Australian model turned wellness guru She Macpherson reportedly made a very odd and downright offensive comment about having “Aboriginal” eyes in a Vogue beauty video. Uh, excuse me?

The Sydney Morning Herald reported that while speaking in a video for Vogue’s ‘Beauty Secrets’ series, Macpherson said, “My eyes are almost black, that’s the Aboriginal in me. Being Australians for seven generations, they don’t reflect light the same way blue eyes do.

Uh. What?? Why do you say that???

There are a couple of things wrong with this one, the most obvious being that referring to Natives in this particular wording is offensive because of its colonial implications, and has been since the 1980s.

Macpherson is 57, so I think it’s probably safe to assume that she was there when this language shift happened, and really, there was more than enough time to unlearn him.

SMH reported that fashion insiders immediately reached out to reps, including sending questions to publicists for Macpherson’s brand WelleCo, to see if perhaps this was her way of revealing Indigenous ancestry. Or at the very least, ask her if she now regretted using an obviously problematic and outdated term.

After sending questions, SMH reported that Macpherson’s quotes were quietly removed from the Vogue video. Despite no response from any publicist. Interesting.

And that brings me to the second element of this story – Elle Macpherson’s sister confirmed to reporters that this was certainly not a claim of Indigenous heritage.

“We are not indigenous and we did not trace our ancestors”, Mimi Macpherson said to Emerald City “strongly”, by SMH.

I’m just posting a photo of my Aboriginal eye because according to Elle MacPherson, that’s one thing. Eyebrows cropped because we’ve been locked in Melbs forever and I could give JWH a run for his money… pic.twitter.com/RCGBM2SHzR

– Celeste Liddle (@Utopiana) 24 October 2021