Miss Australia, Francesca Hung, has responded to the racist video scandal that surrounded her entry into Miss Universe last week, as Who writes.
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Hung was captured on camera talking with Miss USA, Sarah Summers, and Miss Colombia, Valeria Molares, about how difficult it would be for Miss Cambodia, Rern Sinat, competing in the pageant as a woman who cannot speak either English or Spanish.
Here’s what Summers said in the video:
Miss Cambodia is here and doesn’t speak any English, and not a single other person speaks her language. Can you imagine?
Francesca said that it would be so isolating, and I said, ‘Yes’. I mean just confusing all the time.
They also appeared to make fun of Miss Vietnam, H’Hen Nie, for not knowing much English.
“She pretends to know so much English and then you ask her a question after having a whole conversation with her and she goes [nods and smiles].”
They were widely accused of making racist comments in the video, with some demanding they be disqualified from the contest.
When asked on The Morning Show today if she had considered whether the controversy would impact on her chances of winning, Hung admitted that she had thought about it.
“Yes. Nobody would tell you if it did, however in the days leading up to the final I kinda processed in my head that it could perhaps have a negative affect on my placement. I’ll never know if it did or not, but I made top 20 and I’m happy with that.”
She also described what it felt like to be on the receiving end of so much online hatred.
I spent about three days in tears and I had my first panic attack.
I deleted my Instagram at one point and I just didn’t look at anything. After a while I realised that I can’t change other people’s perspective of me. As long as I know my intentions were pure, people around me know me – they know that I would never say anything like that deliberately – so I just had to be okay with that and let other people say what they wanna say.
Hung also described the winner of the contest, Miss Philippines, Catriona Gray, who was actually born and raised in Cairns.
“She’s like any other Aussie. She grew up in Australia so she has the same values and ideals.”
“She was born for this role. She’s a well brought up pageant girl,” Hung said, concluding that Gray will be “amazing” as Miss Universe.
