Victoria’s Secret, the women’s lingerie brand faltering in the #MeToo era, is also taking a hit from its most important employees: Models who say they’re fed up with its failure to protect women and girls from sexual harassment and abuse on the job.
More than 100 models, led by the Model Alliance, have signed an open letter to the company CEO calling on Victoria’s Secret to “take meaningful action to protect its talent and those who aspire to work with the company.”
Specifically, the models want the company to sign up for “The RESPECT Program,” a Model Alliance-designed anti-sexual harassment scheme that demands signatory companies require their employees, agents, vendors, photographers and other contractors to “follow a code of conduct that protects everyone’s safety on the job, and reduces models’ vulnerability to mistreatment.”
The letter to CEO John Mehas, posted online Tuesday, comes after weeks of media revelations about allegations of sexual assault, alleged rape and sex-trafficking of models and aspiring models, the petition says.
Even more poisonous is the recent news of the indictment and arrest of convicted sex offender and financier Jeffrey Epstein, a close friend of Leslie Wexner, the CEO of L Brands, Victoria’s Secret’s parent company. (A spokeswoman for Wexner told the New York Times that he “severed ties” with Epstein about a decade ago.)
“While these allegations may not have been aimed at Victoria’s Secret directly, it is clear that your company has a crucial role to play in remedying the situation,” the models’ letter says.
“From the headlines about (Epstein) to the allegations of sexual misconduct by photographers Timur Emek, David Bellemere, and Greg Kadel, it is deeply disturbing that these men appear to have leveraged their working relationships with Victoria’s Secret to lure and abuse vulnerable girls.
“These stories are gut-wrenching and hit close to home for many of us who have encountered these kinds of abuses that are too often tolerated in our industry,” the petition says.
