Flawed Beauty - Brazil

SEPTEMBER 2010

Brazil, home of sun, sea and catwalks! However as this challenging report shows beneath the glitz and glamour of Brazil's most famous export lies a darker world of racism and segregation.

Brazil has the second largest black population on Earth but an obsession with lighter-skinned models is putting darker Brazilians off modelling. Caroline and her friend Aline are aspiring models, eager for a life of glamour. But Aline is one of the only 10 people out of 200 at a modelling convention who would call themselves black. "There are more openings for white models", one model explains. "Brazil is hiding what it thinks is not beautiful enough." District Attorney Deborah Affonso says the problem is economics. Brands don't want people representing them who are "seen as having no spending power". However, a recent 8% increase in the catwalk quota agreement for black models is a step in the right direction to finding a "Brazilian beauty with a real Brazilian face."

Produced By SBS
Distributed By Journeyman Pictures

Category:

News & Politics

Tags:

• model
• brazil
• equality
• race
• women
• journeyman
• pictures
• news
• documentary
• current affairs
• journeyman pictures

[strainey123]

The fact is that Brazil has the world's best models, black, white, Asian Aline Nakashima example.

[rodrigomoratto]

I do think we should have more black models, but Brazilian models are exported which is why modeling agencies look for them. It has to do with profits not racism or anything like that. Plus thsi video talks about 50% of Brazilians being black. 42% actually of Brazilians looked mixed race. To call someone mixed of black is racist. Brazilian "blacks" are so mixed that Genetic studies point out that they have an average of 60% of European genes and some Indian. They should be called mixed thats it!

[Denisrs]

Brazilians: 42% mix people, 6% black people, 49% white people and 1%, indian natives/asiatics people.

The mix is accountable for a singular beauty and a pacific society (no religious or racism war in Brazil)

[MsChocolatesmoothie]

@tjconr2132 that isn't true and don't forget European men (and women) colonized the world and have forced their myopic beauty standards on every one for centuries so that right there is your answer

[froyokid]

@rodrigomoratto

NO THEY SHOULDN'T! IT'S RACISM AND YOU KNOW IT...BLACK AMERICANS ARE MIXED TOO AND YOU KNOW WHAT? THEY CALL THEMSELVES BLACK BECAUSE TO WHITE PEOPLE IT DOESN'T MATTER IF YOU ARE BLACK OR MIXED THEY'LL TREAT YOU LIKE CRAP ANYWAYS JUST LIKE THEY ARE TREATING THESE PEOPLE

[tjconr2132]

@forgottenmemories63  to an extent, yes. But few people would say that someone like Adriana Lima is not beautiful.

[forgottenmemories63]

@tjconr2132 Beauty is in the eye of the beholder :)

[forgottenmemories63]

Brazilian women are the sexiest :)

[tjconr2132]

@IndyCarDriver With the vast majority of people in the world being non-white, it is impossible to deny the fact that people of all races find whiteness more beautiful and appealing. This is obvious in Asia, for example.

[tjconr2132]

@nicoleblak OMG, have you seen her?? She is very European-looking. I wouldn't even call her mixed. For all you know, her grandmother was 1/4 African, lol. It's amazing to me how far people will go to claim a person is "black". The artist Romare Bearden, for instance, was extremely pale. The only African feature he had (according to photos) was a slightly big nose. People are also ignorant of the fact that many Europeans immigrated to South America as well. European IS white.

[CarbonbaCed]

lol, equal opportunity for models, You don't like it go to a different modeling agent. Those girls were ugly and the agent found the white one to be hot, its just a matter of what filters we see them through.

[CarlosAlbertosig]

@nicoleblak We are not americans, we don't think in one drop rule terms, Adriana Lima is mixed, I doubt she even considers herself black. And she must be like 15% black only.