Did LUSH go too far?

At the end of April, LUSH held a graphic performance against animal testing at their Regent Street store. I haven't posted about until now because I wanted to really analyze my thoughts about it.

LUSH used their store window to perform experiments which animals go through on a daily basis, on a 24 year old performance artist, Jacqueline.

First of all, I will post a link to the Daily Mail website showing you what took place, but PLEASE BE WARNED, THIS ARTICLE IS EXTREMELY GRAPHIC FROM THE START AND MAYBE UPSETTING. 

I have studied animal welfare and know full well the extent of suffering that animal testing causes.

I love LUSH and their products but I still can't help but be undecided on their latest campaign strategy.

Obviously I don't like animal testing and buy cruelty free products when and where I can. I respect that LUSH has pushed boundaries and exposed the world of animal testing to those who wouldn't usually think about it.

However I can't help but feel they went too far with this performance. What if a child had seen this? Apparently staff did guide families away. I think the thing that has pissed me off most is LUSH's response which can be read here.

Taken from the above article -

"It was a performance of violence (not violence against women) where – unsurprisingly – the oppressor was male and the abused was vulnerable and scared.

We felt it was important, strong, well and thoroughly considered that the test subject was a woman. This is important within the context of Lush’s wider Fighting Animal Testing campaign, which challenges consumers of cosmetics to feel, to think and to demand that the cosmetics industry is animal cruelty free. It is also important in the context Jacqui’s performance practice: a public art intervention about the nature of power and abuse. It would have been disingenuous at best to have pretended that a male subject could represent such systemic abuse."

I didn't bat an eyelid about the performance being a man performing experiments on a woman. Now I feel as if they're trying to make it into another argument about sexuality, instead of animal testing and that's what makes me miffed.

Regardless of how I think though, I do hope it's made people question about where their shopping comes from and how it's made. They're are some great websites out their if you want to see how to get cruelty free shopping such as http://www.uncaged.co.uk/crueltyfree.htm  

Or you can sign the EU petition  http://www.fightinganimaltesting.com/sign-the-petition/