This model decided not to shave her legs. Now she's getting rape threats
Photographer and model Arvida Byström said she received rape threats and dozens of toxic messages after she appeared in a shoe advertisement for Adidas showing off her unshaved legs.
“My photo from the @adidasoriginals superstar campaign got a lot of nasty comments last week,” she said. “Literally I've been getting rape threats in my DM inbox.”
The advertising campaign, called “Adidas Originals,” calls on customers to reconsider what they think of as normal.
“Challenge the meaning of originality. Recreate your own cultural moments, remake the past your way,” the campaign’s website says.
The 15-second advertisement shows Byström modeling for the camera and showing off her legs while she talks about what it means to be feminine.
“I think femininity is usually created from our culture,” she says. “I think everybody can do feminine things, can be feminine, and I feel like in today’s society we’re very scared of that.”
The advertisement sparked a firestorm of online criticism. The YouTube video of the ad has more than 3,000 comments, many of them hostile.
“Will never buy Adidas again. Disgusting. Hello, Nike!,” wrote on commenter.
“Horrible! Burn it with fire!” wrote another.
People also took to Twitter to condemn her for her choice.
Model?! Arvida Byström, your hairy legs are so unwomanly, I doubt any man would make any serious sexual threat
— Londontown Investor (@LondontownMoney) October 6, 2017
https://t.co/sLnzyEvuW4
But it wasn’t all bad. Hundreds more rose to defend Byström and said it was completely natural for a woman to have leg hair. Others pointed out the double standard between men and women being expected to shave.
Imagine a world where women threatened to rape a man because he didn't shave...? No, I can't. #smashthepatriarchy https://t.co/CwyD7crewD
— Jennifer Garrett (@JMAGarrett) October 6, 2017
Arvida Byström is attacked foe being natural, revealing her true body, not the retouched version. This is what the world has become.
— Lise Berghagen (@TheWrongWoman) October 7, 2017
Byström has a history of challenging traditional ideas of sexuality and femininity. She is known for her part in creating the book “Pics or It Didn’t Happen,” in which she and another artist de-censored hundreds of Instagram photos that contained sexually explicit imagery.
Byström pointed out that the hateful comments she received may have been much worse had she been a minority.
“Me being such an abled, white, cis (identifying as female) body with its only nonconforming feature being a lil leg hair... can't even begin to imagine what it's like to not posses all these privileges and try to exist in the world,” she wrote. “Sending love and try to remember that not everybody has the same experiences being a person.”
Adidas has not made a statement regarding the controversy.
This story was originally published October 9, 2017 at 9:02 AM with the headline "This model decided not to shave her legs. Now she's getting rape threats."