In the wake of Rhea Chakraborty being grilled in actor Sushant Singh Rajput’s death case, numerous celebrities, including Bollywood actors, have been sharing a quote on Instagram lately — “Roses are red/Violets are blue/Let’s smash patriarchy/ Me and you.” The quote is from a t-shirt Rhea Chakraborty was recently seen in. Since then, these strong words have been creating a storm on social media.
The t-shirt originally found it’s place as part of an awareness campaign on menstrual hygiene, by a social initiative called GiveHer5, in partnership with The Souled Store, a clothing company.
The #RosesAreRed campaign was first put to life in 2018 to raise awareness on gender equality, Shivani Swamy, project manager, GiveHer5, told indianexpress.com. “The Souled Store reached out to GiveHer5 as we had been working on educating and providing women and girls in rural India with safe and sustainable menstrual hygiene knowledge and solutions since early 2017. For every T-Shirt sold, one menstruator’s needs for an entire year are taken care of. The campaign did very well at the time, then grew to its natural conclusion,” she shared.
With the words on the t-shirt becoming popular once again, people have been reaching out to reinitiate the campaign, Swamy said, motivating the team to relaunch it, along with the t-shirt. “The Souled Store also received such requests and so we decided to take it (t-shirt) live again. Within 24 hours of the t-shirt going live again, about 60 of them were sold.” As part of the campaign, for every t-shirt sold, one girl from rural India will be provided sanitary napkins for a year.
Apart from the ‘Roses are Red’ t-shirt, GiveHer5 had also initiated campaigns with other slogans. “People also reached out asking for those quotes and poems that got the most traction at that time. Some people even reached out asking if they could donate directly to the cause,” Swamy stated.
To take the social cause forward, GiverHer5 plans to launch a user-generated activity, encouraging people to send in fresh pieces of artwork and illustrations on women’s issues. “We will feature the best submissions on a new line of merchandise that will further help drive our fundraising efforts and also feature them on our social media to help push the narrative of Period Positivity forward,” Swamy expressed.
The t-shirt is being sold online at Rs 599.