One of our Roommates came across a listing on Zazzle.Com where four white women were modeling t-shirts with pro-black phrases such as “#BlackGirlMagic,” “Melanin & Coconut Oil & Hips & Magic” and a quote from #MaxineWaters proclaiming that she’s a strong black woman. When she reached out to the company, they pretty much explained that what she was viewing was a misunderstanding, but we’re still scratching our heads over here!
First of all, Zazzle told our Roommate that the designs in question “complies with the terms of our User Agreement.” The company also explained that designers select from a pool of modeling photos that are “pre-posed” and ” randomized.”
“In the case of ‘Black Girl Magic’ t-shirts on the Zazzle website, each designer is shown a series of pre-posed randomized model shots upon which their design is placed,” the statement reads. “It’s always possible that gender, race and other attributes of the model do not match up to the specifics of the design, given the ratio of our millions of designs to the 100 or so t-shirt styles we offer.”
If this is the case, then were there more black models? There was only one black woman who modeled one of the shirts, so somebody’s got some splainin’ to do.
TSR STAFF: Talia O. @theclosetratchet on IG, @tallyohhh on Twitter
