When you think of problematic reality television, America’s Next Top Model is usually one of the first shows to come to mind. Premiering in 2003, this competition started during the height of Y2K thinness, when strict diets and slimness were the goal.
Remember, this is before the 2010s, when Kim Kardashian would begin to inspire a new trend of curviness (though, even that wouldn’t become the standard until, really, the late 2010s, early 2020s with the rise of BBL popularity — although that is an entirely different conversation).
For the purposes of our discussion, we’re starting in the time of thigh gaps and the problematic emphasis on size, largely pushed by magazines marketed towards women. Body positivity just, honestly, wasn’t really a thing in any capacity (remember when Jennifer Lawrence was “too large” to play Katniss).
Okay, so back to ANTM. This was a competition show that was both created and hosted by Tyra Banks. She and other judges analyzed these young girls who wanted to break into the industry, and then, after getting about twenty-five final girls, the competition could really begin. They had these weekly challenges and photoshoots, and eventually, enough people were cut that the girls could go live together in a house. Not surprisingly, this allowed for a lot of content.
After a couple of more weeks, they would go on an international trip. Here, they would usually film a commercial and do a couple of “go-sees,” which is where they showed their portfolio (which were all past pictures they took for the show), walk, and personality for potential jobs. This was a bit of a setup because they were in a different country and were kind of just thrown out there with very little direction (think The Amazing Race). Also, a great opportunity for entertaining content.
This show is pretty consistently criticized for its poor treatment of the girls and for upholding toxic norms of the modeling industry. And, yeah. That’s completely fair.
Recently, Netflix came out with a docuseries featuring interviews with former contestants, winners, judges and, of course, Tyra Banks.
The bottom line is that Tyra Banks is (and was) culpable in the damage of this show. Point blank.
She took no accountability for the harm ANTM caused the girls, and was very quick to say she was uninvolved in production when she was literally an executive producer. This is all very clear when former contestant, Shandi, shares how they spun a storyline of her being assaulted into cheating on her boyfriend, and Banks refuses any responsibility.
So, Tyra Banks is perhaps one of the bigger architects of a toxic system. No one is arguing that. However, this docuseries also featured Nigel Barker, Jay Manuel, and J. Alexander. The three of them go to place all of the blame of the problematic tendencies of the show onto Banks, and that’s just not fair.
These individuals weren’t only complicit, but they were actually active participants in the grief the contestants faced. If you watched the show at all, you’d know that Banks was (believe it or not) actually one of the nicer judges. Mr. and Miss Jay were consistently mean to the girls. The rudest of them all was, no doubt, Janice Dickinson, but trust that they were all cruel. It wouldn’t have been as entertaining if all of their feedback was kind, right?
In this docuseries, former contestant Keenyah explains how, during one of the shoots, she was being inappropriately touched by one of the other male models. She brings this up to production, and her concerns are brushed off by Jay Manuel.
One of the more memorable and problematic shoots they did on the show was one that involved swapping the contestants’ races. Manuel expresses that he was uncomfortable at the time of the shooting. While that may be true, I do not believe for a second that he was truly as powerless as he stated. He could have stuck up for those girls because he was in a position of power.
I opened with some context to the body standards of the 2000s. Tyra Banks was actually more forgiving of the “plus-size” models that entered the competition. Toccara in season three was considered plus size (she was a size 10 for reference) for the time, and Banks actually campaigned for her to stay, but was outvoted. This is not to say that she wasn’t harmful, but it is to point out that she was not the only one calling the shots.
All of these individuals participated in harmful behavior, and none of them accepted responsibility in the docuseries. Nigel and Mr. and Miss Jay were not simply victims of Tyra Banks. They were, in fact, central contributors to the very problems that defined the series.
America’s Next Top Model did not exist in a vacuum. It was born out of an industry and a culture that rewarded thinness and humiliation disguised as “tough love.” That does not excuse the harm it caused, but it does explain how so many people were able to participate in it without questioning the damage in real time. Tyra Banks held obvious power. She helped build the machine. But she did not operate it alone.
The Netflix docuseries attempts to offer a reckoning, yet what it ultimately reveals is something far less satisfying: a room full of people unwilling to fully own their roles. Accountability cannot begin and end with one name simply because she was the most visible. Nigel Barker, Jay Manuel, J. Alexander, and the rest were not passive bystanders caught in Banks’ shadow. They were decision-makers, commentators, and active participants in a system that prioritized entertainment over well-being.
If there is any meaningful takeaway from revisiting ANTM, it is this: harm on that scale is rarely the work of a single individual. It is the product of a culture, an industry, and a group of people who all benefit from looking away. And until everyone involved is willing to acknowledge that, the reckoning remains incomplete.