Blackhair Magazine Just Put a White Model on Its Cover

Cultural appropriation is a hugely sensitive issue—especially in the beauty industry where creativity walks a fine line. The latest offender is Blackhair Magazine who mistakenly featured a white model rocking an afro on its cover.

As the name suggests, Blackhair Magazine is known for great hair game among black and mixed-race women, which is why it was so weird when white model Emily Bador showed up on their cover. When Bador saw the cover, she spoke out immediately on Instagram. “I would deeply and sincerely like to apologise [sic] to every one for this, and black women especially,” she said in her post. “I would like to clarify, I believe this shoot is from when I was around 15 and didn't understand cultural appropriation or the impact it has on POC.”

According to her post, the image of the white model, which was taken a few years ago, was used without her permission and she had no idea that anyone would promote it as black hair goals. Still, she apologized for having ever condoned the styling of the shoot in the first place. “I didn't understand that shoots like this support the very Eurocentric beauty standard that the mainstream media focus on which reinforce the idea that black features are only ok on white women,” she said.

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Blackhair Magazine responded in a Facebook post following Bador’s apology, thanking the model for bringing the huge oversight to their attention. “We were obviously not aware of this prior to selecting the image,” the magazine posted. We often ask PR companies/salons to submit images for the magazine, specifically stating that models must be Black or mixed race. We can only take their word for it, and of course, try to use our own judgment.”

Ultimately, this isn’t a blame game, but this type of blatant cultural appropriation is still happening and the beauty industry often fails to give credit where it’s due. Here’s to making some much-needed strides in 2017.

Now, watch model Lula get a curly afro pixie cut: