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When will brands stop sexualizing kids? Enough with the skimpy clothes and sick ad campaigns.
Opinion by Carli Pierson, USA TODAY • Yesterday 3:52 PM
Bedazzled booty shorts and crop tops as far as the eye can see – that was the nightmare that I found myself staring into when I went shopping for clothes for my young daughters this weekend.
Carli Pierson's daughter holds up high-rise shorts for 6-year olds that she recently found at the department store Zara.© Carli Pierson
Why a child would need a high-rise short is beyond me. But to imagine why someone would sell crop tops and high-rise shorts to 6-year-olds makes me slightly ill.
First, some background. I am the mother of two lovely little girls, a 5-year-old and a 6-year-old who are also growing way too fast. Like many parents, I regularly run to the mall to buy new clothes for my kids whose pants now look like capris but aren't supposed to look like capris.
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This past weekend, while browsing the department store Zara, I was very unhappy when I saw that
all the shorts in the girls section were booty shorts, or "high rise" as they labeled them, and the skirts were all miniskirts. From Balenciaga to Zara, big name brands are hypersexualizing kids, knowingly or not.
It's shameful and needs to stop.
Skimpy kids clothes are old news
I walked away without buying anything, and with my kids still rocking their ankle-biting pants. This time they didn't complain. Parents can show designers and big brands they want a change by not buying into that nonsense and demanding more from retailers.