What's missing?

You've probably seen the adverts for Britain's Missing Top Model and if you haven't seen the first episode, check it out on the IPlayer. It's of course a rip off of America's Next Top Model but with the BBC twist- being politically correct to the point of craziness. The show is very similar in the way that girls battle it out each week in challenges to do with posing or interviews and then have a photo shoot with a set (usually warped) theme. At the end of the week there is a judging with some apparently important people in the fashion world and one potential model is eliminated, continuing until the last girl emerges as the winner.

We already have Britain's NTM on LivingTV, so the BBC have come up with the enlightening prospect of having eight girls with disabilities compete, hence the 'missing' model, a pun on some of the girls with missing limbs.

The show is a great platform to raise awareness for people with disabilities and as one girl put it, "I want to show people that wow, you can be disabled and pretty!" This same girl started crying at dinner, asking 'Why did this happen to us?' concerning their disabilities and another comforted her by saying, 'We all think that,' until one put plainly, 'I don't. I don't give a f*****g s**t.'

'I don't know if the public are ready for disabled models' seems to be a theme throughout the show. And there's a constant doubt whether they could ever achieve magazine covers like the model above or her success on major runways... Oh wait, the model above is Brenda Costa and she's been deaf her whole life. The Brazilian beauty is a face of Loreal and is now pregnant with her first child. Did she have any problems breaking into and being successful in the industry? Doesn't seem like it! Funny how there's two deaf girls in the competition. Also in Cycle 3 of America's Next Top Model a partially blind girl sailed to the top three.

It annoyed me throughout they show that it seemed such an original opportunity and that the world needs to be shown that girls with disabilities are beautiful too- don't they realise they're already in the media?! Even people who are in the fashion industry question whether they can 'make it' as a model because the business is so tough. Argh! One of the judges asks 'Do you think having a deaf model would make a difference to the industry?" Funny that there already is a deaf super model and you didn't even notice!

A judge comes out with 'I think it's really important that the disability is obvious in some way. I don't think there is any point in having a disabled model that no one knows is disabled.' Frankly that's quite shocking. Are they not entitled to a career as a model, plain and simple? Do you have to be a 'model with a disability' rather than a 'model' forever?

The thing is, the fashion industry is always looking for controversy, something different, something headline-seeking. If a model will sell clothes, then she will sell clothes, shes hired. Who's to say that if a girl in a wheelchair went to a casting with an exquisite face and and another girl just strolled in with an exquisite face, she would have the upper hand? I know face models, I know hand models. I've seen fashion shows for wheelchair users.

If Lily Cole had her arm missing would she be as successful? I guess these are the questions the programme raises. Would we look at this picture in a magazine and want to buy a product? This month sees an all black model issue of Vogue Italia. Could there be a time when there will be an all persons with disabilities issue?