What Was the Balenciaga Teddy Bear Scandal?
Recently the house of Balenciaga has found themselves in hot water because of their recent campaign with several photographs of children cuddling their plush teddy bear bags that seem to be in bondage gear.
People began accusing them of sexualizing young children. Let’s understand how this story unfolded beginning with the public’s opinion, particularly on social media
Public Backlash
Hashtags #CancelBalenciaga started trending on Twitter and Tik Tok because of how scandalous the photos were. Several celebrities acknowledged how shocking and disturbing the ads were, several celebrities began destroying their Balenciaga products on social media. You can see Arie Luyendyk Jr. and Lauren Burnham even began burning their shoes.
Kim Kardashian’s Reaction
The reality TV star Kim Kardashian who is a huge fan of the brand and in 2022 was officially a face of Balenciaga alongside Justin Bieber and Isabelle Hubert finally broke her silence on Sunday. She had already received a storm of comments from her followers asking her to denounce the brand. Kim Kardashian said that “it’s not because I haven’t been disgusted and outraged by the recent Balenciaga campaigns, but because I wanted an opportunity to speak to their team to understand for myself how this could have happened.”
She is also a mother of four young children, North, Saint, Chicago and Psalm. Her eldest is only 9 and she said that “as a mother of four, she was shaken by the disturbing images,” and that “The safety of children must be held with the highest regard and any attempts to normalize child abuse of any kind should have no place in our society – period.”
What Added Fuel to the Fire
Through the enraged people of the internet, they were skeptical and unhappy about the juxtaposition of children to bondage paraphernalia.
Just five days later on Nov. 21, the Garde-Robe advertising campaign for Spring 23 was released. When people zoomed in on the photos, it contained paperwork from the Supreme Court about child pornography laws.
It seemed that there was a theme at hand and it was unacceptable that Balenciaga allowed for this to happen. Comments on Twitter and Instagram even highlighted that for a campaign to be released, the photos, planning and editing would have gone through numerous hands, how did no one question
Balenciaga’s Apology for the Bondage Bear Photos
Once the pot started to stir for two weeks any apologies by Balenciaga on social media were brushed aside, the public was not impressed with how they were handling it. One such apology was: “We sincerely apologize for any offense our holiday campaign may have caused. Our plush bear bags should not have been featured with children in this campaign. We have immediately removed the campaign from all platforms.”
Eventually, Balenciaga released a statement saying that they had “a series of grievous errors for which Balenciaga takes responsibility.” At the same time there were going to be internal and external investigations, new controls and they were reaching out to “organizations who specialize in child protection, and aim at ending child abuse and exploitation.”
On Dec. 2, five days later, Demna, the Creative Director of Balenciaga, released a statement saying he took responsibility for the inappropriate images. “As much as I would sometimes like to provoke a thought through my work, I would NEVER have an intention to do that with such an awful subject as child abuse that I condemn. Period.”
Balenciaga Proceeded to Sue Production Company in charge of the Ad
Facing such backlash from the public, Balenciaga initiated a lawsuit for $25 million against the North Six, Inc., set designer Nicholas Des Jardins and his production company whom they hired for their Spring 2023 ad campaign.
Their campaign was meant to replicate a corporate environment but amongst the clutter on a desk in one image, it visibly included a page from the 2008 Supreme Court ruling in United States v. Williams, a case “which confirms as illegal and not protected by freedom of Speech the promotion of child pornography,” according to a statement Balenciaga provided to CNN Monday. In the end, Balenciaga apologized and withdrew the campaign.
