Beauty And Beauty Pageants

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On one hand its easy to notice all of the outrageous amounts of money put into beauty pageants, but on the other hand we must note how much a young girl spends in day to day life on cosmetics and beauty treatments. Young girls notice all of the make up that certain celebrities/ beauty contestants will wear and think that they must look the same or dress the same way as the celebrity or contestant so they can feel beautiful and “fit in” with society. On an average girls who are just about to hit their teens spend thousands, sometimes millions on cosmetics and different beauty treatments all in the hopes that they will add up to the other girls seen within social media and pageants, “ fourth graders are in the market for lush $50 haircuts; …show more content…

When entered into a beauty pageant there is a talent portion and swimwear/active wear categories, by having these portions of the contest we are teaching our girls to use their bodies to feel beautiful. A majority of the young girls who are doing the talent portion of the pageant will dance for their talent, these girls are taught to use their cute smiles and sometimes sexual movements to impress the judges to get a crown as representation of their beauty. Over the years a controversy of the swimwear portion of the contest has made an impact to the point where teen pageant competitions now have active wear instead of swimwear in a way to promote a healthy lifestyle that all the girls must have. Even with the switch to active wear girls are still being taught to idolize their bodies, “many of the young women with eating disorders were trained at an early age to value physical perfection, thinness, athletic prowess and attractiveness”. ( Cartwright, Child Beauty Pageants: What Are We Teaching Our Girls?) Another issue that Cartwright brings up about what we are teaching our girls is we are teaching young girls to strive for the wrong form of attention. These young girls are learning that the best kind of attention comes from the way you look. That the outward appearance is what matters, vs whats inside. Pageants also teach girls the wrong form of competitiveness, pageants are teaching them to compare themselves to the girl standing next to them and try to be more beautiful than they are. On the contrary some pageant parents will state that “competing in beauty contests is no different from playing a sport, which also requires time and money and puts intense pressure on young competitors…. like young athletes, little beauty queens learn discipline,and feel great pride in

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