Barbara McAuliffe says the language should not be on display in the window of Urban Outfitters, Tunbridge Wells. Picture: Barbara McAuliffe<\/p>\n
The cushion, which says \u201clive, laugh, f*** off\u201d was placed on the bottom shelf of the window display and stopped the 68-year-old in her tracks.<\/p>\n
The retired business owner said she was \u201csurprised\u201d to see the item at such low-level where children walking past would be able to see it and believed it was \u201cinsensitive\u201d in general to people who find that type of language offensive.<\/p>\n
The mum-of-one said: \u201cI think it\u2019s pushing the boundaries that little bit further. It\u2019s very irresponsible with regard for children and it was at child height.<\/p>\n
\u201cI know they [Urban Outfitters] are aiming at a younger audience, but it was the audience above and below that also can be offended and it\u2019s insensitive and inappropriate for children as well.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barbara McAuliffe took a picture of the cushion, which has been blurred by KentOnline, in the display window of Urban Outfitters. Picture: Barbara McAuliffe<\/p>\n
In response, Barbara and her husband went to speak with staff and explained they thought it was inappropriate to be in the window, given the writing was not censored.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s not what you would expect to see in a display for a high street retailer,\u201d she added.<\/p>\n
But when she spoke to staff Barbara, who has lived in Tunbridge Wells for 35 years, was told it was a \u201ccorporate design\u201d for the window and it couldn\u2019t be changed or covered up.<\/p>\n
After this interaction, the mum looked to submit a complaint on their website but couldn\u2019t find any dedicated section.<\/p>\n
Although Barbara says the use of expletives is more commonplace in today\u2019s world, she added: \u201cThere are still people who consider it a little bit offensive and insensitive.\u201d<\/p>\n
Barbara McAuliffe noticed the cushion had been moved towards the back of the store in Urban Outfitters on Wednesday, October 1. Picture: Barbara McAuliffe<\/p>\n
She says the word used to be considered as more offensive but that now we\u2019ve become more \u201cdesensitised\u201d to its use.<\/p>\n
The 68-year-old says, in her view, it would be acceptable to have the cushion inside the store, given that the target demographic is not children, but believes members of the public shouldn\u2019t have to see it \u201cin their face\u201d when walking on a main thoroughfare in Tunbridge Wells.<\/p>\n
Upon returning to the store on Wednesday, October 1, she discovered it had been removed from the display and moved inside the back of the store.<\/p>\n
Barbara added: \u201cI was pleased to see that the items had been removed from open public display and had at least been placed in a more discreet area to the rear of the store.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis then for me would raise a question as to the suitability of these items in the first place if it\u2019s necessary to place them in a less prominent area – but that\u2019s a different issue.<\/p>\n
\u201cHopefully they did receive more complaints and they took this action as a result. Personally I feel justified in making this complaint and achieving the outcome.\u201d<\/p>\n
Urban Outfitters said the concerns had been raised with its head office for review.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"A mum says it is \u201cirresponsible\u201d that a shop window displayed an uncensored cushion with the word f***…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":180128,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[5],"tags":[84,59,192,191,649,194,3867,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-180127","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-business","8":"tag-business","9":"tag-gb","10":"tag-human-interest","11":"tag-kent","12":"tag-quirky","13":"tag-syndicate","14":"tag-tunbridge-wells","15":"tag-uk","16":"tag-united-kingdom","17":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180127","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=180127"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/180127\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/180128"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=180127"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=180127"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=180127"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}