Argumentative Essay On Toddlers And Tiaras

Child beauty pageants began in the 1960s, but the modern glitz pageants first garnered public attention in 1995 with Painted Babies, a documentary that followed two 5-year-old glitz contestants and their families. The 1996 death of JonBenet Ramsey introduced the world to tot beauty queens and 2001 brought the documentary Living Dolls. Toddlers and Tiaras launched in 2009 . "high-glitz" pageants like the ones featured on Toddlers & Tiaras is a potential source in child body impairment, low self esteem, and pressures children to grow up too fast. The pint-size stars on that TV show are often pumped with sugar as they pile on fake hair, heavy makeup, and even false teeth before taking the stage. Many kids wear revealing outfits that critics say

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After video of the performance aired on The Learning Channel 's (TLC) popular reality television show Toddlers & Tiaras (Toddlers), it also earned cries of outrage and admonishment from news media, bloggers, and the public at large.’ Bodily impairment problems in child pageants are considered highly likely due to the consumption of large amounts of sugar and caffeine consumed by these children in order to remain alert throughout a long day of pageant activities. Pixie Six, a sugar-based candy, commonly known in the industry as "pageant crack," is one standard method parents use to keep their pageant princesses full of energy.40 Added sugar has been reported to be the worst ingredient in any diet. Not only does it negatively affect ones metabolism, but, it also a big contributor to resistance to the hormone insulin, which can contribute to diseases such as metabolic syndrome, obesity, cardiovascular disease and especially type II diabetes (). One Toddlers mother, June, has received particular media scrutiny for feeding her six-year-old daughter, Alana ("Honey

Placing children in the public eye to be judged according to apparel, makeup, and hair pushes to grow up at a faster rate by turning them into hyper-sexualized objects. Bolsters social acceptance of these types of voyeurism can in return lead to serious criminal activities like child exploitation and pornography as they now believe that these are the actions they must act upon in order to gain a social acceptance in the adult world. As Meg Gehrke explains, "This exchange of beauty for power is ultimately destructive to women because it results in dependency on men and lowered self-esteem and sense of self-worth”(Darling Divas or Damaged Daughters, 432). The child stars seen on TV shows like Toddlers and Tiaras are often dressed up with heavy makeup, fake hair, and even false teeth and eyelashes before shown off on stage. Many of these children often wear revealing apparel critiqued as not age-appropriate. Psychologist Henry Giroux warns that when beauty pageants impose adult-like gender stereotypes on very young girls, the consequences can be dangerous”(Darling Divas or Damaged Daughters, 433). Encouraged by their parents, these children are too young to understand this correlation and are expected to not only act like adults and live up to these expectations but to embrace it as a part of growing up. Mothers like that of five-year-old Carley from Toddlers and Tiaras admits