Young Beauty Contests
For years beauty contests have been around for people of all ages. These classy, beauty contests are known to be wonderful and exciting for children. Many assume that these contests result in nothing but positive aspects. Walking up and down a stage, almost like modeling, can make someone feel confident, beautiful, and also bring great opportunities in his/her future. Feeling special under that bright light would make anyone smile. It is interesting how a lot of parents involved in these pageants think their child needs beauty pageants to help the child’s self-esteem and the way he or she feels inside. Attention is wonderful and the feeling of looking perfect would bring smiles among the person or child competing and the audience. Some people take beauty contests far too far when it comes to children and even babies. These pageants have negative emotional, physical outcomes, and can cause problems in the future of these contestants. Thus, beauty pageants may seem positive to many people, but they can have negative outcomes.
Many argue that beauty pageants are good on a child’s self-esteem and confidence. Confidence and self-esteem are important aspects in young children while going through their childhood stages. Supporters of beauty pageants for young children also believe beauty pageants help in the child’s confidence, will help in future public speaking, and being in front of crowds. However, these ideas can be immature in some cases. It is said that adults do not remember being under the age of three so how would these pageants help a child in the future if they decide to stop doing pageants and move on to something else, as most of them do. These youngsters can also become overly confident and have t...
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...lopmental process of growing up. Beauty pageants for young children are not only physically damaging and could lead to bad outcomes in a child’s future. Young beauty pageants may seem positive to many people, but they can have negative outcomes which may affect a child in physical and emotional ways. Take off the tiara, and let a child be a child.
Works Cited
"Children and Beauty Pageants." Children and Beauty Pageants.N.p., n.d. Web. 28 Nov. 2013.
"The Effects of Beauty Pageants and Cutest Baby Contests on Children." GoodTherapyorg Therapy Blog Beauty Pageants and Children Its Not Always Pretty Comments. N.p., n.d. Web.
29 Nov. 2013.
"Oh Where, Oh Where Have Those Early Memories Gone?: A Developmental Perspective on
Childhood Amnesia." N.p., n.d. Web. 01 Dec. 2013.
"The Ugly Truth to Child Beauty Pageants." Uloop.N.p., n.d. Web. 30 Nov. 2013
In 2009, TLC aired a reality television show entitled Toddlers and Tiaras. It was instantly a hit with home viewers and also brought major controversy over child beauty pageants. The show focused mainly on glitz pageants; which requires all contestant, however young, to compete with make-up, spray tans, acrylic nails and revealing costumes. Many, such as I were entertained at first with the pint size Barbie dolls; however after watching a couple episodes, controlling stage moms and toddler melt downs reveal that glitz beauty pageants are nothing less than objectification and exploitation of young girls. Beauty pageants not only exploit children but are detrimental to the child’s physical, emotional and psychological health.
One professional psychologist and registered dietician has warned that competing in the beauty pageants may lead young girls to feel that the approval and love of their parents is based solely on their looks and whether they win a crown at the pageant or not. Losing in a pageant category may generate lower feelings of self-worth in young children who do not know how to properly cope with loss at such a young age. Additionally, there are countless examples of women who as children participated in beauty pageants and began stressing at a young age while attempting to maintain an impossible ideal of perfection. Many of the young girls who cannot keep up a perfect look will begin to feel body shame, depression and may even develop an eating disorder. In fact, one study was done on approximately 130 females who had participated in beauty pageants.
According to Wiehe, “Parents certainly have a right to spend their money on children as they wish, but if this expenditure of money and effort is for the ultimate goal of the child winning the contest and the child fails to do so, what is the emotional cost to the child? What happens to the child’s self-esteem?” (493) In reality a lot of pageant parents don’t think about the emotional damage that might happen. In pageants children get told all the time that receiving a tiara means that out of all the kids there the judges saw something pretty or talented about them, and if you don’t get a tiara then that means the opposite. For a child their minds will sum that up to the fact that they are not pretty enough. In Toddlers and Tiaras there was a scene in which the cameraperson asked the little girl if she felt gorgeous and right away the toddler started crying saying that she’s always gorgeous and yelling to her mother that the cameraperson thought she was not
Villines, Zawn. "The Effects of Beauty Pageants and Cutest Baby Contests on Children."GoodTherapy.org, Therapy Blog, Beauty Pageants and Children: It’s Not Always Pretty. Good Therapy, 15 Nov. 2012. Web. 22 Feb. 2014.
