WATCH: Anna Wintour's 'Nonsensical Response' to Question About Race at Met Gala Mirrors Former Miss Teen South Carolina's Infamous Flub
Anna Wintour stumbled her way through a question about allyship in fashion on the Met Gala red carpet.
May 5 2025, Published 8:25 p.m. ET
Anna Wintour left Met Gala fans scratching their heads over her "nonsensical babbling" in response to a question about race and allyship at this year's event, RadarOnline.com can reveal.
The Vogue editor-in-chief, who serves as the main organizer and co-chair of the annual event, gave several awkward pauses as she stumbled her way through the interview, reminding some viewers of former Miss Teen South Carolina Caitlin Upton's infamous 2007 pageant interview.
Wintour as served as the Met Gala chair or co-chair since 1995.
This year's Met Gala theme is "Superfine: Tailoring Black Style," which celebrates and explores the history of Black dandyism.
As she walked the famous Met stairs, Wintour stopped to chat with Blakely Thornton, who represented The Cut as a red carpet reporter.
Thornton asked Wintour: "How do you use fashion to create allyship?"
Allyship refers to the "active support for the rights of a minority or marginalized group without being a member of it."
Wintour was accused of making viewers 'dizzy' with her jumbled response.
Wintour paused before answering: "Uh... I think fashion is a language, like music is a language. And it's a global language, so I think an event like tonight will have a global resonance.
"We have guests coming from all over the world so whether you're in India. In Asia. Sorry, Japan or Europe or whatever, there will be many people here that you will know and recognize.
"So I think trying to reach everyone with the important message of this event is so important."
Other viewers called out Wintour for not answering the simple question.
Instagram users were quick to call out Wintour's word salad response to the simple question.
One user wrote: "She made us dizzy without telling us anything."
A second said: "Did she answer the question? Allyship?" and a third echoed, "She didn’t answer the question though."
Another added: "She has no idea what party she's at. She still had all day to have it written out for her. But love that he got something that resembled an answer."
Wintour's bizarre naming of different countries reminded some viewers of ex-Miss Teen South Carolina's infamous 2007 pageant answer.
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While one user quoted Wintour and mocked her jumbled answer with thehashtag "definitionofallyship," another user replied: "She sounds like Ms Teen South Carolina. “Like… such as… South Africa…”
Upton went viral for her rambling response to being asked why she believed one-fifth of Americans could not locate the U.S. on a map during the 2007 Miss Teen USA pageant.
She replied: "I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because some people out there in our nation don't have maps and I believe that our education such as in South Africa and the Iraq, everywhere such as, I believe that our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., should help South Africa and should help Iraq and the Asian countries so we will be able to build up our future."
Meanwhile, social media users applauded Thornton and highlighted Wintour's botched answer as a reason more questions like his are needed on the red carpet.
One wrote: "Is the allyship in the room with us? Your coverage is the only one I care about tonight. Please keep asking these questions!"
Another said: "The important thing is that you asked an absolutely brilliant question. And that question was presented to the host of The Met Gala. Kudos, darling."
