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Hi
My name is cameron
Russon
And for the last a little while i've been a model
Um actually for ten years
And i feel like there's an uncomfortable tension in the room
Right now
Because i should not have worn this stress
So luckily i brought an alphachange
Um this is the first alphaa change on the ted stage
So you guys are pretty rucky to witness it
I think if some of the womwomen really really hrified when i came out
You don't have to tell me now
But i'll find out later on twitter
Um
I'd also note that i'm quite privileged to be able to transform
What you think of me in a very brief ten seconds
Not everybody gets to do that
These heells are very uncomfortable so good thing
I wasn't going to wear them
The worst part is putting in sweater of my head gives out ts you'll laugh at me so don't do anything well
It's over my head all right
So why did i do that
That was awkward well
Hopefuly not as awward as that picture
Image is powerful
But also image is superficial
I just totally transformed what you thought of me in six seconds
And in this picture
I had actually never had a boyfriend in real life
I was totally uncomfortable in the ptotographer was time me to arch my back
And put my hand in that guhair um
And of course borrowing surgery or the fake ten that i got two days ago for work
There's very little that we can do to transform
How we look and how we look
Though it is superficial and immutiable
Has a huge impact on our lives
Um so today for me being fearless means being honest
And i am on this stage
Because i am a model
I'm on this stage
Because i am a pretty white woman in my industry
We call that a sexy girl
And i'm going to answer the questions of people always ask me
But with an honest twist
So the first question is how do you become a model
And i always just say how i was scouted
But that means nothing the real way that i became a model
Is i won a genetic lottery
And i am the recipient of a legacy
And maybe you're wondering what as a legacy
Well for the past few centuries
We have defined beauty
Not just as um health and youth and symmetry that were biologically program to admire
But also as tall thunder figures and femininity and white skin
And this is a legacy that was built for me
And it's a legacy that i've been cashing out on
And i know there are people in the audience
Who are skeptical at this point
And maybe there are some fashiony y that's where like wait
Niomi
Tyrat
Joones
Smallls
Lewan
And first i commmendo in your model
Knowledge for very impressive but unfortunately i have to inform you
That in two thousand seven a very inspired and yupd student counted ted the modedels on the runway
Every single one who was hired
And of the six hundred and seventy seven models
It were hired
Only twenty seven were less than four percent were nonwhite
The next question
People always asked me is can i be a model
When i grow up
And first anscer is i don't know they don't put me in charge of that
But the second answer in what i really want to say to these little girls is why you know you can be anything
You could be the present the united states or the inventor of the next internet or and inja cardiothrasc surgeon poet et would would be awesome
Because you be the first one
If after this amazing list
They still are like no no
Cameron
I want want be a model
Well then i say be my
My ss
Because i'm not not charge of anything
And you could be the editor chief of american vogue
The the ooh neor or the next seven in my own
Saying that you want to be a model
When you grow up is a kin to saying that you want to win the parparable
When when grow up
It's you know out of your control
And it's awesome
And it's not a career path
I will demonstrate if you now ten years of accumulated model knowledge
Because unlike cardiothrosic surgeons
It can just be distilled right into it right now
So if the photographer is right there
And the light is right there
Like a nice hmi and the clients is cameron
We want a walking shot
Well then this light goes for a nice along
This arm goes back
This arm goes for the head is at three quarters
And you just go back in forth
You just do that
And you look back at your imaginary friends
Three hundred
Hundred four times
Five hundred times
It will like something like this
And hopefully less awkward than that one in the middle
That was i don't know how in there unfortunately
After you've gone to school
And you have a resume
And 'done a few jobs
You can't say anything anymore
So if you say you want to be the present the united states
But your resume reads underwear model ten years
People give you a funny look the next question
You always asked me is do they retouch all the photos
And yeah
Theprepretty much retouch all the photos
But that is only a small component of what's happening
This picture is a very first picture that i'ver took
And it's also the very first time that i had worn a bikini
And i didn't dn't dn't have my period
Yet
You know we're getting personal
But you know i was a young girl
This is what i looked like with my grandma just a few months earlier
Here's me on the same day as this shoot my friend got to come with me
Here's me at the sumber party a few days before i shot french folk
Here's me on the soccer team and envy magazine
And here's me today
And i hope what you're seeing is that these pictures are not pictures of me
They are constructions
And they are constructions by professionals
By haircyluand makeup artists and photographers and stylists
And all of their assistance and preproduction
Impost production
And they build this that's not me okay
And the next question
People always ask me is do you get free stuff
I do have too many eight and sheelwhich i had never get to wear except er earlier um
But the free stuff that i get is the free stuff that i get in real life
And that's what we don't like to talk about i grew up in cambridge
And one time i wanted to a storand
I forgot my money
And they gave me the dress for free
When i was a teenager
I was driving with my friend who was an awful driver
And she rean a read
Of course se we got pulled over
And all it took was a sorry officer
And we were on our way
And i got these three things
Because of how i look
Not who i am
And there are people paying a cost for how they look and not who they are i live in new york
And last year of the one hundred and forty thousand teenagers that were stoppp in risk
Eighty six percent of them were black and latino
And most of them were young men
And there are only one hundred and seventy seven thousand young black and ltinommen in new york
So for them it's not a question of will i get stopped
But how many while i get stopped
When will i get stopped
When i was researching this talk
I found out that of the thirteen year old girls in united states fifty three percent don't like their bodies
And that number goes to seventy eight percent by the time that they're seventeen
So the last question people asked me is
You know what is it like to be a model
I think the answer that they're looking for
Is if you are a little bit skinnier
And you have shiny er hair
You will be so happy and fabulous
And when we're back stage
We give an answer that maybe makes it seem like that we say it's really amazing to travel
And it's amazing to get to work with creative
Inspired
Passionate people and those things are true
But they're only one half of this story
Because the thing that we never said on camera
That i have never said on camera that i am insecure and i'm insecure
Because i have to think about what i look like every day
And if you ever are wondering
You know if i have thinathsize and shineer hair will i be happier
You're just seem to meet a group of models
Because they have the thinnest size and the shinese hair and the coolest closed
And of the most physically insecure women probably on the planet um
So when i was writing this talk
I found it very difficult to strike in honest balance
Because in the one hand i felt very uncomfortable to come out here
And say look
I've received all these benefits from a deck stacked in my favor
And it also hoelt really uncomfortable to follow that up with
And it doesn't always make me happy
But mostly it was difficult to unpack a legacy of gender and racial oppression
When why one of the biggest beneficiaries
But i'm also happy and honor to be be here here
And i think that it's great
Got
Got come come
You know ten or twenty or thirty years had passed
And i had more agency in my career
Because
Because
Maybe
Then i wouldn't tell the story of i got my
My first bb
Maybe i wouldn't tell the story of how i paid for college
Which seems so important
Right now
If there's a take away to this talk
I hope is that we all feel more comfortable
Acknowledging the power of image in our perceived successes and our perceived failures
Okay
Thank you
