Company Pulls Sexy 'Red Maiden' Costume After Getting Slammed By 'Handmaid's Tale' Fans
DENVER (CBSLocal) — An online clothing company has pulled a Halloween costume from its website after being criticized on social media. Yandy.com sold the costume that it described as the "Yandy Brave Red Maiden Costume."
It's a much more revealing version of the outfit worn by women subjugated by the authoritarian government in the dystopian Hulu series "The Handmaid's Tale."
The description of the costume read: "An upsetting dystopian future has emerged where women no longer have a say. However, we say be bold and speak your mind in this exclusive Brave Red Maiden costume."
Fans of the series found the sexy costume disturbing and distasteful.
"We're now beyond satire. 'Sexy' 'Handmaid's Tale' outfit. There's nothing like fighting the patriarchy by sexualizing a show about misogyny and rape," one person tweeted.
"Wait. Is this … sexy handmaid? This is so far from the point I can't even," someone else tweeted.
"I'm dressing up as existential despair this Halloween," another wrote.
"Our society doesn't take the rape of real women seriously, why should they take the rape of fictional women seriously?" another person tweeted.
"I can't decide if this misses the point of The Handmaid's Tale, or encapsulates it completely," another tweeted.
"Dressing up in the handmaid's signature red capes has become a symbol of women's resistance in the real world in recent months," TIME reported.
Protesters with Demand Justice dressed as handmaids stood outside Brett Kavanaugh's confirmation hearing room on Capitol Hill earlier this month. They were protesting his views on abortion.
Yandy.com released a statement to its Twitter page following the backlash.
"Over the last few hours, it has become obvious that our 'Yandy Brave Red Maiden Costume' is being seen as a symbol of women's oppression, rather than an expression of women's empowerment," the statement read.
