Oops, Urban Outfitters has done it again. The clothing store – known for selling controversial items like medical-themed drinking products – recently discontinued a T-shirt featuring a pitchfork design similar to that used by the well-known and ‘vicious’ Chicago gang The Gangster Disciples.
According to The Huffington Post, the company discontinued its $32 “Vanguard Pitchfork Tee” after learning through the media about the design’s resemblance to the gang sign.
“Urban Outfitters had no prior knowledge of this symbol’s affiliation when we purchased the t-shirt from the designer,” Public Relations Manager Crystal Carroll wrote in an email to the Post. “It was never meant to offend nor promote gang violence.”
An opinion editorial about the gang that appeared in the Chicago Tribune noted that “the GDs have a long history of vicious criminality. They are believed to account for a significant fraction of Chicago homicides. Two alleged members have been charged in the fatal shooting of 15-year-old honor student Hadiya Pendleton.”
In fact, Sen. Mark Kirk (R-Ill.) recently called for the mass arrest of the gang’s 18,000 members, according to the Tribune. The U.K.’s Daily Mail also claims that according to police estimates as many as 100 of the city’s 392 homicide victims last year are connected to the gang.
The senator’s comments aroused criticism from other Illinois congressmen including Rep. Bobby Rush (D-Ill.) who told the Chicago Sun-Times that the Kirk’s proposal was a “headline-grabbing, empty, simplistic” and “upper-middle-class, elitist white boy solution to a problem he knows nothing about.”
In the past, the clothing outlet was criticized by the Anti-Defamation League for advertising a t-shirt online that featured a symbol resembling the Star of David on the front pocket. It also came out with multiple anti-Mitt Romney t-shirts during the 2012 presidential campaign.
