Elie Fortune
thebuffaloreview@gmail.com
(Buffalo, N.Y.) – SUNY Buffalo State’s Black Active Minds (BAM) held its 9th annual “Miss PHAT” beauty pageant April 9 in Rockwell Hall.
Miss PHAT, which stands for pretty hot and thick, is intended to celebrate plus size women and promote confidence, empowerment and body positivity.
To enter, contestants had to be a member of BAM and they had to wear size 10 or higher.
“I was always a BAM member and always knew that they had the pageant. A lot of the (executive) board members from last year were like asking me to do it,” Symone Campbell, Miss PHAT 2016 and current BAM president.
Symone Campbell and her twin sister Semaj Campbell appeared on the The Buffalo Review TV April 6 to discuss the pageant.
“At first I was like no, I’m okay, I don’t really want to be on stage. And then I was just like well, why not do it? So, I went to try outs and they chose me,” said Symone Campbell.
She said the event is intended to give plus size women a platform to showcase themselves and become more comfortable in their bodies.
“It’s a confidence boost because people don’t want to see plus size women showing skin. So it was just like, deal with it, it’s life, we’re women too,” said Semaj Campbell.
“It was pretty cool, I wasn’t really doing it to win at first. I just wanted to do it,” said Symone Campbell. “So when I won, it was really exciting and just liberating. I’m doing something for a cause.”
Sophomore Taliece Waters won this year’s event, which included a Super Hero theme.
* Ashley Steele contributed to this report.
Buffalo Review 