She says it promotes violence against women. Similar shirts have sparked controversy elsewhere.
The T-shirt was marked down from $18 to $9.99, but that didn't diminish its message.
In the first panel, a stick figure man watches a stick figure woman with "shout" lines streaming from her mouth.
"Problem," it says beneath the scene.
In the second panel, the man's arm is extended and the woman has been knocked out of the panel.
"Solved," it says.
Renee McPheeters was shocked Sunday when she saw the shirt on sale at Belk in the Crystal River Mall. She thinks the message promotes violence against women.
"Women need to be on the alert," she said. "They need to protect their rights."
So she took action.
McPheeters bought a shirt, kept the receipts and called her lawyer. He told her that Belk had the right to sell the shirt, and she had the right to object.
She started to call different media outlets. WESH-Ch. 2, the NBC affiliate in Orlando, aired a story about it this week.
On Thursday, a Citrus Times reporter could not find the shirt in Belk. The Crystal River store manager and representatives from Belk's North Carolina headquarters were unavailable for comment.
McPheeters saw the shirt while shopping with her mother. She had started a conversation with a Belk's saleswoman, and they began chatting about politics.
"I was telling her about how I thought women needed to get more involved," McPheeters said. "And she said there was a certain thing in the store that made her really angry."
She showed McPheeters the shirt. When McPheeters confronted a store manager about the shirt, she was told that all purchasing decisions were made by regional headquarters, not individual stores.
McPheeters said she will meet today with Diana McIntosh, executive director of the Citrus County Abuse Shelter Association, to discuss the shirt and what else can be done.
According to news accounts, shirts with the same message sparked controversy in December in Augusta, Maine, and in January in Toledo, Ohio.
Times Staff Writer Barbara Behrendt contributed to this story. Elena Lesley can be reached at
or 564-3627.
