if you see me in a nude lounge set on the gram....I'm not 10-years-old, and nude requests are always welcome in my inbox.
