D∆WN’s ‘Graphic’ PETA Billboard Lands in Detroit
Just in time for the fall shopping season, R&B superstar D∆WN bares it all for a new PETA billboard in Detroit. The stunning image shows skin being torn off her body next to the words “Leather Is a Rip-Off. That Leather Jacket or Upholstery Was Someone’s Skin.”
The billboard was rejected in Atlanta, Los Angeles, and D∆WN’s hometown of New Orleans for being too “graphic.” Detroit was brave enough to allow the message to be displayed—the billboard just went up by the M-8/Davison Freeway, near the I-75 exit.
In an exclusive video interview, D∆WN reveals the inspiration for the gruesome ad: “[A]nimals don’t have the ability to say how much pain they’re in or tell you not to rip their skin off for your ability to wear something.”
The advertising companies that rejected D∆WN’s ad told PETA, “It is the graphic photo! If you had a different image it may work,” and “It [is] due to the skin being ripped off the woman.”
But the ad’s image is no more graphic than the reality.
At slaughterhouses, cows killed for leather may be skinned and dismembered while still conscious—after they endure castration, tail-docking, and dehorning without painkillers. A recent PETA exposé of the world’s largest leather processor that has supplied retailers like H&M, Coach, J.Crew, Nine West, Adidas, and countless others also showed workers branding calves on the face and electroshocking and beating cows and bulls.
D∆WN is part of a growing list of celebrities—including Alicia Silverstone, Jhené Aiko, Eva Mendes, P!nk, Taraji P. Henson, and Penélope Cruz—who have bared it all to help PETA save animals and promote kinder wardrobe choices.
