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A man who complained about the lack of diversity in Miss Scotland 2019 became the target of ridicule himself after his tweet went viral.

Iain Robertson from Glasgow  took a shot at the racial makeup of the contestants by sharing a photo of them with a caption that read, “Delighted to see such a diverse lineup for Miss Scotland this year.”

“I’m friends with two of the women in the photo, they posted the photo on social media. They also agree with me that the contest lacked diversity,” Robertson told Bored Panda.

Yes, his post has accumulated over 4.6K likes. However, it has also received more than 6.2K comments, many of which criticize Iain’s interpretation of the picture.

A man complained about the lack of diversity in Miss Scotland 2019

Image credits: yoiain

Image credits: yoiain

Image credits: yoiain

People were unhappy that Robertson started throwing accusations without considering Scottish demographics. According to them, racism isn’t to blame for the lack of “diversity” in the Miss Scotland photo.

Scotland’s Census 2011, the most recent official study of the country’s demographics, said that 84% of Scotland’s population reported their ethnicity as ‘White: Scottish’ and a further 8% as ‘White: Other British’. Together, minority ethnic groups and white non-British groups (which include ‘White: Irish’, ‘White: Polish’, ‘White: Gypsy/ Traveller’ and ‘White: Other White’) made up 8% of the total population.

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The Asian population was the largest minority ethnic group (3% of the population or 141,000 people), while the African, Caribbean or Black groups made up 1% of the population.

However, he soon became the target of ridicule himself

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However, Robertson remained confident that the women shortlisted for the final did not accurately represent the diversity of Scotland—particularly Glasgow, the city he lives in and where the organization operates. “Beauty pageants are an antiquated concept as it is, and beauty is subjective, so displaying a standard of ‘beauty’ as only one type of person leaves others, especially younger women and girls, feel that they won’t be accepted as ‘beautiful’ because they don’t see anyone representing them in such contests,” he told Bored Panda. “There are beautiful women of all sizes, abilities, races (note, I didn’t mention race in the tweet), beliefs, religions that deserve a voice just as much as the women shortlisted, and I was disappointed that the organization chose to not include them in their contest. Previous years had been far more diverse.”

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“In fact, the responses I received made me feel more strongly about it, largely due to the bigotry in those comments and the lack of understanding of the issues my throwaway tweet represented,” Iain continued. “The most interesting thing about it is, as you can see, my tweet doesn’t mention race at all, it’s basically a sarcastic comment about how they all look alike, however that can mean so many different things. The backlash only focused on race…”

He also thinks that these comments were largely from people who have never been to Scotland. “For example, Glasgow, our biggest city has a significant Asian demographic that has been around for decades, our communities are far more enriched with diverse cultures than these people think.”

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