Target Removed LGBTQ+ Merch For Employee Safety. Now the Designer Is Getting Death Threats
Designer Erik Carnell, the gay trans man behind the London-based company accessory and apparel line Abprallen, was honored to see his products sold at Target as part of the company’s pride collection. “I’m especially happy at the thought that young closeted people will see it, and I hope that in some way they’ll feel a bit more comfortable in themselves, as we all deserve to feel,” he wrote on Instagram last week. Now, those same items have been removed from availability online and stripped from store shelves as part of Target’s response to the intense conservative backlash to the LGBTQ+ products that the company says has threatened employee safety. Meanwhile, death threats are filling up Carnell’s inbox.
“This whole situation has been far worse than I could have imagined in terms of pushback against my person,” Carnell tells Rolling Stone over email. “I have received innumerable death threats and threats of violence, these only being outnumbered by the sheer volume of hate messages I’ve received. I am upset over the lies that have been spread about me and the falsehood that I designed so-called ‘satanic’ items for children in Target. I designed items only for the adult sections, none of which had any occult or otherwise ‘satanic’ imagery.”
More from Rolling Stone
Dodgers Apologize and Reinvite Sisters of Perpetual Indulgence to Pride Night
Right-Wingers Furious That Fox News Doesn't Hate Trans People As Much As They Do
LA Pride Pulls Out of Dodgers' Pride Night After Team Rescinded Charity Drag Group Invite
While certain items sold by Abprallen include that imagery, the sweatshirts and tote bags Carnell designed for Target only featured colorful illustrations with outer space themes and phrases like “Cure Transphobia, Not Trans People.” Not a devil horn or pentagram in sight. These products were available online and in-store just last week. Currently, no results for the company appear when searched for directly through Target, and users accessing the items through Google are redirected to a “product not available” landing page.
“Since introducing this year’s collection, we’ve experienced threats impacting our team members’ sense of safety and well-being while at work,” Target shared in a statement on Tuesday, May 23. ”Given these volatile circumstances, we are making adjustments to our plans, including removing items that have been at the center of the most significant confrontational behavior.”
Target’s Pride collection items, usually located in the clothing departments nearby the front entrance, will be a little bit harder to find heading into Pride Month, if the merchandise is still available at all. According to Associated Press, Target locations in certain Southern states will be moving these impacted products towards the back of the store. The company also declined to specify which items would be removed from its shelves. So far, the only items to have been fully removed from availability are from Abprallen.
Carnell explains that while he understands the importance of employee safety, he believes Target could have approached its response differently. “I wish that Target had taken a different approach, such as employing more security and using those resources to remove distributive patrons instead of removing or shrinking the Pride displays,” he says. “I do, however, understand that employee’s physical safety comes first, as it should, particularly in open carry States.”
But the backlash lives online, too, similarly born from misinformation. [In recent days, some swimwear pieces that appear in Target’s pride collection — including “tuck-friendly” swimsuits for transgender people who have not undergone gender-affirming operations — have been falsely promoted on social media as being available for children. In reality, the items are only being carried in adult sizes and stored in the adult section of Target’s stores and website. The suits, which are marked with circular tags that read “Tuck-Friendly Construction” and “Extra Crotch Coverage,” range in size from an adult XS to an adult 4X for inclusive sizing. Tags on certain swimwear items for children read: “Thoughtfully Fit on Multiple Body Types and Gender Expressions.”
These tuck-friendly items have received an uptick in negative, one-star reviews online. The comments, particularly on a color-blocked one-piece, range from generally standard (“Not cute. Do not buy.”) to more straightforwardly transphobic (“It would be cute if my gender and all the experiences and struggles that have come with it was a costume.”).
In response to Target’s decision to remove items from their pride collection, California Governor Gavin Newsom tweeted: “CEO of Target Brian Cornell selling out the LGBTQ+ community to extremists is a real profile in courage. This isn’t just a couple stores in the South. There is a systematic attack on the gay community happening across the country.”
Best of Rolling Stone
