Confused?  Don’t be.  I’m not a member of PETA – I eat meat by the pound and I’m wearing a chinchilla coat while writing this blog.  I AM, however, a member of PETSA, People for the Ethical Treatment of Stuffed Animals.  Maybe we PETSA’s are selfish because our association is really about our relationships with the animals.  You see, I have no personal tie to the random cow in field or the pig at the trough…. but I DO have major connection with Kermit The Frog!

Which is why my radar went off when I saw that Lady Gaga did an interview with a German tv show clad in this Kermit shawl, complete with Kermit head headband.  I don’t get it.  It certainly makes a statement but it’s pretty uncool to Kermie.  Gaga said “My friends and I in New York dress this way because it’s the way we live… I dress this way because my whole life is art, and my whole life is performance.”  Well, this frog fiasco is one ‘performance’ I don’t want tickets to.  She looks like an attention-whore and that’s about it.  To me, this isn’t fashion,  it isn’t creative, and it’s mean to the frog.  How do you think Miss Piggy feels, Lady Gaga!?!

Here’s the thing – Gaga is going after a look and the attention, but she is doing it wrong.  We’ve seen this before, but done well.  If you don’t remember anything that happened at the the 2001 Academy Awards (and let’s be honest, who does?), you probably still remember singer Bjork wearing her infamous swan dress.  While myself and the rest of the PETSA members did have some ruffled feathers (pun definitely intended) over this outfit, at least she did it right.  This dress was designed by Marjan Pejowski, the Macedonian designer who’s been successfully running his own fashion line since 2000.  The gown may be made out of a swan stuffed animal, but it is still tailored and sewn into the form of a flattering, form-fitting dress.

Lady Gaga is forgetting that the first goal of style is to actually look good… and then you can have fun and go wild with your fashion design.  See, she missed the first step – and it’s such an important step – looking good.  When Bjork wore the swan dress, she was photographed as much or more than anyone else attending the awards, and she grabbed the lion’s share of the attention on the red carpet.  She was there to perform her song, “I’ve Seen It All” from Dancer In The Dark which was nominated in the Best Original Song category, but the dress eclipsed that purpose.  What also makes her look work is that she could have cared less about the attention.  When asked about it, Bjork said “It was a joke. I find Hollywood dress sense very alienating. Obviously, I was sticking my tongue out at it.” Slightly different from Lady Gaga, who I believe has her fingers crossed under the Kermit shawl, hoping to make the cover of US Weekly in that catastrophy of an outfit.