The Devil Wears Marital Disunion

Reformation’s latest clothing collection is premised on the idea that divorce needs to be destigmatized. It doesn’t.

Laura Wasser models a sweatshirt from the Divorce Collection. www.thereformation.com

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“Sustainable” fashion brand Reformation’s latest collection comes with a terrible message: Leave your spouse.

The Divorce Collection is an about-face for Los Angeles-based Reformation. One of its most recent collections was “boyfriend”-themed, with a campaign starring actor Pete Davidson. “Things change,” Reformation explained in a press release. “We’re just ready to move on, get back out there, feel sexy again.”

Reformation has many fans, especially among young women. It has 2.5 million followers on Instagram. One item in this new collection stands out: a gray sweatshirt bluntly imploring the wearer, “Dump him.” It may be an admission against interest, if not for me, then at least for my sex, to allow that this might be good advice for some women about some men. And at the right time. Say, before marriage vows are exchanged.

There’s ostensibly a charitable motive for the collection. Sale proceeds will go to legal services for women in tough domestic situations. These are real and sad.

I’m not much of a fashionista. So I’m ill-equipped to comment on the aesthetics of the line. But that doesn’t make the message of this collection better. It’s premised on a casual elision between relationships and marriage, one that makes them seemingly interchangeable. To the extent it offers a distinct gloss on marriage, it’s the modern, pleasure-focused, self-centered version. The collection is “all about moving into a sexier chapter of your life, on your own terms.”

Reformation has made Hollywood divorce lawyer Laura Wasser the “face” of this new collection. Ms. Wasser has worked with Britney Spears, Kim Kardashian and Angelina Jolie on their divorce proceedings. Though Ms. Wasser and Ms. Jolie had a separation of their own: In 2018, Ms. Jolie stopped using her as counsel in her divorce with Brad Pitt. The collection, per Variety, aligns with “Wasser’s broader mission to destigmatize divorce and remind clients ‘that you’re never married to one decision.’ ”

If the goal of Ms. Wasser and this collection is to “destigmatize divorce,” then it’s time to declare mission accomplished. No-fault divorce is legal in all 50 states and the District of Columbia. Eighty percent of Americans consider it morally acceptable. The divorce rate has declined from its 1980 peak. But around 40% of marriages still end in divorce.

Divorce is doing fine, though society isn’t. Treating marriage as just another “decision” weakens what must be a strong institution. Family breakdown has real consequences. Especially for children. We shouldn’t need studies to prove that parental separation hurts their kids, but the data are out there for anyone who doubts it.

Wealthy celebrities of the sort Ms. Wasser represents can try to soothe some of the pains with mounds of cash. Those of lesser means are worse off. Yet that’s precisely the group now likelier to divorce.

Ms. Wasser’s clientele aside, the well-to-do tend to produce stabler families—even as they promote divorce as a solution to those less prepared to weather the consequences. As sociologist Charles Murray wrote in “Coming Apart,” our elites, though personally successful, “have abdicated their responsibility to set and promulgate the standards” that can bring success to others.

The Divorce Collection may only be a line of clothing. But the mindset behind it is making society worse. You don’t have to know much about fashion to realize that’s unsustainable.

Mr. Butler is deputy editor of Free Expression.