Activists in Canada are planning to picket Oprah for a highly unusual reason.
The Toronto Star reported Wednesday that the Canadian Foreskin Awareness Project, a group that opposes circumcision, has beef with Oprah after she endorsed SkinMedica's TNS Recovery Complex, an anti-aging cream that contains cells derived from human foreskin. Activists picketed her stops in Ottawa and Montreal earlier this week, and plan to protest in Hamilton on Saturday as well.
“How would Oprah respond if a skin cream for men hit the market that was made using cells from the genitalia of little girls?” Glen Callender, CFAP’s founder, told the Star. “I think she would be absolutely disgusted and appalled, and rightly so. So it’s crazy that she’s doing the opposite.”
In an interview with the Montreal Gazette, activist Jeremy Kung called on the media mogul to stop endorsing the product because it "perpetuates" circumcision. The group previously protested Oprah in Vancouver on January 24, carrying signs that "CIRCUMCISE OPRAH. SHE'LL 'BE CLEANER.'"
For its part, SkinMedica has said that the cream is made from cells derived from a single foreskin obtained twenty years ago.
Oprah featured the cream on her former daytime show, and has also endorsed it in interviews. The cream, which retails for $165 for less than ounce, claims to "improve the appearance of fine lines and wrinkles" and "enhance skin tone, texture and firmness." The website lists "Human Fibroblast Conditioned Media" among the cream's ingredients.