Child beauty pageants have been a part of American society since the 1960’s. These pageants consist of modeling swimwear, evening attire, dance and talent. The young children entered in the pageants are judged on perfection, confidence, capability and looks. Judges would call this “the complete package.” Children are divided into different age groups to make the pageants fair. They are guided by there parents who spend well over 200 dollars for the pageants. Money is spent on fake nails, hair extensions, makeup, clothing, eyebrow waxing, and anything else their parents are willing to do to make their child the best looking. Keep in mind that these little girls range from ages 1-12. The issues with these pageants are that these extremely young girls are beginning to compare themselves to other “prettier” girls, which leads to negative effects in the future.
Many children are involved in pageants, and many varieties of people have different opinions. Some people feel that they are good, others not so much. Opinions vary from person to person, and reasoning also varies. But, the real question for this topic is "are these pageants good for them in the long run?"
Beauty pageants are linked with an immense variety of negative effects. These children are trying to be someone that they are not. The effects on these children can escalate quickly and affect them their entire life. When a parent first enters their child in a pageant, they do not think about the negative consequences they could have on their child. No parent wants to experience the tragedy that the Ramsey family did. Although some children do gain things from these pageants, the majority of them are harmed. The effects from these pageants range from eating disorders and body image problems to social and psychological problems. If there are not regulations put on these pageants in the near future, our young children are going suffer from growing up to fast. When will people learn that looks are not everything and we should let the kids be kids?
compete in an ‘adult-like’ beauty pageant. They have to act like grown women where they are expected to look beautiful and graceful. They are simply removed from their nature and pushed to wear costumes that socialize their figure that are not appropriate for their age. By the time a child ceases from pageantries, she will almost likely be psychologically hurt and have self-esteem problems. Treating the children as adult ruins the spontaneity and the dynamism that children carry as part of their nature. According to Toddlers & Tiaras, viewers gets a glimpse on how child beauty pageant works as it is just as pressurising as adult’s beauty pageant.
" In the end, children’s beauty pageants are essentially harmful to both young girls safety and minds. It may not happen to some, but most of the young girls that compete in beauty pageants seem to have a bit of an attitude towards their parents and other people who will not cooperate with them.... ... middle of paper ... ...
Some claim that they help boost self-esteem but that is just not true. India Knight states in her article titled, France had said ‘non’ to those creepy child beauty pageants-why don’t we? that “no confidence was ever bred by a child being judged on its looks.” She also goes on to say that pageants involve “the indoctrination of the poor children… that all that matters are looks, ‘glamour’, and ‘sparkle’” (Knight). Not only do the pageants teach that outer beauty is everything, they also “encourage girls to change their looks to fit narrow, invented standards of beauty” (O’Neill). With so much pressure being put on them to look good, they can lose confidence and even possibly suffer from eating
Many young girls are forced to wear preposterous outfits and enormous amounts of makeup that deny them of their innocence at a young age. Beauty contests are meant more for adult women who are mature enough to understand all that’s going on and can handle losing competitions to the other contestants. Children should not be able to compete in pageants because of the harmful effects on self-confidence and character. Some people think they are good and some do not agree that they are good. (Leo, 2014)
Issues regarding the purpose of beauty pageants alarm women since majority of the beauty pageants are for them. Let us look at the good side of beauty pageants. First, allows the use...
Beauty pageants have long been a form of entertainment, exhibiting beautiful women with ideal bodies competing for their talent and looks. Many pageant moms involve their daughters in children’s pageants to help them improve their social skills, exercise their talents, and boost their self-esteem. Although the pageants may seem like harmless competition with benefits, research shows that they may be doing the young beauty queens more harm than good. “.the girls are receiving conflicting messages: In order to win, the girls must show a unique personality, but they must also act and dress in a hyper feminine manner and conform to the pageant world's ideal standard of beauty and narrow set of conventions.”
Cromie, William J. “The Whys and Woes of Beauty Pageants.” News.harvard.edu. 2000-2014. Web. 30 Apr. 2014.
Today there are many new extracurricular activities that occupy a lot of young Americans minds. One trending activity is beauty pageants. It is more common in children where the ages may vary between eight months and even older. The trending debate is whether or not beauty contest serve any purpose in society. While many Americans feel as though pageants are helpful to a child’s self esteem, many feel that the effects of the contest have a very harsh effect on child development by devaluing a child. Researchers have found that beauty contests are effective for women to help make platforms for their careers and also create new jobs for women to create like mentoring children.