In the roughly eight years since it burst onto the global e-commerce scene, the uber-cheap fast fashion marketplace Shein has been accused of everything from stealing designs and requiring exploitatively grueling shifts to forcing China’s Uyghur minority to work at its facilities, and even working with suppliers that used child labor.
Now, the Chinese-founded and Singapore-based online megaretailer is again under scrutiny due to a product listing whose model looks a lot like Luigi Mangione, the 20-something alleged assassin of United HealthCare CEO Brian Thompson last December.
First spotted and tweeted out by Pop Crave, a massively popular X account that has become something of a news wire for the social media set, the fast fashion site’s use of Mangione’s likeness led to immediate derision online.
“Seriously,” remarked Tarence Ray of the “Trillbillies” podcast in a post on X, “how is this guy supposed to get a fair trial at this point[?]”
“Prison industrial complex meets fast fashion industrial complex,” bemoaned Megan Hunt, a state senator from Nebraska, in another X post. “So bleak. I hope he sues them.”
Beyond the well-deserved chiding, many suggested that the beloved alleged murderer’s face had been placed in the ad using AI tech. If that’s the case, it unfortunately wouldn’t be the first time Mangione’s case has intersected with the tech: in the wake of his capture last year, people online began making chatbots based on him, including ones that called for the murder of more CEOs.
One thing’s for sure: the real Mangione definitely didn’t sit for a photoshoot, because he’s currently awaiting trial in the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn, New York.
As another X user noted, it’s bad enough that someone’s “face can be used, without consent, to promote products that [they’ve] never even touched thanks” to AI, but also that whoever made the product photo used the “image of an incarcerated individual who has already lost all autonomy,” is darker still.
Yet another X user posted one of the most salient points of the whole scandal: that a “multi-million dollar fast fashion company [is] using the face of an anti-elite individual to model their products through AI,” which is an affront indeed.
In a statement to Newsweek after the image went viral, a representative from Shein claimed that the “image in question was provided by a third-party vendor and was removed immediately upon discovery.”
“We have stringent standards for all listings on our platform,” the Shein statement continued. “We are conducting a thorough investigation, strengthening our monitoring processes, and will take appropriate action against the vendor in line with our policies.”
As an archived version of the product page shows, the item — sold by a brand called “Manfinity” — is described in the inscrutable patois of fast fashion: “Men’s New Spring/Summer Short Sleeve Blue Ditsy Floral White Shirt, Pastoral Style Gentleman Shirt For Everyday Wear, Family Matching Mommy And Me (3 Pieces Are Sold Separately.)”
Whether Manfinity was the “third-party vendor” behind the since-kiboshed product image, we can’t be sure — though we’ve emailed the brand just to check.
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