11 | July | 2018 | Be a Seed for Change

Kibwe Chase-Marshall just started a petition to the Council of Fashion Designers in America and Vogue to It is time to address the systemic anti-Blackness of the fashion industry

It is time to address the systemic anti-Blackness of the fashion industry

Dear Friends,

I just started a petition titled “#BreakSilenceBreakCeilings: End Employment Discrimination Against Black Designers“

Black designers continue to face systemic employment discrimination within the mainstream fashion industry.This renders them generally incapable of landing upper management and executive roles, and—as evidenced by H&M’s “Coolest Monkey in The Jungle” hoodie photographed on a young Black boy—often allows for the irresponsible dissemination of insensitive, insulting, and exploitative depictions of Blackness within advertising.

I recently launched a social media campaign, #breaksilencebreakceilings to address just these issues. Attention around the campaign, resulted in me publishing a game-changing op-ed “Why Aren’t There More Black Designers”, last week in the Business of Fashion. Not content with merely listing complaints throughout the piece, I delivered actionable steps toward dynamic change, charging the Council of Fashion Designers of America and American Vogue to partner on initiating a 3-pronged plan to engage the fashion design and recruitment communities in greater transparency and more equitable hiring practices.

Join us if you believe relying on racism in fashion should be addressed before another racist campaign is produced.

The proposed initiative aims to reform an industry that has normalized the exclusion of Black professionals. Design and recruitment industry participants would be availed of comprehensive bias mitigation training and hiring-practice audits.

Will you sign the petition and forward this email to make sure your voice is heard? Add your name here.

By signing this petition, you will amplify this call-to-action directed at the CFDA and Vogue, organizations that have a responsibility to no longer turn a blind eye to the fashion industry’s marginalization of Black talent. Collectively, our signatures will #breaksilencebreakceilings, declaring that time’s up for employment discrimination against Black designers.

It’s time to take the racism out of fashion, tell the Council of Fashion Designers America and Vogue to stop combat anti-Blackness in fashion.

Thank you,

Kibwe Chase-Marshall

now Brightmoor

Friends,

We need your help today- please take 30 seconds to sign this petition in solidarity with the Brightmoor community in Detroit, Michiganas they fight to ensure Black families have access to clean water.

Detroit has implemented a city-wide water cutoff policy that will hit predominantly Black communities like Brightmoor the hardest.How bad is it? So bad the state of Indiana is issuing travel warnings urging their residents to get vaccinated for Hepatitis A before traveling to Michigan.¹ Yet folks in Michigan are being told not to panic and instead make sure they wash their hands and maintain good hygiene. This is cruel advice to people who are being denied access to clean and safe water. We have alredy seen a preliminary study conducted by the Henry Ford Global Health Initiative found, “patients who live on blocks that experienced water shutoffs were 1.55 times more likely to be diagnosed with a water-associated illness.”² Without any running water, how are the people of the city supposed to wash their hands, prepare sanitary food, or clean themselves? The city of Detroit denying its people water has already played a role in a growing Hepatitis A epidemic – instead of giving bad advice, the city needs to work quickly to give people clean water.

Having access to safe and clean water is crucial to the health and safety of any community, but instead of working to make sure the people of Detroit have the water they need to stay well, the city is still threatening to deny thousands of people water. Join us in telling the mayor and city of Detroit to stop playing games- don’t cut off water to communities.

Friends, over 30,000 people have signed on to tell the city to stop taking water from residents. Will you sign too?

Rev. Roslyn Bouier

P.S. Below is the email we sent a couple weeks ago:

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