Something is off-color about new Sidibe magazine cover

The now infamous Sidibe 'Elle' cover and a shot from a premiere (courtesy of MSNBC)

Coming on the heels of Vanity Fair being called out for not including Precious star and Oscar nominee Gabourey Sidibe on its "Young Hollywood 2010" cover in March, the editors at Elle probably assumed that giving Sidibe one of its four coveted covers celebrating its 25th anniversary would only generate praise.

While the choice has been applauded, the actual cover has ignited a maelstrom of controversy. Right now, charges of skin lightening lead the long list of criticisms. Blogs have especially witnessed heavy traffic on the subject. One web page received more than 4,300 comments in a 24-hour period.

Magazines alter cover subjects all the time. Many African-American celebrities have looked noticeably lighter on the covers of mainstream magazines and in mainstream ads. Two years ago, Beyoncé's L'Oreal ads were at the center of the "skin whitening" controversy, prompting L'Oreal to issue a statement denying the charges.

Yet, in January 2009, the gossip site Bossip noted how the recent ads looked more like the actual Beyoncé than previous ones, providing a galley of images as proof.

In 2005, when I was in Johannesburg, I personally did not recognize Beyoncé in an L'Oreal billboard. To me, she looked like the Bollywood star Aishwarya Rai.

But skin color is not the only issue at play with Sidibe. Initially, many African-American blogs zoned in on her horrendous weave. Geneva S. Thomas at women's blog Clutch.com wrote: "The weave looks like an old used up brillo pad that has seen too many greasy pots and too many anti-humidity products."

At Dime Wars, another blog, it wasn't skin lightening or a piss poor weave that set them off. Most egregious to them was the shot itself. "When comparing the Elle covers celebrating other 25ish celebrities like Lauren Conrad, Megan Fox and Amanda Seyfriend," reads the post, "you see that the camera is zoomed in on Gabby Sidibe to make it appear that she covers the whole cover." The other covers show the entire bodies of the other skinnier subjects.

Regardless of which foul has you blowing the whistle, it's clear that there is definitely a certain aesthetic at play within the fashion industry. If beauty is in the eye of the beholder, as the old cliché goes, then what the fashion industry in particular beholds is no secret: Thin and white has always been in, with thin being more highly valued than whiteness.

But how do we combat such ingrained attitudes? Within corporate America, there are diversity programs and initiatives. Many photographers and fashion stylists and even editors these days are freelancers, however, not beholden to any company. So how does one regulate them? Does F.I.T. offer classes on ethnic perceptions of beauty? Are such classes even relevant when a slim standard of beauty seems to be at play throughout the world? Vogue India made headlines with its April 2010 cover by featuring a bevy of dark-skin Indian beauties on its cover. Sadly, that was a revolutionary act.

Magazines have risen to the occasion in the past. Naomi Campbell has rarely been lightened. Throughout her career, her dark skin has universally been celebrated.

Still, far too few photographers learn how to best shoot non-white people. There is an art to that as well. Certain types of lighting and even film and exposure levels capture darker hues best. Make-up also plays a role. It's only been a little over a decade that mainstream cosmetics companies have even begun offering lipsticks and eye shadows in hues that work well for people of color. So there are a lot of other reasons why people like Sidibe haven't often looked great on mainstream covers.

Weight is another major one. Campbell, for example, has never been weight-challenged so, on that level, she fits the mold. Sidibe doesn't and most women, regardless of hue, don't either. Models have certain requirements and being thin has traditionally been one of them. The reasoning has been that clothes look better on slight frames and, the point, in case anyone has missed it, especially for a fashion magazine, is to sell the clothes.

Elle has always been a fashion magazine first. Although it has regularly dotted its pages with cultural tidbits, it's still a fashion magazine. Still, unlike many others, Elle has long strived to represent a wider spectrum of beauty than many of its counterparts. Let us hope that the discussion generated from Sidibe's cover will not keep them from putting another non-model on the cover. Next time around, hopefully, they will enlist some "real women" experts who can help them present the next Sidibe in her best light.

Something is off-color about new Sidibe magazine cover