Women Are Frankly Flawed, Victoria’s Secret, Get Used To It

My dear Victoria’s Secret friends. What in the world is up with you guys this week? It’s bad enough that you launched a new bra called ‘Flawless’, as if we ladies need to be reminded yet one more time of just how much we need fixing. Our brains are already saturated with inferiority complexes as we pick up yet another cue that our natural beauty just isn’t good enough.

Hopefully your former super Angel Gisele can set you straight on why ‘Flawless’ isn’t a good name for a bra these days. Take a good read of yesterday’s post Gisele Bundche & Johan Lindeberg Say Basta To ‘Flawless’.

We LIKE our imperfections and unique features. They are part of our IDENTITY. We don’t need the biggest lingerie brand in the world — one that consumed 10 years of my life in a great career ride — telling us that we need to assess our flaws every time we look in the mirror.

Some of us are blondes and some brunettes. Some of us have round faces and others high foreheads with chiseled features. A few of us are 5’10” but most 5’4”. Some of us care about others and have good hearts with regard to how we treat people. Others do not.

Using Kate Upton Is A Mortal Sin After You Publicly Humiliated Her

Frankly, I can forgive you for ‘Flawless’ and continue to hold you in some regard. But you have committed a MORTAL SIN putting Kate Upton’s 2011 image on the back of a new Victoria’s Secret catalogue.

What in the world were you thinking, Victoria’s Secret Catalog ??????????????? I thought your previous treatment of Kate Upton was a new low. In your crass tearing up of a woman’s reputation — which you did very publicly with your Victoria’s Secret stylist representative Sophia Neophitou saying that Victoria’s Secret would never use Kate Upton, because she is “like a Page 3 girl” — I thought you hit a new low in how you relate to women.

Neophitou said that Upton is “like a footballer’s wife with the too-blond hair and that kind of face that anyone with enough money can go out and buy.”

Today, because Kate Upton is a great success in spite of Sophia Neophitou’s obnoxious, petty, demeaning comments about her, you decide to capitalize on Kate’s acceptance by Carine Roitfeld, Anna Wintour, Steven Meisel, and countless other top people in fashion. This is a totally disgusting turn of events, Victoria’s Secret.

‘The Kate Upton Effect’ By Mario Testino for Voge US June 2013

I wrote in February 2012, calling you guys out for Sophia Neophitou’s comments:

There is so much interest in my own article about Kate Upton, perhaps because her body is one to be celebrated — as is her look.
Reflecting personally, let me share with readers that my 2Ps in a Pod column with a Catholic monk is now over. The skin care ads are down.
Why, you ask? Because a few self-appointed, very uppity people with mouths like Neophitou think that I’m a Page 3 girl, too. Too-blond hair and a slut-girl face. Decadent, disgustingly sensual — as Rick Santorum would say as he now turns to condemn sensuality, too — and a danger to humankind.
Blonds like Upton and me have no moral fiber, given our embrace of Smart Sensuality identities.
I’ve connected the dots between fashion and flogging since 2007. Top fashion industry stylists like Sophia Neophitou make moral judgement calls on women, just like the Catholic bishops. The whole damn world is fighting over women’s bodies and many of us have just “had it” with fashion monasticism and woman hate from fashion designers like Karl Lagerfeld to stylists like Neophitou to social conservative investors in nonprofit skin care companies.
American women are fighting for our rights to birth control in this country, and Victoria’s Secret is condemning Kate Upton as not their kind of girl. On this subject, I will have to check in with Marilyn, because she fought the same fight, being judged by elitists like Neophitou and condemned by the clergy.

Kate Upton & Co By Sebastian Faena & Carine Roitfeld for Harper’s Bazaar Australia May 2013

Kate Upton Was Graceful and Positive About Your Attempts To Destroy Her

After you were content to destroy Kate Upton’s career future with Neophitou’s elitist, slimeball comments, Kate Upton held her head high. Kate reminded everyone that Gisele is a footballer’s wife, and her life has worked out OK. Upton made no references to your destructive strategy on labeling her and every other woman who is too blonde a slut — you’re talking to me here — instead making her way forward with her beautiful head held high.

Women have had to deal with this kind of guilt management for eons — specifically since the dawn of private property and monotheism when it was decided that women needed to be veiled, to avoid our corrupting influence.

The Victoria’s Secret attack on Kate Upton was unforgivable in my play book, but this young woman with determination and a great spirit moved on, with the support of millions of women of every age, including me.

This morning I’m prepared to ask you to clarify once and for all exactly what you meant, Victoria’s Secret, about saying that Kate Upton was “too obvious” and I am “too obvious”. My post would have celebrated the fact you have come to your senses about Kate Upton as all the headlines read.