No, not her hairy armpits (although everyone IS talking about those too!), I’m talking about her eyes! Love her or hate her (and just for the record, I’m the former, LOVE her!!), you cannot deny that she has the most amazing pale baby blues…

 

Paris Jackson

 

Read an article about this very topic and it somewhat tickled my fancy, you know, because it’s about eyes, and it prompted me to do a little research – something that honestly hasn’t happened for quite some time!

 

So, OK magazine report in this article that according to her make-up artist, Jo Baker, her icy blue eyes are down to a mystery eye condition. They go on to say that “as well as impacting the shade of her bright eyes, Paris revealed on Twitter: “It does affect my eye sight badly. I have to wear glasses/correctional contacts.” This was interesting to me, because although I know it may be hard for you guys to believe, I’m not the font of all optical knowledge, and I had no idea what eye condition it could be? I have heard about complications caused by having such pale eyes, but… so I Googled!

 

I found that website HelloGiggles had had the same idea… purely speculating that it could be Waardenburg Syndrome(??). Yep, I hadn’t heard of it either! #cuemoreGoogling. Waardenburg Syndrome is a genetic disorder that can cause “unusually diminished coloration (pigmentation) of the hair, the skin, and/or the iris of both eyes (irides).” Interestingly, it can also be the cause of different eye colours: “differences in the pigmentation of the irides or within different areas of the same iris (heterochromia irides). For example, the iris of one eye may be blue while the other has a different colour, or one or both irides may seem unusually “mottled” in appearance.” HOWEVER, although it states that “the range or severity of associated symptoms and findings may vary greatly from case to case”, the majority of symptoms appear to be physical:

 

  • Unusually wide bridge due to displacement of the inner angles (canthi) of the eyes (dystopia canthorum)
  • A white lock of hair growing above the forehead (I know, you’re all thinking Rogue (X-Men) right?!)
  • Premature graying or whitening of the hair
  • Leukoderma – patchy, abnormally light regions of skin (it was well publicised that Michael Jackson suffered from the very similar condition, Vitiligo)
  • Some hearing impairment due to abnormalities of the inner ear
  • Distinctive malformations of the arms and hands
  • A digestive disorder where there is an absence of groups of specialised nerve cell bodies within a region of smooth muscle wall of the large intestine

 

Looking at Paris, she doesn’t seem to suffer from many of these (possibly the first one? I can’t tell…), although we have no way of knowing about the latter!

 

Nowhere in any of my reading, did I find that Waardenburg Syndrome causes actual problems with eyesight. So, I ashamedly Twitter-stalked Paris, and although it won’t let me go back any further than 12 months(!!), I couldn’t find any reference to this alleged “Tweet”. (Seriously, do these guys just straight up lie?!) I was flummoxed!

 

Returning to the original OK article, I realised that they’re referencing a Teen Vogue article – THEY were the ones who actually interviewed the make-up artist! And guess what? In this article it states “In case you were wondering, it doesn’t impact on her sight whatsoever”! Yep, these glossies really do seem to make it up as they go along…

 

I can’t seem to find any other “genetic conditions” of which pale irides are a symptom, so Waardenburg does seem a plausible candidate, particularly bearing in mind her father’s medical history. However, it seems that if this is the diagnosis, she only has a very mild case.

 

So it just goes to prove, don’t believe everything you read! We may never know why Paris’s eyes are so blue, and at the end of the day it’s none of our god damn business, but I’ve sure had fun researching! AND it’s given me the writing bug again! So thank you Paris! x o x o