more Patrick

There were lots of black models being featured in high fashion magazines in the 1980's.

Women all get objectified in high fashion, I don't mind that, high fashion is about certain sense of idealism of beauty and drama, but we are not talking about that, we are talking about job opportunities, and opportunities for exposure.

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Interesting and enlightening reading about a personal experience in the matters of what it is to be a black in the fashion industry .... but I cannot understand that bit about Naomi behaving the way she does because : "Naomi is a product of an industry that has overtly told her since she was a teenager that you are not as good nor as valuable as your white counterpart. You will always be less than and simply consider yourself lucky to be here."That is why Naomi is so very angry " This is why such a beautiful creature continues to behave in such an ugly way'"

REALLY ? I mean is this all officially recorded as to be used as FACTS ??? ... How can someone who is blessed by nature and fable like fortune assume the role of the ' POOR VICTIM ' in spite of having the status of being a glamourous SUPERMODEL , SUPER RICH, FAMOUS, treated like a SUPERSTAR , get away with murder as often as possible and then JUSTIFY her utterly poor and selfish attitude towards fellow humans who have absolutely nothing to do with her demons ? . What has NAOMI done in real life to help her fellow men who are a lot less blessed and cannot get such dreamlike opportunities ? ..... ACTIONS indeed speak louder that mere hollow words !
I have a great admiration for talented people like OPRAH because she is not walking around with a huge ship on her shoulder .... no I don't think NAOMI has much founded reasons to go around spitting and calling everyone who doesn't happen to bow to her to call them racists or be abusive just because she may simply wish to be treated as the Queen Bee ..... Queen Naomi ... and RACE has, in my opinion , absolutely nothing to do with it .... let's get real !

Galileo's Universe, you took my referral to the 'abstract revenge' posed by Naomi and ran a mile with it. Why should it be intended as a bitter recrimination against all white people, as opposed to those who find endless excuses to exclude ethnic models in campaigns and on runways? The photographer, I presume the conceiver of the idea, is himself white. I do agree, though that such a response, however liberating, may be shortsighted. And it certainly is unfortunate that an infantile, self-pitying and unjustifiably wealthy woman has appointed herself spokesperson for all disgruntled and genuinely neglected black models. However credible Malsirrah's indignation and fury, I actually think a little insiduousness, rather than screaming confrontation wins the day.

Many minorities in the US and UK, Indian and Bangladeshi, Chinese, Jewish and Italian, live by the credo of self-reliance and self-enlightenment above all. They refuse to claim victimage, form alliances amongst themselves in business, and stress strong family links and a collective, unbreakable sense of identity that does not yield so easily to fashionable tastes and opinions. They enjoy a sense of community and a place at the powerbroking table. Yet black people, often poorer and more fragmented as a collective, are far more widely represented in mainstream media: I haven't seen a model of Indian descent in a major fashion magazine since the days of Yasmeen Ghauri, no doubt in part due to the strong influence of religion.

It's painfully true that many young black people have never known the tutelage and worldly confidence that a responsible father can provide for his children, and thorny issues such as crime amongst black youth or higher levels of depression are routinely attributed to negligent governments or negation by the white majority rather than family instability or a divisive culture, things which seemingly overwhelm the Christian convictions of black Britons and Americans. Like many white working class kids, so many black kids pour their energies into pursuing success of a self-advertising kind in music or sport, drifting into unfulifilling jobs, if at all, when life defeats their bright hopes. Maybe Chinese and Indian kids in the UK, having almost no representation on the sports field, in movies or in the singles charts are blessed to be free of such a narcissistic pipe dream culture. Black success stories? Music moguls and urban clothing designers.

THere's Vogue India, Vogue China, Vogue Taiwan, perhaps for black people to create more opportunities in the modeling and fashion field is to have their own high fashion magazine, more Kimora Lee and Tyra Banks, who run businesses and call the shots.

Vogue India

I couldn't find any high fashion magazine such as Vogue based in South Africa, perhaps Naomi could do something about that.