Huh? 'Women of Color' story in Utah Magazine Features only White Women

Utah Valley Magazine

Insensitive Mistake Causes Uproar

If a magazine touted a "Women of Color" headline, you'd assume the accompanying story and photos would include at least a few ladies of various ethnic backgrounds, right? Not according to Utah Valley Magazine, which ran a story of the same title...but failed to feature a single non-Caucasian woman in the photo.

Instead of pleading colorblind, the magazine's editor, Jeanette Bennett, plead cluelessness after coming under fire for the offensive snafu.

"[The headline] was not intended as an ethnic comment," Bennett said when questioned. "It was just clever wordplay. It was that women add color, and there's more than one meaning of color."

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However Bennett did admit to a huge lack of ethnic women - or ethnic men for that matter - on her staff. Explains Bennett, "I definitely don't think we're ethnically diverse. But we did have an article in this issue about the first African American Miss Utah Teen USA."

In the words of the Church Lady, ‘Well, isn't that special?'

Since the buzz about this broke, the headline has (thankfully) been changed to "Colorful Women."