The 10 year old girl posed seductively at the camera, eyes at the distance, wearing glamorous lipstick and killer heels on top of a tiger fur that made the viewers uneasy. The certain act caused a debate regarding over-sexualization of little girls.
The CEO of Concerned Women for America, Penny Nance, appealed to The Daily Caller that the parent of the said model should be held responsible for letting their child to perform such act. “This is clearly child exploitation and her parents should be legally charged,” said Nance.
Thylane Loubry Blondeau happened to be the daughter of Patrick Blondeau, a soccer star and Véronika Loubry, who is a reporter and now a fashion designer. She already joined publications together with some young models but her work appeared to be more vigorous than others and it earned some impressions from some media outlets.
Just last Thursday, deputy editor of Mommyish.com, Koa Beck, told ABC’s “Good Morning America” that seeing these photos provokes readers to see Blondeau in a sexual way.
“I think that I’m seeing a very young girl being sexualized, being gazed at in a very adult way,” Beck added.
Senior director of women’s programs at the American Psychological (–foul word(s) removed–)ociation, Shari Miles-Cohen, also told ABC that it’s detrimental for children to rush into adulthood.
Miles-Cohen added, “We don’t want kids to grow up too fast,” “We want them to be able to develop physically, emotionally, psychologically and socially at appropriate rates for their age.”
Also, it’s unlikely that the young model understands that her performance could be perceived in a sexual manner.
In a Tuesday blog post, Jezebel.com’s Jenna Sauers addressed this: “Is she aware that, to people older and more familiar with the common places of fashion photography than she is, the way she is being portrayed reads as somewhat adult, somewhat sexualized?”