Model behavior

Damning photographs of supermodel Kate Moss allegedly snorting cocaine were published earlier this month by the United Kingdom's Daily Mirror, and accordingly she was dropped last week from several of her most lucrative modeling contracts. The contracts dismissed included Chanel, Christian Dior, H&M and Burberry. All four companies, which are among the largest names in the fashion industry, echo the sentiment that they do not want their labels associated with drugs or drug addicts.

You heard them. It is only ok for Kate to look like a drug addict. She can't actually be one. It is such a relief that these fashion labels are so concerned with how their images impact social consciousness.

The truth is that fashion labels only want to disassociate themselves from models with drug addictions when these models' drug addictions are exposed. It is perfectly fine to make bank off of the addict image in fashion ads and on the runways as long as these models keep their problems hush-hush.

Don't stain the dress, darling.

Whoa, wait a minute. Kate Moss does drugs? Nah, models don't do drugs.

Moss is famous for being of the founders of heroin chic, a term coined following a 1997 Calvin Klein ad campaign that featured uncomfortably thin models with glazed, dark sunken eyes and wispy, unkempt hair. Since then, rumors of Moss's addiction, as well as the idea that drug addiction is rampant within much of the fashion industry, have surfaced over and over again.

That drug addiction and the fashion world have connections is nothing new, and has become so publicized that while in office President Bill Clinton condemned the drug/fashion-model relationship when he said, "You do not need to glamorize addiction to sell clothes."

Since then, many fashion labels claim to have left the heroin chic ideal behind, and as of last week this point was punctuated by Moss'sloss of the four contracts, as well as having many of her other contracts reviewed.

Honestly though, is anyone surprised? No. The idea that Kate Moss and many of her model peers may be enthralled in serious drug problems is no shocker. Moss just won a libel settlement in July of this year against London's Sunday Mirror, which accused her of going into a cocaine coma while on a trip in Barcelona, Spain.

Oh, that's it. Kate just started doing drugs after signing contracts with Chanel, Dior, Burberry and H&M, and executives in any of these companies had absolutely no idea that she may have an addiction. Not likely, considering The Mirror ran the article in question during 2001, and the libel case took more than four years to settle.

Moss checked herself into rehab in 1998 due to "exhaustion," but weeks later told the British magazine The Face she had not been sober on a runway for more than ten years, and that she was also not the only model staggering down the catwalk. Seems as though behaving 'model-y' is exactly what Moss has been doing.

What doesn't seem fair is the fact that these companies are happy to use Moss' image to sell their clothing, meanwhile allegations of her drug use have been rampant for more than a decade. These companies are suddenly jumping on board a moral bandwagon, taking the high road and being socially responsible by dropping one druggie from their labels only when she can no longer dismiss addiction allegations. Creating images is obviously what they do best, and now that Moss's is irrevocably tarnished, these labels are making certain that she doesn't scar theirs as well.

To disassociate with the model and her well-known image now that Moss has entered rehab (again) to supposedly solve her addiction problems sends a completely different message: Being quietly addicted is fine -- just don't publicize it. Getting help for an obvious drug addiction, now that is a total fashion faux pas.

It looks like the haute couture this fall is hypocrisy.