Why do otherwise smart women watch “America’s Next Top Model”? Does the excitement of manufactured drama, artificial suspense, and/or a subconscious wish to be “super” models themselves override their perception of and threshold for offense?
Dating a fan of A.N.T.M. has compelled me to endure several episodes of its garbage. At first, I was reluctant to watch not only because there was usually a basketball game on at the same time, but also because my macho sensibilities prohibit me from watching near an hour of make-up, gay hairdressers, and repetitive, inevitable crying without putting up a fight.
Shortly into my first experience with the show, I was not annoyed at how quickly some virtually non-existent problem escalated into a catty argument like I had expected. Instead, I was appalled at a racist comment made by one of the stylists, make-up artists, hair boys, or whatever he is. Homeboy had the nerve to instruct one of the contestants, “Don’t get ghetto in the face!” (Wtf?!) I wondered aloud how could homey feel comfortable saying that nonsense on a show with a black head, before I remembered that the fashion modeling is a very racially biased profession in the first place.
Some Black women I know were mad at Kelly from Season 3 for complaining that she didn’t like her profile because her lips made her look like “a monkey.” I didn’t quite share their venom towards her, since Kelly’s essential concern was warranted. Regular, “monkey-mouthed” black chicks usually aren’t welcome and don’t belong on runways in Milan. Big lips, hips, plump booties, and broad noses are not couture. Her comment was shameful, but highlighted her intuitive knowledge that features too “Negroid” might cancel her bid for the top model crown.
Why she, the chick some people referred to as “dumb,” could recognize that the modeling profession is unfriendly to sistahs, while other sistahs can’t, is beyond me. Worse yet, many sistahs do recognize that high fashion does not represent them, yet still watch this program, which reinforces a white aesthetic ideal. Don’t gimme dat sh*t about light-skinned, light-eyed, rail-skinny Eva won! Don’t gimme sh*t about there have been black super models either! So what?! They are the exceptions, not the rule. More importantly, they collectively do nothing to expand their industry’s or their audience’s fundamental perception of what “beautiful” is. Beyond that, most black runway models that I’ve seen are ugly! (Yeah I said it! Now what?!) Sure, Naomi, Tyra, and Eva herself are gorgeous, but I’m confident a lot of others get gigs, just so that designers can accentuate how pretty the anorexic, white chicks they walk next to are.
In all fairness, I too certainly enjoy some things that are in discord with my politics. Lord knows my love for the Geto Boys and Too Short don’t coincide well with my clamor over ubiquitous misogyny. The thing that irks me about A.N.T.M. is its evil genius. Geto Boys ‘n ‘em were just uneducated, hood niggas wit’ mics, while A.N.T.M. seems like it is has been conceived by The Man himself. Think about it: a show where some people make a group of women feel like sh*t, so that they themselves can go and make women in the general public feel like sh*t subsequently. Now that’s spooky.
(Whistling “The Twilight Zone” music, while slowly looking over both shoulders.)
Tyra Banks and crew place some of the most overzealous, young women in a myriad of absurd situations, which they would probably never encounter on the path to becoming a model outside of the program, then happily belittle the candidates for not performing well under ridiculous circumstances. (Hey! Kinda like pledging a fraternity! At least my big brothers had the decency not to photograph me when…well they actually did, so nevermind.) The reward for taking, what Big Sistah Banks and her marshals think is, enough good pictures, while posing nude with snakes, or bouncing on a freakin’ trampoline, or after running up a gotdam skyscraper, is a guarantee that the winner will get the opportunity to shoot regular women’s confidence to hell, just like Big Sistah You Ain’t Sh*t ‘n ‘em did her. (Again, just like pledging!)
The winner of A.N.T.M. will naturally get deals to promote various products through magazines, television, and other means. Unlike what sellouts claim about rap, there is actually hard evidence that such advertisements have a harmful effect on their female audiences. How many studies have they done where a perfectly sane woman feels fine about herself before, then looks at Cosmo and wants to force her hand down her throat afterwards? How many stinkin’ times do feminists have to warn us that fashion advertising contributes to anorexia and bulimia? (You’re a fat bitch! Go throw up! Look at me, I’m six inches taller than you, but only weigh 99 pounds with a sweater on. And that’s after eating a garden salad, you pig!)
With its bigoted undertones and insidious messages to young women, both of which I only scratch the surface of here, I would expect at least a touch of outrage from educated women, at least as much as my favorite video, “Tip Drill.” Some students at Harvard want to block Snoop from performing there this semester, where they at to scream down A.N.T.M.? Where are the dang Spelman girls to turn down UPN’s and Tyra Bank’s money for some worthy cause? Why no Essence conference? Nothing! Where are the authorities to arrest Tyra and her staff for hazing?
Am I really the only one that sees a problem with this program? (Sulking, looking for a teddy bear.)
