“I guess simulating gang bangs are fine,” tweeted Kelly Cutrone. “But IVF and same sex marriage are not.” Cutrone, a fashion publicist, was responding to fashion duo’s Domenico Dolce and Stefano Gabbana’s recent comments about gay relationships and parenting in Italian publication Panorama. Here’s a sampling of their remarks:
“We oppose gay adoptions. The only family is the traditional one.”
“You are born to a mother and a father—or at least that’s how it should be. I call children of chemistry synthetic children. Rented uterus, semen chose from a catalog.”
“You are born to a mother and a father—or at least that’s how it should be.”
In her tweet, Cutrone was referencing a 2007 D&G fashion ad that appeared to glamorize a rape or a gang bang to cite D&G’s apparently warped values. Elton John, meanwhile, offered this Instagram response: “How dare you refer to my beautiful children as ‘synthetic.’ And shame on you for wagging your judgmental little fingers at IVF—a miracle that has allowed legions of loving people, both straight and gay, to fulfill their dreams of having children. Your archaic thinking is out of step with the times, just like your fashions. I shall never wear Dolce and Gabbana ever again.”
And neither should anyone else, John insists. The singer has called for a boycott of all things D&G. Many other celebrities, from Al Roker to Ricky Martin to Victoria Beckham to Ryan Murphy to Courtney Love—have either joined John’s #BoycottDolceGabbana campaign or have voiced their own criticisms.
All of which led Gabbana to issue a response: “We firmly believe in democracy and the fundamental principle of freedom of expression that upholds it. We talked about our way of seeing reality, but it was never our intention to judge other people’s choices.”
Well, but, except that’s exactly what they did—judge. And that’s OK. What’s not OK is some boilerplate “apology” likely churned out by a PR flack. I’m always annoyed when people make judgmental comments while simultaneously maintaining that they are not judging. (It’s akin to saying that you support a woman’s right to choose but don’t think that women should ever choose abortion. There’s judgment there.)
Let’s face it: The only reason any of this is a bit shocking is because the comments came from two gay fashion designers. So first, the incident should remind us all not to assume that traveling in liberal circles inherently means one holds liberal views.
It seems that the designers’ thinking stems mainly from their cultural upbringing. The Italian society in which they were raised upheld conventionalism. For the most, part it still does. Dolce said as much in his own statement about the controversy: “I’m Sicilian and I grew up in a traditional family, made up of a mother, a father and children. I am very well aware of the fact that there are other types of families and they are as legitimate as the one I’ve known. But in my personal experience, family had a different configuration…I was talking about my personal view, without judging other people’s choices and decisions.”
What are we to make of this? Does one’s culture give someone a pass for having outdated views?
It does not. The fact is that many of us grew up in less enlightened times that may not have allowed women to vote, blacks to sit next to whites on buses, or gays to wed. Never mind that decades ago, IVF was as foreign a concept as a black American president.
But then something happened to us. We grew up. We now understand the world differently because the world is different. To argue that Dolce and Gabbana still live in a traditional Italian society is simply untrue. By nature of who they are, they belong to a far more global culture and have been exposed to all sorts of individuals and families just like their own—filled with love. There’s nothing synthetic about that.
In other words, they should know better. Ultimately, culture is a valid explanation for an opinion, but it is never a justification once you’ve been exposed to greater diversity.
