Be glad if you didn’t see it. Luxury fashion house Balenciaga won the race to the bottom with its recent ad campaign. It featured children posing with bondage-styled bears and included a page with a Supreme Court ruling on child pornography.
Fashion advertising strives to be “hip” and “edgy” and “transgressive.” But what Balenciaga did is way too far. It isn’t bold—it’s deviant. It’s a concerted effort to destigmatize the sexualization of children. That’s evil and it’s wrong.
The good news is that Balenciaga has gotten a lot of blowback for what they did. And that’s key. Because the only way radicals will stop pushing the envelope is if the rest of us say to them: Enough. Hands off the children.
It’s every adult’s job to protect the young and vulnerable from predators—even if they’re trendy fashionistas at Balenciaga, to their eternal shame.