It appears that love really is dead after a new line of seasonal sweaters on sale at Target sparked outrage.
The outlet began selling two colorful sweater designs in store ahead of Valentine’s Day.
The first was pink with ‘Dump Him’ emblazoned in bold red lettering across the front, while the second was a light blue sweater with ‘Emotionally Unavailable’ written in black cursive.
But despite the seemingly harmless messaging, it was soon pounced upon in a series of pictures and videos shared on social media, with some users slamming the corporation for spreading ‘anti-men’ messages.
Lisa Britton, who describes herself as a men’s rights activist, took to X (formerly Twitter) to air her frustrations.
‘I saw this sweater promoted at Target today. Could you imagine if, in the month leading up to Valentine’s Day, Target was spotlighting a “Dump Her” sweater in the men’s section?’ she wrote, along with a picture of the display.
Britton continued declaring: ‘People would lose it. I’m so tired of this garbage.’
It appears that love really is dead after a new line of seasonal sweaters on sale at Target sparked outrage
The post was then filled with responses from people horrified at the store’s decision to sell the clothing.
‘More women hating men propaganda. Gee shocker,’ said another sarcastically.
‘Target is woke,’ one simply said.
‘Anti-male garbage. I stopped shopping at Target a long time ago,’ snarked someone else.
‘Misery loves company. Those without a man hate to see other girls happy in a relationship,’ was another person’s opinion.
But others were quick to shut down the criticism as one male reader hit back: ‘Here’s the big difference: Men don’t mind this stuff.
‘We don’t need you to be our champion of righteousness, Lisa. We’re not harmed by words on a sweater.’
‘At some point you’ll just have to stop taking everything so seriously,’ another added.
Lisa Britton, who describes herself as a men’s rights activist, took to X (formerly Twitter) to air her frustrations
The second ‘offensive’ sweater was a light blue sweater with ‘Emotionally Unavailable’ written in black cursive
Last year, Target came under fire for its Pride collection, with shoppers noticing they failed to finish editing the tags on the Pride merchandise.
Several staff members noticed the tags read: ‘body copy tincidunt ut lorem ipsum,’ the tags say. ‘dolor sit amet, consectet adipiscing elit, sed diam ad nonummy nibh…’
The sentences are frequently used as placeholder text for graphic designers and publishers looking to test out different fonts.
Reddit users pointed out that Target clearly forgot to finish the graphics on a heavily scrutinized collection.
‘They didn’t finish editing the tags on the Pride merch,’ one staffer pointed out.
The incorrect tags impacted clothing items across the lineup, with pictures showing placeholder text on tags for products like the ‘adult athletic pant’ and the ‘adult woven top.’
Some shoppers, who have already felt spurned by the brand’s reversal on diversity and inclusion policies, said the mistake was ‘tone deaf.’
