Amelia Hamlin was posting thirst traps long before she hooked up with Scott Disick.
The 19-year-old model has seen a significant boost in interest since their entanglement began.
However, fans are now worrying that the worst that the Kardashians have to offer is rubbing off on her.
Amelia is responding to accusations of blackfishing, thanking fans for educating her.
Amelia shared photos to Instagram this week in which she is showing off, well, brown skin.
It’s not just a tan that has eyebrows raised and alarm bells going off in her comments, however.
Her overall look, from the styling of her hair into one long braid to the spray by her hairline, feels … at best, Kardashian-style.
If you were to look at Amelia’s photos from just a couple of weeks ago, you’d be seeing something very different.
Her parents are both white. Amelia herself is, too.
And in all of her past photos, you would not have to guess about that.
To put it bluntly, it appears that Amelia has styled herself to more closely resemble a Black woman, from her makeup to her skin tone.
This is such a disturbingly common phenomenon that it has a name — blackfishing.
The play on the word "catfishing" distinguishes this immitation of style and look from plain ol’ blackface.
Blackface has a history rooted in the mockery and dehumanization of the Black community.
In contrast, blackfishing is an attempt to appropriate Black features that are (finally) seen as desirable by fashion trends.
The primary culprits are Instagram influencers, most of whom are white, many of whom make followers believe that they are biracial.
There’s more to blackfishing than one’s skin tone. It’s about the makeup and hair.
Sometimes there is a verbal component — appropriating AAVE into Instagram captions, though Amelia did not do that part.
As you can imagine, she received a hefty barrage of comments, some gentle, some firm.
"I’m receiving a lot of comments in regards to my latest photo," Amelia acknowledged.
In her Instagram Stories, she wrote: "I am being told that I am ‘black fishing.’"
"Thank you all for educating me on this topic," Amelia expressed.
"I recently went on vacation in the sun," Amelia explained.
She continued: "And with my Italian heritage I tan very easily."
"There is no self tanner involved," Amelia emphasized.
"Or," Amelia continued, "intention of looking darker than my own natural skin color."
In conclusion, she stressed: "I had a lot of fun creating this look with no malice intention or offense."
We can all read things and miss them, but we did not see an explicit apology in there.
Amelia has not deleted the photos.
Admittedly, immediately deleting bad photos is not always the best call.
However, in addition to leaving them up, she has deactivated comments under the images.
We get it — Amelia is 19, she’s a model, she was dabbling in looks, and her parents are firmly entrenched in the celebrity bubble.
No one is reasonably accusing her of being a bad person, but she did make a mistake that she can correct.
Frankly, there should be a service where a team of normal people sit down with celebrities and tell them about the world, so that they won’t do this stuff.
The spectrum of her natural skin tone is beautiful, and that’s fine.
The stylistic choices accompanying her tan were a problem.
Yes, the Kardashians do this to. That is not a good thing. We can all be better than that.