Priyanka Chopra has said she feels “horrible” after appearing on the cover of Condé Nast Traveller wearing an "insensitive" vest about refugees some claim only highlighted her own privilege.
The Bollywood actress, 35, is featured on the front of the magazine's October issue wearing a vest bearing the crossed-out words ‘refugee’ ‘immigrant’ and ‘outsider’ above a fourth word: ‘traveller’.
Condé Nast said the point of the top was to challenge and subvert existing stereotypes around labels such as ‘refugee’ and ‘immigrant’ that perpetuate a culture of xenophobia.
But the message on the shirt was branded “dehumanising”, “privilege-strutting” and accused of trivialising the escalating refugee crisis. More than 4.7 million Syrian people have been displaced to neighbouring countries since the civil war began in 2011.
Chopra told the Indian channel NDTV: “They [Condé Nast] specifically got this made and implored me to wear it. They said they were addressing xenophobia which is a big issue that is happening.
“Traveller was left according to them because traveller was ‘let’s be ambiguous about it; people moving in and out, whether it is by choice or not by choice, you are still travelling.
“So their idea was that. And I bought into it, I guess. And I am really, really apologetic about the fact that so many sentiments were hurt. That was definitely not the reason. […] I am someone who always stands for no labels. [...] I was very affected, I felt really really horrible. That was never the intention. [...] It was misconstrued. The point that the magazine wanted to make was actually something good.
“Politically, the words have been used so much to berate people, to put them in a box, to profile them, and the magazine's idea was to break that."
In a statement accompanying the cover, Condé Nast said: “At Condé Nast Traveller, we believe that the opening up of borders and the breaking down of walls can help us discover the world, and open up our minds and hearts.
“So, when we had actor Priyanka Chopra wear a T-shirt we created on the cover of the 6th-anniversary issue, we had a point to make.
“It’s about how our labelling of people as immigrants, refugees and outsiders is creating a culture of xenophobia. We are allowing thousands of innocent people who are forced to cross borders due to unimaginable terror and atrocities to be treated without humanity and empathy.”
The Independent has contacted Chopra’s publicist for comment.
