Thursday, November 7, 2013

The Backlash against Lululemon


Lululemon

A sports fashion clothing retail chain that includes, but is not limited to Yoga wear.

Of late, there appears to be a genuine backlash growing amongst the greater yoga community. The basic sentiment is that Lululemon is not an ethical company and is cynically leveraging off Yoga without demonstrating values that are aligned with the fundamental philosophy of the practice.

I've been of two minds about how I feel about this reaction. I'm not a great fan of the overt commercialisation of Yoga, but I have come to realise that I neither own nor control the word "yoga" nor what it stands for. The fact is, several years ago I got a formal teacher qualification and I am therefore allowed to call myself a "yoga teacher". At times calling myself such has really bugged me. For reasons that range from the stereo-type expectations of who I am and what it is I offer, to the genuine distaste I have of certain gurus and/or their particular systems of yoga -that have swept western culture like wildfire, soaking up a lot of money in the process.

My initial instinct regarding Lululemon is that it is a "business" that saw an opportunity and realised it. I have never seen that company as representative of anything but big business in the new age holistic fitness industry. I had a friend who used to perform Acro Yoga in one of their stores as a marketing ploy, and for doing so was gifted free clothing. Whether I think this is a useful representation of what Yoga is, at the end of the day, is irrelevant. As a libertarian my underlying attitude is that this was an agreement freely made by adults who both saw mutual benefits in the arrangement and my judgement is neither required or useful.

Lululemon sell clothes. They sell pretty and functional sports clothes. It seems like they are meeting a market requirement. while I don't think they represent Yoga in any sincere sense of the word, I'm not really sure where the depth of hostility towards the company is really coming from. I don't see that as a clothing company they are interfering with anyone else's Yoga "business". There seems to be this idea that lululemon has the power to alter peoples consciousness and divert them from the "true message" of Yoga. In my opinion I think that is an overreach. Anyone who's yoga practice is primarily defined by the brand of clothing they wear can't really blame a company who is ready to exploit their vanity, as the cause of their shallow yogic perceptions. All though it may be tempting, when it comes to our capacity to think for ourselves, that responsibility falls to each and every one of us as individuals.

Lastly, and I'm just going to say this. Fashion is part of human culture. For better or worse, it has deeply found it's way into Yoga, I mean seriously, the sheer volume of high-fashion yoga-asana photo's that roll past my fb newsfeed everyday is massive. These photo's are very much used with a commercial imperative to catch eyes; improve hits; and gain subscriptions; followers etc. Again, I've realised it is not my place to judge, I don't own Yoga, but I am free to define and evolve it in the way that feels truest to me, and especially of late, I do so without really giving a damn about what anyone else thinks. Surely, therefore I am obliged to return that favour lest I call myself a hypocrite?!?

So bottom line, as far as I'm concerned Lululemon can keep doing what they do, I'm never going to buy anything from one of their stores. Surely that in itself is all I need to say on the matter.
 

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