By Rob Fox
Dystopian-themed fashion house Bstroy, founded by designers Brick Owens and Dieter “Du” Grams, has a hot new line of, um, uh…bullet-riddled school shooting hoodies?
Be the hottest-looking person to be put on a watch list this fall when you walk around your neighborhood rocking Bstroy’s faded navy and white Columbine hoodie, distressed to look as someone had been murdered while wearing it.
And you’ll never look more fabulous than you will while wearing, and being viciously beaten for wearing, their green, bullet hole-covered Sandy Hook hoodie. You know, Sandy Hook…where first-graders were slaughtered.
(It’s probably just a sick coincidence that the model they have in the Sandy Hook hoodie resembles the Sandy Hook shooter. On the one hand, this feels like something someone tone-deaf enough to make these things would do. Then again, someone dumb enough to design these is almost certainly not informed enough to know who the Sandy Hook shooter was or what he looked like.)
Based on the prices listed on fashion house’s website, you’ll soon be able to buy one of these daring fashion statements for about $250 a pop, with absolutely none of the profits going to the victims’ families or any other worthy cause.
Mostly, buying these things will probably just pay for the drugs Owens and Grams will use to inspire their next brilliant fashion idea.
This is like the output of some low-level, college fashion design class project gone wrong.
As you’d expect, the creative pair behind the new line has received a significant amount of backlash — from Marjory Stoneman Douglas students, Sandy Hook parents, among others. Owens and Grams released a statement that basically said, ”We made them because it makes you think, man.” Or something.
Sometimes life can be painfully ironic. Like the irony of dying violently in a place you consider to be a safe, controlled environment, like school. We are reminded all the time of life’s fragility, shortness, and unpredictability yet we are also reminded of its infinite potential. it is the push and pull that creates the circular motion that is the cycle of life. Nirvana is the goal we hope to reach through meditation and healthy practices that counter our destructive habits. Samsara is the cycle we must transcend to reach Nirvana.
So, yeah, these guys dropped some faux-Buddhism to justify making money from dead children. Which is probably right on-brand.