Sut Jhally needs to get to Moscow, quick
Telegraph (London) - August 13, 2007 http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/main.jhtml?xml=/news/2007/08/13/wads113.xml
Ads targeting schoolgirls spark fury
By Adrian Blomfield
Moscow’s oldest department store, which was infamous in Soviet days
for its empty shelves and churlish staff, is at the centre of
controversy after telling young schoolgirls to wear Western designer
clothes or else become social outcasts.
In a demonstration of the extent to which the land of Lenin has
embraced consumerism, TsUM - the Russian capital’s equivalent of
Harrods - placed a display in its windows with the slogan: “If you
don’t wear Prada, you’re a reject”.
In a series of cartoons, a girl of about six is shown sneering at the
childish pleasures of life.
One shows her turning her back on her teddy bear and toy bunny,
saying: “I don’t need you two any more. Now all I’m interested in is
clothes.”
In another she tells the unhappy bear: “You are unfashionable!
Farewell!”
Standing across from the Bolshoi Theatre, TsUM has become a symbol of
New Russia.
Brimming with clothes and accessories, from Gucci to new Russian
favourite Dolce & Gabbana, it is frequented by a growing number of
affluent customers.
But with its latest stunt, the store seems to have misjudged the
public mood.
Russia’s newspapers - broadsheets and tabloids alike - have reacted
with outrage, mourning a crude attack on childhood innocence.
“TsUM likes to portray itself as a world-class store on a level with
Harrods, yet it speaks with a nouveau riche accent,” commented
Komsomolskaya Pravda, the country’s biggest newspaper, on its front
page.
“It is difficult to imagine Harrods declaring that only rejects don’t
drive Bentleys.”