Season nine of TLC’s hit reality show 90 Day Fiance premiered Sunday, and already one couple has caused a stir online.
Jibri Bell and his Serbian vanilla queen, Miona Bell, had social media abuzz during their introductory segment. Miona’s faux Kardashian/ Jenner aesthetic, abominable spray tan and bronzer combo and bad wigs (also known as Blackfishing) left folks scratching their heads and calling foul on her unconvincing attempt to cosplay Black swag. To make matters worse, her Black beau’s apparent desire for proximity to whiteness and repeatedly identifying himself as “biracial” –equally annoyed viewers tuning into the show.
Miona reportedly answered and then deleted one person’s question about her race, saying that she “didn’t want to spoil” the mystery.
Though she didn’t want to spoil the mystery, the internet already did. Reddit users stealthily dropped her pale receipts– showing a very different and white Miona.
Here are more examples of Miona’s Blackfishing shenanigans.
Serbia is located in southeastern Europe. For the better part of the 20th century, the country was part of Yugoslavia. Serbians are of Slavic origin. Serbia has over 8.5 million people, and of those populates, virtually none are Black.
Miona isn’t the only one with an identity crisis. Black Twitter had smoke for her “soon-to-be-husband” Jibri, too. The frontman for the band Black Serbs touts himself as biracial on the show. His mother is biracial, and reportedly the 28-year-old man’s biological father wasn’t in the picture. She married his white stepfather when Jibri was six years old, and that’s who he claims as a father. Although the South Dakota resident’s bio dad’s identity is up in the air, 90 Day Fiance fans speculate that the man is Black.
Though season nine has just begun, the tea is the 23-year-old Serbian woman, and Jibri allegedly wed before 2020. Her last name on Instagram is the same as his. Their storyline may be contrived by TLC. Soap Dirt reported that Jibri had been visiting Serbia for almost ten years and immersed himself in the culture- even speaking fluent Serbian. The publication also posted a screenshot alleging that he used an alias– Jovan Crnovic – when traveling to the Eastern European nation.
A video posted on Youtube by Serbian Television USA showed Jibri or Jovan showed him dining on Serbian cuisine with friends and talking to a reporter in December 2018.
A Serbian newspaper clip reportedly detailed his move to Serbia after former Minnesota police officer Derek Chauvin killed George Floyd in 2020. He referred to Miona as his wife. Jibri also made no mention of being biracial, referring to himself as “Black” in the interview.
There’s also speculation that Jibri’s family has to been to Serbia, but his mother claimed not to know Miona.
The Bells are already with the Dolezal sh*ts, and fans aren’t fooled by the couple’s antics. We’ll just have to see what happens next on 90 Day Fiance.