Every day we face the incredulous, unfair, unjust, and down right ridiculous online. I felt compelled to get it out and have a rant because I couldn’t have been more shocked to see Sarah Jessica Parker, someone I have followed, admired, even loved for many many years, front and centre at the Primark superstore opening in NYC. WTF.
Sarah Jessica Parker needs little introduction especially in fashion circles. Probably most famous for her portrayal of Carrie Bradshaw in the widely acclaimed and award winning HBO series Sex and The City alongside Co stars, Kristen Davis, Kim Catrell and Cynthia Nixon.
When do you imagine we are going to see Sarah Jessica Parker on the red carpet sporting her latest purchase from Primark?
This rant is less about my love for Sarah Jessica Parker, her talent as an actor, her passion for literature as an advocate for reading and her position as a booker prize judge, her love of the ballet and unwavering support of the arts but more about how could she use her hard fought for position as the guiding light for all things fashion and style to promote and endorse Primark. For me it’s worse than Anna Wintour selling the Met Gala to Jeff Bezos.
I am not going to pull all the stats and recount all the negative media coverage about the unethical practises of the fast fashion retailing giant. How many workers do we have to see pinning their cries for help to trousers bound for the west to open our eyes or the piles and piles, mountains of clothes ending up in Kantamanto Market in Accra, Ghana where 90% is unusable and unsaleable, strangling their beautiful landscape and ocean as we use their country as a dumping ground for a cheap top worn once.
SJP what are you thinking? Surely You don’t need the money. I honestly thought you’d be the type to be outside protesting not inside sipping champagne telling the press you think the clothes are well made.
The worst part is how disappointed I feel to have invested so much love, and genuine support into someone I don’t actually know, only think I know because of constant exposure on TV, in films and through the press and social media.
I have unfollowed Sarah Jessica Parker today, someone whose posts I have always shared and commented on in the past, even looked forward to.
It was like choosing to give up smoking, something you like but discover is really not doing you that much good. I remember deleting R. Kelly from my play list and feeling that sense of loss. Now whenever I hear an old favourite all I can think of is how many people he hurt and immediately switch off. You can change years of enjoyment and mental connection if you really want to. I try not to listen to Michael Jackson anymore for the same reason.
SJP may not be a wife beater or abuser but her decision to stand with a major fast fashion producer when her whole gig is about standing out, creating style and recycling luxury is such a let down I can’t stand it.
The famous basketball coach John Wooden said “care more about your character than your reputation, your character is who you really are, your reputation only who people think you are.”
I wonder how many other grown up women of her 9.9 million followers on Instagram who love fashion and style as much as Carrie Bradshaw an incarnation of Sarah Jessica herself will feel the same.
The thought of never rewatching and revisiting Sex and The City, the movies One and Two, and Just Like That, well it’s difficult to go there but if Samantha (Kim Cattrell) could say goodbye then so can I.
I don’t imagine my unfollow will impact that much. Although that said it reminds of a story I once read about about a man walking along a beach throwing stranded baby turtles back into ocean and her friend saying why do you do this, look how many there are, you’ll never make a difference and her saying, I just made a difference to that one.
My reason to throw SJP back in the proverbial ocean as a fashion lover myself I just don’t see her giving up her Manolo Blaniks in favour of Primark and Atmosphere any time soon. I’m not buying it Sarah. Sorry.