Design by Ingrid Frahm
There’s something powerful about wearing a message on a T-shirt; something vulnerable about putting it on your body. You’ve committed to your message, and it’s there in plain sight across your chest for everyone to see.
Feminist activists have been using T-shirts to challenge a culture that denies women and others their basic rights for decades and to keep pushing social justice movements themselves to be more inclusive. In the same way that posting a feminist or anti-racist meme on social media is not a substitute for the hard work of political organizing and action, there’s certainly a limit to the T-shirt’s political power. Without any further activism behind it, a T-shirt is just cotton fabric. Yet, fashion, like social media, can increase visibility, which in turn can make a political message more accessible and approachable, and more widely seen, forcing itself into the cultural conversation.