One shopper posted a photo on Reddit.com a social news website, of the shirt on a mannequin with a neon green note attached to it with the message: “SMART girls are cool. Don’t buy this top.”
Many comments on Reddit.com expressed disdain for the shirt.
“It’s a big deal because there is still this childish perception — among females AND males – that girls can’t do math,” wrote a commenter by the handle mikgyver. “I can’t tell you how many times, as a girl who’s good at math, that I’ve been accused of ‘trying to be a guy’ when I get good grades in math.”
Another commenter, called “kadhai” and self-identified as a “student of mathematics,” wrote, “I’m curious as to what the story behind this top is, and who thought it would be a good idea to put something so offensive as this on a shirt.”
“Our merchandise is intended to appeal to all audiences, not to offend them,” Linda Chang, a senior marketing manager for Forever 21, told ABCNews.com in a statement. “We would like to apologize to our customers as our intent was not to discredit education and we are taking the proper actions necessary.”
The company told ABCNews.com that it is pulling the shirt from its website.
The trendy, Los Angeles-based retailer is popular among teenagers and the shirt is being sold for $12.80. There were no shirts that alluded to education in the men’s section of the website.
And the algebra shirt isn’t the only one on the website that seems to be down on school.
One shirt blatantly declares “Skool sucks” and another shirt has a list on the front that reads: “A+=amazing, B=brilliant, C=cool, D=delightful, F=fabulous.” The website’s tagline for selling the shirt is “F doesn’t always mean fail!”