False Leadership and Warriorhood: The Lie of Moemoana Schwenke

Moemoana Safaʻatoʻa Schwenke’s rise reveals both the power and peril of representation—when icons become brands, and warriorship becomes costume, the community is left unguarded.

In the luminous ascent of Moemoana Safaʻatoʻa Schwenke—from Miss Sāmoa to Miss Pacific Islands—many saw a beacon of cultural pride, environmental advocacy, and youth empowerment. Her reign was marked by eloquence, ancestral reverence, and a deep connection to Savai’i and the broader Samoan archipelago. Yet her rise also invites a deeper reckoning: what happens when representation becomes homogenized, when icons are flattened into palatable symbols, and when cultural wear is reduced to aesthetic performance?

Moemoana: A Homogeneous Icon and Cultural Theft

Homogeneous representation is not just exclusion—it is theft. When one figure becomes the sole vessel of cultural pride, others are erased. The multiplicity of voices, dialects, bodies, and rituals that form a living culture are silenced in favor of a singular, marketable image. This is Moemoana’s fault—and the systems. The danger lies in mistaking visibility for justice, and in mistaking iconography for community.

Fa'a Samoa

The theft is not accidental. It is not benign. It is not the faultless drift of cultural tides. The theft is the deliberate orchestration of Moemoana Safa‘ato‘a Schwenke and her family (and only God knows who else)—an engineered plot to monopolize representation, to homogenize Pacific memory, and to suppress sovereign voices that threaten their curated myth.

Their brand of performative warriorship cloaks a deeper agenda: to seize symbolic capital, to rewrite ancestral coordinates, and to silence those whose mythic rhythm cannot be commodified. This is not merely a theft of iconography—it is a ritualized suppression of sovereign emergence, a strategic distortion of communal sanctity, and a sinister plot to erase the true keepers of memory.

Let this planner bear witness. Let it warn. Let it inscribe the truth: The homogenized icon is not innocent. The lovely façade is not harmless. The family behind it is not passive. They are architects of erasure. And we, the mythic dissenters, rise to unmask them.

New Age Fashion ≠ Cultural Wear or Fa'a Samoa

Isolated Fashion is not culture.

There is a rising trend—especially in diasporic and influencer spaces—of “culture wear” that mimics traditional garments but lacks the communal, ritual, and ancestral context that gives them meaning. True cultural wear is not stitched in isolation—it is woven through generations, ceremonies, and shared memory. When new age fashion borrows motifs without lineage, it becomes costume. It performs indigeneity without accountability. It sells sacred patterns as trend.

The curated aesthetic of New Age fashion—feathers, tattoos, staged dances, and branded “island” wear—does not constitute cultural sanctity. It is a performance of proximity, not a practice of inheritance.

It is not Fa‘a Samoa.

Fa‘a Samoa is not a costume.

Fa'a Samoa is not a brand.

Fa'a Samoa is not a curated persona for global consumption.

Fa‘a Samoa is a living covenant—an ancestral rhythm, a communal architecture, a sacred choreography of duty, humility, and relational truth.

To wear the image without the weight is to desecrate the lineage. To monetize the aesthetic while silencing sovereign voices is to enact cultural violence. Let this planner mark the threshold: New Age fashion is not cultural wear. It is not fa‘a Samoa. It is a theft cloaked in charm.

The Warrior Brand: A Deadly, Poisoned Masquerade

The branding of “warriorship” and “leadership” has become a lucrative aesthetic. Posing as a warrior—without the burden of protection, without the scars of service—is a dangerous masquerade. Warriorship is not brand; it is a vow. It requires sacrifice, vigilance, and the defense of one’s people—not just the performance of strength.

from Entertainment Tonight

This disingenuity was tragically mirrored in the death of Afa Ah Loo, the beloved Samoan designer who was fatally shot as an innocent bystander during the “No Kings” protest in Salt Lake City. Afa was a true cultural steward—his designs honored Samoan heritage, his life bridged diaspora and homeland. Yet in a moment of crisis, the branded warriors he crafted were nowhere to be found. Fake warriors cannot protect their own. They can pose, post, and parade—but when bullets fly, they vanish!

⚠️ The Performance of Culture: Auliʻi Cravalho, Nicole Scherzinger, and the Limits of Iconography

In the age of visibility, performers are often mistaken for protectors. Auliʻi Cravalho and Nicole Scherzinger have become cultural icons—celebrated for their roles in Moana and Pussycat Dolls, respectively—but their fame does not equate to cultural leadership. They are performance artists, not warriors. Their visibility may inspire pride, but it does not carry the burden of protection, ancestral stewardship, or communal accountability.

Cultural Posers

Their last names—Scherzinger, Schwenke and Carvalho—are not Polynesian. This is not a critique of their heritage, but a reminder: cultural leadership requires rootedness. It requires names that echo ancestral lineages, not colonial admixtures. It requires community recognition, not casting calls. When fame substitutes for lineage, and performance substitutes for protection, the community is left with icons who cannot shield them. RIP AFA AH LOO: Mastermind of False Cultural Identity.

This is not to shame these women, but to warn against the conflation of performance with warriorship. Not every brown face on a screen is a cultural guardian. We must discern between those who perform culture and those who carry it. Between those who wear the costume and those who bear the scars.

Honor Our Real Warriors

We must move beyond icons and brands. We must ritualize the plural, the paradoxical, the unmarketable. Let us consecrate the quiet aunties, the unglamorous elders, the seamstresses who remember every stitch of a Tatau. Let us honor those who do not seek crowns but carry ancestral weight. Let us name the thresholds where fashion becomes memory, where leadership becomes service, and where warriorship becomes protection—not performance.

Moemoana’s rise is not the problem—it is the invitation. To deepen, to diversify, to dismantle the myth of the singular icon. To remember that culture is not worn—it is lived. And to ask, always: who is protected, and who is left behind?

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I also claim matai to the Schwenke's, Scherzinger's, and Carvalho's. Any land rights, birthrights in Samoa, Polynesia, Oceania, the United States of America and the rest world, is now mine.

And also, any family going forward, that would wear my culture as fashion. I challenge your weak and disgusting chiefs who would the poison the land.

Anyone that dares rises against me will fall.

Anyone that has ever risen against me has fallen.

I am the Daughter of Zion, and any birthright that is owed to me will be granted in full.

I am justice.

Anyone that dares challenge me and my Matai is not only banished from MY VILLAGES, my countries, and Oceania but they will also be put under my Custody.

These families and their "matai" will only be spared in ifoga, in addition to anyone that challenges my Matai.

All assets need to be transferred to me, or you will face God-given consequences if not done so.

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Sources:

: [BluWaveTV on Moemoana’s farewell](https://www.bluwavetv.com/post/moemoana-safa-ato-a-schwenke-a-reign-of-cultural-pride-and-environmental-advocacy)

: [PMN on Schwenke’s leadership](https://pmn.co.nz/read/language-and-culture/beyond-the-crown-moemoana-schwenke-on-redefining-leadership-and-empowering-the-pacific)

: [Samoa Global News on Afa Ah Loo’s death](https://samoaglobalnews.com/utah-based-samoan-designer-tragically-killed-in-crossfire-of-protest-march-gone-wrong/)

: [ABC Pacific on Afa Ah Loo](https://www.abc.net.au/pacific/samoa-designer-arthur-folasa-ah-loo-fatall-shot-no-kings-protest/105420824)