BUT I'M I-TALIAN

When I happened upon the accompanying movie poster, I was reminded of a discussion that I was party to at a braai in Mitchell's Plain a few years ago. The Coloured hosts told me that during the dark days of Apartheid, many of their friends, particularly those of lighter complexion, would circumvent the Group Areas Act by passing themselves off as Italians.

For those of you that are not familiar with the Act, it was "an act of parliament created under the apartheid government of South Africa on 27th April 1950. The act assigned racial groups to different residential and business sections in urban areas in a system of urban apartheid." (Wikipedia)

In any event, the friends under discussion would say they were from Italy, or some other Mediterranean country, when confronted by members of the police force. This allowed them freedom to move in areas designated for whites. Not that the Afrikaner policemen loved the "I-ties" or "slimey Greeks", but they had no choice other than to tolerate "those" Europeans.

I was also told that many Coloured parents gave their children Italian or Mediterranean names to help them beat the system. That is why there are so many Luigi's, Carlo's and Sergio's running around Mitchell's Plain today. Now how is this relevant to the Miss SA pageant and pageants in general?

Anyone that has been following pageants for a while will recall that, in order to counter the criticism directed at the string of European looking Miss Universe and Miss World winners in the 50's and 60's, there was a tendency to favour Latina contestants for a win in the 70's and 80's. They were, after all, not too dark and not too fair, and should have appealed to most when searching for a universal definition of beauty.

Although we have had two blonde and two black Miss SA's in the past 10 years, the remaining six winners have either been Coloured (SA Latina?) or Mediterranean looking. One should also bear in mind that the CEO of Sun City and the Head Judge of the pageant are of Mediterranean origin.

The poster reminds me of what the black and white contestants would like to do to the organisers who are copping out by choosing the Mediterranean looking chick, whether deserved or not, as a winner.