The rise and fall of Kate Moss
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The skeletal model's coke-fueled plunge from grace has exposed some ugly truths about the fashion industry -- not least its world-class hypocrisy.[/font][font=times new roman, times, serif][size=-1]
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By Rebecca Traister[/font]
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Sept. 23, 2005 | [/font] [font=times new roman, times, serif]
As the 1980s melted into the 1990s, a new breed of supermodel started stalking the earth. Her emaciated frame made Twiggy's look chunky; she appeared permanently prepubescent; her sunken-eyed pallor made her look like a junkie. She was embodied by Kate Moss.
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Now, 15 years later, in a set of circumstances that have exposed the hypocrisy and sanctimony of everyone involved, Moss and the fashion industry are becoming accidental and unwilling poster children for a new anti-drug message.
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News that models do blow is akin to news that rock stars have casual sex: not news at all. But the Moss humiliation was special. While photographers and models haunt the same VIP rooms, presumably sometimes partaking in illegal activities together, rarely do we see photographic evidence of cocaine getting sucked into recognizable nostrils. [...]
Of course, Moss' real error was in getting caught on tape, a situation that is certainly unfortunate for her, but just as inconvenient for fashion companies, now forced to place their favorite clotheshorse in the stocks, and to distance themselves from her by proclaiming their wide-eyed innocence.
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On Thursday, a spokeswoman for cosmetics firm Rimmel announced that the company was "shocked and dismayed by the recent press allegations surrounding" Moss, and that it would reconsider its relationship with her. Earlier, the CEO for Gloria Vanderbilt denim had told the press, "We would have second thoughts about using Kate Moss" again, and that "we weren't aware of any issues with Kate prior to this campaign."
The fashion companies' professions of surprise are hard to believe. Would it be more embarrassing for them to admit they hired a model who they knew had done drugs than it is for them to admit to never having picked up a paper? Moss has spoken of her own drug use many times, and did a widely reported stint in rehab in 1998. She has denied heroin use, and often claimed she was clean, but in 2003 she gave an interview in which she said that dabbling was fine, but that an earlier period she'd spent immersed in drug use "wasn't a nice time."
Moss' record alone renders Gloria Vanderbilt's and Rimmel's assertions of naiveté ludicrous. And what about H&M's statement to the New York Times, that "If someone is going to be the face of H&M, it is important they be healthy, wholesome and sound"? The spokeswoman also told the Times that after feedback, "we decided we should distance ourselves from any kind of drug abuse."
Remember Capt. Renault's assertion to Rick Blaine in "Casablanca" that he is "shocked, shocked to find that gambling is going on in here," just before the croupier hands him his winnings?
If it were important that the face of H&M be healthy, wholesome and sound, the company would have very few working models to choose from, and everyone -- both in and out of the fashion industry -- knows that. 
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In truth, the impression that Moss has made in the past two weeks has probably been one of the healthier ones in her history -- simply because this chapter of her life has made drug use and addiction look not like giggling fun for beautiful people, but like a habit that can be sad and grimy, and which can produce terrible personal and professional results. Those pictures of her were ugly. They looked sad. The rolled-up fiver was skanky, as was her outfit. This was not the glamourous Mediterranean bar-top bacchanal that some might fantasize about when they think about a model's hard-living lifestyle. This was a filthy room with gross people.
And her professional offloading certainly hasn't seemed like it's been fun. Reports had Moss in tears when she heard that Chanel would not be renewing with her. 
The industry that sent her to the stratosphere has cut her loose without much of a second thought. When cornered by reporters after the Mirror story first appeared, a distraught Moss told them to, "f*ck off, f*ck off, f*ck off, f*ck off! Just f*ck off!" Her father, caught at his home in West Sussex, England, and shown the pictures of his daughter doing illegal drugs, said only, "It doesn't surprise me." A London Sun report today had Moss smoking crack, a drug that has no street glamour at all. The only good news, as reported in the gossip columns, is that she may have broken up with Doherty again.
But between her personal humiliation, professional tumble, declining economic prospects, soured romance, and dire image problems, Kate Moss -- avatar of 1990s heroin grunge -- has this week become a walking D.A.R.E. ad.
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About the writer
Rebecca Traister is a staff writer for Salon Life.
Salon.com
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