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
At first, I didn’t understand your initial beef with the very popular show but after looking at it with a critical eye, I can’t help but agree with your sentiments. Yes, I’ve always admitted that ANTM contributes to the destructive and unrealistic messages that women absorb about beauty and body image. What occurred to me while reading your piece, though, is that ANTM is even more detrimental to black women than any Cosmo magazine because it has Tyra’s seal of approval. As Black women, we can usually overlook (externally at least) the images of food-deprived white women that grace every magazine cover and just chalk it up to the fact that white men control media. But in spite of Tyra’s many attempts to express her contributions to the modeling industry because of being considered beautiful in spite of her (regular) Black woman shape (ain’t nothin that special from what I can tell), she still perpetuates the white man’s standard by looking at pale and underweight white girls and finding “beauty” in them too. Even having a show that places Black women in an aesthetic contest with white women is starting to sound ludicrous. I just want to thank you for your insight, one of the few pieces out today that made me think critically. ~Leader of the Blacks.
hey — i appreciate the beef, but i’m one with ANTM. The interest boils down to one easily arguable phrase: girls.are.silly. As Earth, Wind and Fire says “We like to dress up, be cool, look pretty, on ego trips.” That makes ANTM fun to watch. Plain and simple as that
Nah my friend, there is a problem with the show. Yes ANTM is fun to watch we like to see drama and females acting catty so folks are going to watch the show to see what all the talk is about. Truthfully even though Tyra clams to be a “sistah” I dont think this show is for my folsk. They just threw in a couple of sistah’s in the mix for the drama so she don’t get called out. Im still waiting to see a real sistah to win, one with the big lip, wide nose, thick booty and nappy hair to hold it down. But then again the sistah’s are just there to bring in the ratings.
i was kinda sad when they brought in the 2 hood bitches this season. i felt like they included them JUST SO they can prove the point that you can take a bitch out the ghetto… [u finish the rest]. i was embarassed for them. as far as them perpetuating the european standard of beauty, well… i can’t really cosign. at 110lbs after bearing TWO (count em, niggas) children, some women are just meant to be slim *shrugs*. all ANTM makes me want to be is taller… and i’ve felt like since i wear an 8.5 shoe i was supposed to be 5′6″ at the very least.
you are completely right about this show. i was rooting for yaya last season simply because she was the closest thing to what black women look like. eva is the typical racially ambiguous type that seems to be in favor among blacks & whites alike. don’t expect any flack from Tyra, after all she got a nose job b/c it was “too African.” why do i watch? i don’t know.
This show is not about black and white unfortunetly. I am a black women who is always looking to pull a race card on every situation, but here it’s not the case. The little white girls thats on the show get verbally abused as much as the white and for those that watch know, Tyra sticks up for over-sized, black,white,ugly. Does she have influence from the white-man, sure. We don’t own the network from which she distributes her show that I know of. Fashion is fashion black,white. If you don’t fill out an application to get on the show, then you won’t get picked to be on the show. Two ghetto girls filled out their applications and got on the show, simple as that. They made bad examples of themselves no one else. Fashion is cruel to all. It doesn’t matter.
The only thing that I’ll never quite understand is why White women constantly win this show (which is something that most people here have also wondered). I’m surprised that Tyra would not rally a little more for the women with darker skin, darker eyes, & fuller lips. She claimed that she went through the same trials and tribulations when she first got into the modeling industry. She said that people joked about her nose, mouth, & body (saying that she was “too black”)..& this was coming from a light-skinned black woman, with naturally light hair, & green eyes. It makes me angry to know that people in this country are constantly sent negative messages about black people in the media. Psychological studies have proven that we are highly influenced by certain materials (if we’re exposed to it for a long enough period of time). The thousands of years of biggotry in the USA have made many black women subconsciously feel as though we are not quite “good enough.” Blondes (no matter how attractive or unattractive they may look) are seen as “perfection, innocence, & beauty”..White women are usually given the benefit of the doubt in most situations (in comparison to any other minority group)..and black women are constantly used as the butts of jokes in various predominately-White comedies. For example, did anyone here see the Sureal Life? Whenever Janice Dickenson would do something evil (like refer to a “special person” as RAINMAN), the American public would seem to find a way to justify her behavior. They claimed that she may be mentally unstable because of her rough childhood. However, no one really paid attention to the rough background that Omarosa also came from. The producers of the Surreal Life also failed to mention the fact that (in spite of her difficult surroundings) she graduated from Harvard University. They also failed to mention that fact about Traci Bingham (the 1st black woman who was a regular on Baywatch). She also graduated from Harvard. But the show painted her as “the conceited airhead.” I also noticed that (as far as Janice Dickenson being mentally unstable goes) America seems to have a tendency to quickly diagnose more White people as having disorders..to explain any behavior that is a deviation from the norm. And of course, that’s when it’s “tragic.” However, whenever a black person behaves in an odd, violent, or irrational manner..he/she is seen as simply being “a typical product of his/her culture.”