Cosmetic Cartel: Beauty brand is blasted over outrageous video of staff ‘mocking disabled people AND abduction victims’ – but the owner says there’s an innocent explanation
An Australian beauty brand has been criticized for an ‘offensive’ video of staff mocking people with disabilities.
Cosmetic Cartel, based in Seaford Meadows in Adelaide’s southwest, quickly deleted the video after it sparked strong reactions on its Instagram page.
The video shows two women struggling to walk down a hallway with the caption: “When you work a late shift and don’t want to be kidnapped from the clinic to the car.”
Viewers branded the video ‘offensive’ and ‘scandalous’ and called on customers to ‘avoid’ the company.
Many said the video (photo) appeared to ridicule people with disabilities
“There’s nothing like mocking people with disabilities to promote your business,” one person said.
‘Yes, it’s scandalous. It’s not a child’s account; it is meant to be a professional company. They certainly do not promote equality and diversity practices, but rather mock them,” wrote a second.
A third wrote: ‘Often your own judgment about what they were trying to do here, but the fact that they removed all the negative comments from the video instead of apologizing for the mistake and removing it immediately speaks volumes.’
“Absolutely horrific mockery of people with disabilities for the sake of the content, without any responsibility or accountability for their actions,” said a fourth.
However, the business owner has denied claims that its employees were mocking people with disabilities, saying it was a zombie impersonation as part of a TikTok trend.
The beauty clinic owner said they were pretending to be zombies for a TikTok trend
‘The reel was a TikTok trend that makes funny zombie walks to avoid being kidnapped at night. It’s under #howtonotgetabducted,” the woman wrote.
‘I certainly did not make fun of people with disabilities and I do not discriminate against anyone.
‘I didn’t think people would see it as a person with a disability at all!
Sorry if I offended anyone. I definitely have a big heart and it makes me feel so sad that I upset people with my latest movie!
‘Although that was absolutely not the intention!’
Daily Mail Australia has contacted Cosmetic Cartel for comment.