Hugo Boss is one of Germany’s largest clothing companies. With global sales totaling over $3 billion, Hugo Boss’s high-end fashions are well-known across the world. Since the company’s founding, Hugo Boss has had controversial ties that continue to this day.
Recently, Boss posted this statement on its official, verified Weibo account: “Xinxiang’s long-stapled cotton is one of the best in the world . . . We believe top-quality raw materials will definitely show its value. We will continue to purchase and support Xinjiang cotton.”
Weibo is Communist China’s Twitter-like equivalent. So, it’s quite odd that Boss quickly deleted the comment, saying that the statement was “unauthorized.” They simultaneously posted a statement on their website saying that they never used Xinjiang cotton: “So far, HUGO BOSS has not procured any goods originating in the Xinjiang region from direct suppliers.”
So what’s happening here? One theory is that Boss is doing major damage control and distancing themselves from this Chinese cotton amid reports of forced Uyghur labor in the autonomous region. These allegations of Chinese Communist Party state-backed, coercive labor are nothing new.
Understanding this labor means understanding the Uyghurs. The Uyghurs are a Turkish-speaking, mostly Muslim minority residing in Far West China. According to Gardner Bovingdon, Uyghur historians viewed them as the original inhabitants of Xinjiang. The Chinese Communist Party disagrees; therefore, they are systematically exterminating the Uyghurs.
Men are imprisoned in concentration camps by the millions like Nazi Germany. The women are forced into sterilization, abortion or the unauthorized sale of their young children into Chinese Factory slave labor. Recent footage shows hundreds of Uyghur men, handcuffed, blindfolded and heads shaved, herded onto a train bound for a secret camp. Plain and simple, this is slavery.
Hugo Boss has a long, dark history as a Nazi sympathizer and slavery supporter. Sadly, this behavior appears to be continuing today.
When Hugo Ferdinand Boss started his business in 1924, most of his products were police uniforms. A specific timeline from that point is unclear, but it is factual to say that Boss joined Hitler’s National Socialist Party in 1931. In a 1934-1935 advertisement, Boss proudly claimed to be the “creator of Nazi uniforms since 1924.”
According to “Hugo Boss: Hitler’s Tailor” by Andrei Tapala, Boss made uniforms for several key Nazi party organizations. In fact, to keep up with wartime uniform demands, Boss capitalized on the labor of about 40 prisoners and about 150 slaves from the Baltic states, Belgium, France, Austria, Poland, and the USSR. Historians also indicated that Boss’s corporate directors were “in love with Nazism” and that Mr. Boss displayed a photo of himself with Hitler in his 1945 apartment.
This is the history of Nazi Germany repeating itself. This is the history of Hugo Boss repeating itself. We need brave journalists to look further into these stories and report the truth. Otherwise, history will continue to repeat itself. This is about much more than a nicely tailored suit. It is about the value of human life.
