Lucy and Maria Aylmer appeared on the Australian morning show last month outrage over the interview has steadily risen. Photo / Screengrab / Channel Seven
Lucy and Maria Aylmer appeared on the Australian morning show last month outrage over the interview has steadily risen. Photo / Screengrab / Channel Seven
A mixed-race twin who appeared to be the victim of a racist comment during a live TV interview denies there was racist intent behind the quip.
Lucy Aylmer was taking part in an interview with her sister Maria on an Australian TV show about their rare genetic anomaly: Maria wasborn with the brown skin of her half Jamaican mother and Lucy was born with the fair skin of her father.
When introducing the twins on the Channel 7 show in Australian, presenter Samantha Armytage described the appearance of each 18-year-old and added a "Good on her!" comment about Lucy's fair skin. Armytage has since apologised and denied any racist intent.
Lucy has taken to Facebook to defend the comment too, saying she and her sister "took no offence".
"We believe she did not mean this as a racial comment," she wrote.
"We do not think it was necessary for her to apologize and I apologize to her for any distress it may have caused ... we believe your comment was completely misinterpreted and taken completely the wrong way by a lot of viewers."
"We understand that Samantha could've said it differently, but we understand what she meant and if we had taken any offence to it we would've addressed it ourselves."
