Five Reasons Why You Should Care About #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch

Have you ever wondered where your pride merch was made? Besides the “made in….” tag, imagine the stories and lives behind the shirts, flags and totes that carry the colors of your sexuality, what can you conceive of? Would you dare imagine that the very people that make your pride month merch are not able to express their sexuality in their home country?

All these questions should make us curious. Inspired from Fashion Revolution’s #WhoMadeMyClothes, blogger of The Quirky Environmentalist, Izzy McCloud, started #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch. It is a consumer activist campaign that seeks to address that brands making pride merch should be transparent in their supply chain and protect their garment workers, especially their LGTBQ2S+ workers. It runs during Pride Month, from June 1st through the 30th and everyone is invited to participate. The following reasons are why you should care and take action:

Rainbow Capitalism

Pride clothing is often made in countries where being LGTBQ2S+ is illegal. Corporations have taken advantage of the free market to capitalize on pride by selling collections that showcase their support. This support is inherently false and superficial when the LGBTQS+ garment workers that are making their pride merch could lose their job, be arrested and even killed if they came out. Examples include the following brand pride collections, their source of origin and associated policies on LGTBQ2S+ rights:

Levi Pride Collection: Partly made in India, where homosexuality is illegal
H&M Pride Range: Partly produced in Bangladesh where homosexuality is punished with life imprisonment and gay activists have been targeted and murdered. Also, the range was manufactured in Turkey and China, where homosexuality is legal but gay people suffer homophobia. In 2017, the Turkish capital Ankara banned all gay festivals, screenings, forums and exhibitions.
Primark Pride Collection: Partly made in Myanmar, where homosexuality is banned

2. Lack of Transparency

Have you ever wondered why you have never heard of this topic before? Transparency in the supply chain of our products is masterfully kept from all consumers to avoid this very conversation. Corporations want you to mindlessly consume and not ponder more deeply on where products are actually coming from. To question where your pride gear is to rebel from the very systems that are oppressing LGTBQ2S+ members all over the globe. Unfortunately, to learn more about how the lives of LGTBQ2S+ people in the fashion supply chain is relatively difficult. There is little literature and information to be found on this topic. Research and data needs to be pursued to bring greater justice and light to the plight for this sector of garment workers . We should be able to know how workers are being treated, what their struggles are and that their story be heard. This is important because our purchasing power is directly voting for what type of world we want to live in. Without more information we will therefore not be able to make the best informed purchase, which helps prevent the oppression of those we are striving to empower and advocate for.

It is critical that companies release the information on where their pride collections are being made. It would provide key insight if the LGTBQ2S+ are being treated with respect and tolerance. For companies that have released Pride collections in the past, they MUST reveal the source of their Pride collections, the condition they were made under and who made them. For example, the following are companies that did not want to disclose the origin of their pride collection:

Nike’s BeTrue range - refused to state where their range was made
Adidas Pride Running Shoes - did not disclose where they were manufactured

3. No Union For Garment Workers

Most garment workers in the fashion industry do not have a union representing their best interests. Workers are often paid less than minimum wage, work more than 40 hours a week, are subject to harassment in the workplace and have access to little to zero of their rights. In the case of a LGTBQ2S+ garment worker, its highly unlikely they will be able to demand their rights in their local society without feeling serious repercussions. They will likely be oppressed their whole life time because of their sexuality, will never have the chance to feel accepted and loved for who they truly are nor provided a safe space in society. In essence, pride should not just exist in developing countries. This would effectively become an elitist movement and truly a counter-intuitive logic. Real change can occur at the consumer level to advocate for the workers of their products to have more rights. Without consumer demands, it is highly unlikely that anything will change. Campaigns such as #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch strives in pushing the conversation to the forefront to help activate a wave of change, which includes the unionization of workers. In this method, the needs and rights of workers can be met and heard. Despite legal repercussions, with enough people talking and advocating together, hope for our LGTBQ2S+, on a governmental level, can become a possibility.

4.Rainbow Capitalism Oppresses LGTBQ2S+

Buying from corporations that only produce pride collections for money will directly oppress LGTBQ2S+ garment workers. In truth, very little money is actually donated from the purchase of these collections. Examples include H&M donating 10% of their sales price from their Love All collection to UN’s Free & Equal campaign and Levi has donated to an Indian charity to help reverse the ban of the country’s homosexuality. However, at the end of the day, the corporations are reaping most of the profits. It effectively makes brands look like they care for their community but are secretly enslavingtheir LGTBQ2S+ garment workers, which are predominantly BIPOC. This effectively condemns garment workers in a miserable life of misrepresentation and exploitation. In addition, as more corporations enter Pride, it becomes more expensive to participate. This drives up the prices and therefore drives out more vulnerable communities to be excluded. Special consideration thus needs to be taken on what the criteria should be for corporate allyship. This requires everyone to start asking questions and to think more deeply on what it means to be part of Pride, from an economic standpoint. This mental work hopefully can bring about more inclusivity and conscious consumerism to better support the LGTBQ2S+ community.

5.Brands Owned and Operated From Anti-Gay Belief Structures

The title says it simply enough. The executives in their high chairs know exactly what they are doing. The transparency of the supply chain is muddied and complex but nothing can be more clear than the opinions held in the heads of brand executives. It simply is not enough to be involved in performative activism. Brands need to stop woke washing, which means they are using social issues as an advertising tactic which directs consumers' attention away from their unethical and unsustainable business practices. Ask yourself this, if you were the owner of a brand and knew you were selling a LGBTQ2S+ pride collection made from LGBTQ2S+ oppressed garment workers, would you be really supporting the movement? I don’t think so.

What Now

Pride should continue to be a special month where we can celebrate and cherish the beauty, diversity, inclusivity, individuality and authenticity of LGTBQ2S+ community. Clothing is a powerful way we can illustrate this and provides a means of self expression. However, we should be curious under what conditions they were made and by whom. Queer solidarity is also labor solidarity. We cannot have real Pride when the respect and livelihood of queer workers is not protected.

How to Participate in #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch

Make sure to start asking brands that are releasing pride merch, #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch to find out where it's being made, how it’s being made, how LGTBQ2+ workers are being treated and what they are doing to protect them and love them.

You can pick a brand, any brand making money off of the rainbow flag and pride this season, and email them, tweet them, write a letter to them, ask them #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch. Templates can be found on Izzy’s blog post here
Pose with one of our posters and tag brand(s) asking #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch.
Wear merch you already own and ask the brand #WhoMadeMyPrideMerch and it if they're protecting their workers this pride month.

Download these posters and share on your social media: link