The front covers and faces on world-famous magazines have changed drastically over the past 20 years. What I mean to say is simply this: magazine covers a few decades back were the exclusive domain of caucasian faces.
But nowadays it’s increasingly common to see a much more diverse selection of faces. Beyoncé, Naomi Campbell, Zendaya and many others are all on covers of Vogue or Elle and it is empowering to start seeing women of colour on such powerful glossy pages and it was much awaited.
There is more variety now and we are not just seeing the same type of people on the covers these days. Although there is a fine line between trying to promote an idea genuinely and just doing it to jump on the bandwagon. With the transformation of culture throughout time and history, one would think that race is a topic that should not matter but unfortunately it still does, and you know this when you see titles like “25 Black Females Firsts”.
On a similar note, it is the same with the whole LGBTQ community. There are parades and headlines to emphasise on things like equality and acceptance when it just boils down to a human being falling in love with another human being. It ultimately is the matter of doing something and overdoing something.
I personally believe that there is no need to commercialise love or people of colour or shape and so on and so forth. Diversity and inclusion and equality are causes that should be fought for, the same way it was years back. It should not be given the value of numbers and be sold in the process as this completely defies the purpose of promoting it.
With today’s progressive world, one should not have to make a selection process to display the incorporation of diversity in the workplace or in a particular industry. It is something that people just should subconsciously think of and do not feel the need to advertise it and market it. Having women of colour or different shapes on magazine covers is a revolutionising concept as long as it does not go to the lengths of commercialisation and does not look like a staged effort to promote an idea that should be inevitable in today’s society. The whole effort and purpose will start to look perfunctory and the whole purpose of magazines is to shape a certain culture and its main aim is not to exploit it and make profits.
What do you think? Let us know in the comments.
