Shamed magnificence queen stripped of title over ‘racist’ photograph backed by politicians as row grows
Several politicians have gathered together to back former Miss Finland Sarah Dzface controversially, after the beauty queen was disgraced for an image which was deemed offensive.
A shamed beauty queen stripped of her title after posting a ‘racist’ photo has been backed by right-wing politicians, who themselves have shared offensive photos.
Former Miss Finland Sarah Dzafce, 23, was pictured using her fingers to stretch her eyes into a slanted shape. She tried to defend herself, saying she was rubbing her temples and stretching her eyes due to a “severe headache” which “relieved the pressure”.
But the caption underneath said “kiinalaisenkaa syömäs”, which roughly translates to “eating with a Chinese person”. As a backlash grew, she was stripped of her title as Miss Finland. She said about the controversial image: “My friend thought it looked funny and said, Let me take a picture. ‘”
The Miss Finland organisation apologised for the incident and announced that Sarah had been stripped of her title during a press conference last week. Sarah apologised for her actions at the press conference.
Following this, the organisation’s CEO, Sunneva Sjögren, said it was “offensive, harmful and completely contrary to the values of the Miss Finland competition”.
But despite the severity of these actions, several right-wing politicians in Finland have come out in support of Sarah, in a dig at the organisation’s decision to strip her of her title.
MPs Juho Eerola and Kaisa Garedew, and MEP Sebastian Tynkkynen – all members of the populist Finns Party – shared images of themselves on social media, adopting the same pose that Sarah did.
Juho posted a photo of himself, similarly, stretching his eyes to the dismissed beauty queen, saying: “Je suis Sarah!”
Following this bold response, he told local media: “I want to give my support to Sarah Dzafce, who was forced to give up the Miss Finland crown.”
Kaisa did the same with another message aimed at the organisation: “Still at the office, a long day since my morning run. I thought I’d try a temple massage to avoid a headache in this crazy world.”
These images have put serious pressure on Finland’s current coalition government.
Education Minister Anders Adlercreutz, of the Swedish People’s Party of Finland, said that the response to Sarah’s demotion was “irresponsible, childish and stupid.”
National Coalition Party MP Pia Kauma agreed that “This needs to be stopped” in a situation which has certainly got out of hand.
She went onto say: “If an MP behaves in a way that can lead to conclusions about racism, it can easily spread elsewhere.”
For the latest breaking news and stories from across the globe from the Daily Star, sign up for our newsletters.
