H&M does not fit in this world

Chappell Roan is a breakout musical star from the American Midwest. She's a young Queer icon whose hits include Good Luck, Babe! and Red Wine Supernova, oh and Pink Pony Club. Today I want to thank Chappell Roan for putting this so simply and so well:

‘H&M does not fit in this world. Also, fuck H&M.’

In an interview for Rolling Stone, Chappell Roan talked about all the things that are trying to tear off pieces of her creativity - from dangerous fandom and stifling record labels to brand deals. By 'this world' she means the world she has built for herself and her music, a world she wants to protect. This protection includes barring H&M from mining her life-force, stripping it of meaning and flipping it to sell piles of polyester.

H&M do not fit in Roan's world because her world is DIY fierce drag, high camp, bespoke costumes and Queerality, whereas H&M is mediocre. It's not mean to call out mediocrity when that mediocrity is part of how H&M gets away with doing what they do. The pictures of the recent H&M x Charli XCX concert in East London show a ‘red carpet’ full of clothes so meh and poorly made that they are about to be binned by the bored looking celebrities who were paid to wear them. Spending vast sums of money on such a display of mediocrity only makes sense when you remember that H&M want to be in the middle with SHEIN (the cheap villain) on one side and ZARA (the expensive villain) on the other. They want to be the mediocre ‘nice’ one.

We should learn from Chappell Roan telling H&M to f*ck off. H&M have taken a big piece of our collective world. As a climate arsonist, H&M sit at the top of the toxic greenwashing leader board. When the Changing Markets Foundation looked into 4,000 products produced by 12 fashion brands they found H&M were the worst offender for ‘routinely deceiving’ people by making green claims so phony that they broke the rules set by the UK Competition and Markets Authority. Never trust the mediocre nice brand - H&M’s ‘Conscious Collection’ contained a higher share of synthetics than its regular collections – 72 per cent compared to 61 per cent.

H&M do not fit in this world because overproduction and climate crisis do not fit in this world. These vast piles of clothing literally can't fit into the world, spilling out of shops to clog up deserts, waterways and beaches even as brands scheme towards endless growth.

When the terrible murder of 21-year-old garment worker Jeyasre Kathiravel took place in Tamil Nadu, it was revealed that H&M had been sourcing from the factory where Jeyasre worked for over a decade, benefiting from a system where women were forced to make more than 1,000 items of clothing a day and were routinely preyed upon by male supervisors. One woman who was interviewed stated: “Even married women are not safe. It is just abuse and production targets. We are nothing more to the factory.” Even after the truth came out, it took months and a concerted global campaign to get H&M to sign the Dindigul Agreement to End Gender-Based Violence and Harassment.

H&M do not fit in this world because gender-based violence and indentured servitude to brands do not fit in this world.

Nor does H&M pay anything like a living wage in its supply chains. Instead we have a system whereby millions of impoverished people work as machine operators and garment quality inspectors on poverty wages, pressing shirts and snipping loose threads six days a week while billionaires buy super-yachts. Despite resigning as Chairman of H&M in 2020, Stefan Persson still owns 36 percent of the company making him Sweden's richest person. His personal fortune currently stands at $18.2 billion.

H&M do not fit in this world because inequality and wealth hoarding do not fit in this world.

Chappell Roan is right to shut out H&M because they want to use her vitality to prop up their facade. Time after time, fashion ad campaigns take our ideas and our social movements and sell them back to us devoid of original meaning and used as a screen for human rights and environmental abuses. These brands are trashing everything that is good, true and authentic. They are an existential threat to us having a habitable planet.

What does fit in the world?

Clothing freed from the denigration of being a source of corporate profit. Clothing produced in harmony with the biosphere. Clothing that exists as a tribute to the profound truth that humans are part of, not separate from, nature. Clothing that expresses the expectation that equality is sacrosanct. Clothing that celebrates difference and identity. Clothing made because art and beauty is for all.

Bangladesh

I am speaking at a free online Labour Behind the Label event: Bangladesh Uprising: What Next For The Workers? on Tuesday 8th October. Sign up link here. Please come along for a full update from a panel that will include labour organisers in Bangladesh.

Bangladesh's political system is still in a state of flux. There have been many strikes - both official and wildcat, as workers have not been paid all the wages they are due. There is also a reported sense that with state apparatus like the police and army still being unorganised, workers can carry out strikes without the previous fear of being beaten or shot.

In the meantime, here is a list of demands from the Awaj Foundation and Sommilito Garments Sramik Federation (SGSF). For subscribers who are journalists - this list is FULL of stories.

● Call for the immediate withdrawal of the 35 criminal cases filed against workers and union leaders during the 2023 minimum wage protests. Take steps to prevent future legal harassment of workers and the criminalization of trade union activities. Remove workers’ names from blacklists associated with the minimum wage movement.
● Reassess the RMG sector minimum wage, which was set in 2023 by the former government without following legal procedures and without the participation of independent unions. Enact a new minimum wage that takes into account the rising cost of living and include independent trade unions in this wage-setting process.
● Amend the Bangladesh Labour Law 2006 to come into compliance with international labour standards.
● Address corruption within the Directorate of Labour that undermines independent trade union registration.
● Simplify the complicated Union Registration process, ensure collective bargaining rights and stop unfair labour practices, especially violence and harassment against workers and trade union leaders.
● Focus on implementation of all ILO Core Conventions which have been ratified by Bangladesh.
● Brands need to monitor the exploitation of the workers and ensure responsible purchasing practice. CSDDD (Corporate Sustainability Due Diligence Directives) need to be enforced mandatorily in the supply chain.
● BGMEA (Bangladesh Garment Manufacturers and Exporters Association) and BKMEA (Bangladesh Knitwear Manufacturers and Exporters Association) biometric systems of workers' databases need to be publicly institutionalized to ensure that they are not misused to retaliate against workers for exercising their fundamental right to freedom of association.
● Calling for Government to take necessary steps to release the detained 57 migrant Bangladeshi workers who expressed their solidarity with the student movement in UAE now.

This newsletter is free - please post it on your socials and forward to a friend or two.

Before I started this newsletter I read about newsletter writers becoming fixated on publishing schedules and writing tearful apologies if they were a day late, not realising that no-one except them had noticed. Now that I am a newsletter writer I have an insight into the specific pressure that self-publishing brings. So this is a (probably unnecessary) disclaimer that this newsletter is not going to stick to a rigid timetable for the foreseeable future because I am in Album Mode with my book, AND starting work on a new investigation.

I will, however, see you sometime soon for the next edition of Patched.

In solidarity for the month ahead, plus a Vulcan Salute to the friend who sent me the Chappell Roan interview,

Tansy.