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Ethics of beauty pageants
The adolescent’s preoccupation with body image and the problems that arise
Beauty pageants and society
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According to Bloul (2012, p. 4) exploitation in the modern world is one of the major problems affecting the society. There are various kinds of exploitation in the world today, including sweatshop working, slavery, and trafficking among others. Money is said to be the main reason for all kinds of exploitation in the modern world. Make-up, teased hairstyles, hair extensions, flippers (fake teeth), clouds of hairspray, sophisticated costumes, weird postures, screaming crowds (mostly mothers), twitched face expressions, trophies, tiaras, and money are the main ingredients for the beauty pageants for underage girls, along with hysterical crying, exercised smiles and outbursts. There is an increasing debate as to whether beauty pageants for underage girls fall under the category of exploitation or generally an ethical issue in the modern society. It is for this reason that France has led way towards the banning beauty pageants for underage girls. The question as to whether other countries such as the United States should follow in the trend to ban them is the focus of this paper, and the anger is yes. This paper provides evidence for the argument that beauty pageants for underage girls should be discontinued because they are exploitative.
Argument in support of thesis
The senate in France has recognized the negative side of the beauty pageants for underage girls and moved a motion to ban them (Nick, 2013, p. 12). Various reasons in support of this move will be discussed in this paper. One of the main reasons for the support of the move by the country and for the need for the same to be done in other countries, as argued by Latham (1995, p. 150), is the ‘hypersexualization’ of the children. It is a fact that such activities make chil...
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...arrwright, Martina M. "Princess By Proxy: What Child Beauty Pageants Teach Girls About Self-Worth And What We Can Do About It." Journal Of The American Academy Of Child & Adolescent Psychiatry 51.11 (2012): 1105-1107.
Grosaru, Lucia. Toddlers and children beauty pageants – Risk factors for severe psychological turmoils, psychology corner, 2009. Available http://psychologycorner.com/toddlers-and children-beauty-pageants-%E2%80%93-risk-factors-for-severe-psychological-turmoils/
Latham, Angela J. "Packaging Woman: The Concurrent Rise Of Beauty Pageants, Public Bathing, And Other Performances Of Female "Nudity." Journal Of Popular Culture 29.3 (1995): 149-167.
Nick, Bramhill. "France bans contests for girls in lipstick and heels." Daily Mail 19 Sept. 2013: 12.
Tice, Karen W. "Queens Of Academe: Campus Pageantry And Student Life." Feminist Studies 31.2 (2005): 250-283.
In “Toddlers In Tiaras” Skip Hollandsworth purpose is to get readers to understand that pageants are teaching young girls to young women that the sexualization of their looks are their main value, leaving a negative effect on contestants physically. He believes parents are usually the main reason why young girls join the pageants to begin with so, he targets parents as the audience of his essay. To get readers to understand his point of view and to persuade them to agree with him he displays evidences from reliable sources using ethos, pathos and logos throughout the article.
Children beauty pageants encourage young girl’s to wear make-up, dress in fancy, expensive clothes, and prove to the judges they have what it takes to beat the other contestants. Jessica Bennett states in Tales of a Modern Diva “But this, my friends, is the new normal: a generation that primps and dyes and pulls and shapes, younger and with more vigor. Girls today are salon vets before they enter elementa...
Michelle Healy's "Could child beauty pageants be banned in the USA?"(Article A) appears in the USA Today on September 25, 2013. This article gives a response to the issue of France's proposal to ban beauty pageants. “Instead of following France’s proposal to ban child beauty pageants, researchers in the USA say safety regulations and education about how the competitions affect children are needed.” Healy uses persuasive techniques such as logos, pathos and ethos to convince people that it’s the parents’ responsibility to take responsibility on how they betray their daughters. The article also shows both sides of the disagreement therefore convincing other people even more since it shows that there are many reasons to agree or disagree with beauty pageants for children under the age of seventeen.
...as Miss USA and Miss Universe are competitions intended for mature, self-assured women who are capable of making their own decisions. Child beauty pageants, however, ruin childhoods and force them to grow up believing in their looks, rather than in themselves. It is no surprise, that emotional distress plagues the contestants that participate in beauty long after stepping off of the stage; subjecting young girls of any age to judgment and ridicule is not only humiliating but horrific to think that we are sitting back being entertained by their competitive nature. Rather than raising strong, confident girls who want to achieve the best in life; the parents and the hosts of these competitions provide a platform on which little girls are dressed up as skimpy Barbie dolls and paraded around, trying to achieve some form of perfection that shouldn’t exist in little girls.
Beauty pageants that involve children are a booming industry and growing fast in popularity. This is partially because of television shows like Toddlers and Tiaras and Living Dolls, which glorify pageants that threaten the innocence of childhood. According to Lucy Wolfe, “in 2011, three million children participated in pageants across the country” (454). With so many children, some as young as six months old, partaking in pageants and countless more aspiring to be pageant princesses, a closer look needs to be taken at the practices that are used to prepare them for the show. Often working long hours, not only prepping for the pageant but also performing in it, the children have no laws protecting them from being harmed or exploited.
Look at child beauty pageants. Notice that the girl’s childhood is filled with sparkly dresses and makeup. They are trying to grow up to fast and if they continue on this path they could turn out like a “special” celebrity. These kid’s faces have foundation, fake eyelashes with mascara, and bright lipstick. On top of that they are wearing clothes that aren’t appropriate for kids. If they continue to act the way they do now the next generation of girls to be total brats. Some psychology experts believe that these pageants are teaching children to act and dress about ten years above their age. Therefor child beauty pageants should be banned.
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.
She grabs the foundation and smothers her face with it; she creates a mask. She sprays the hairspray till the fumes clog the air. She squeezes into her bejeweled dress and puts on her heels. She transforms into someone who is unrecognizable, and fake. This is a little girl. The process of preparing for a beauty pageant is very demanding and stressful while little girls spend hours training and getting ready for their appearance on stage. Weeks are spent choreographing their dance routines and thousands of dollars are spent on, “glitzy” dresses, fake teeth, and spray tans. As long as beauty pageants for girls under the age of 16 continue, there will be an increase in mental and physical issues, an increase in the objectification of women, and there will be negative impacts for little girls.
“Based on statistics about 5,000 child beauty pageants are held every year and about 250,000child contestants are participating” (Occupy Theory). Beauty pageants obtain the purpose of growing skills and confidence for contestants. Over the years, beauty pageants have gone over the top for young contestants because parents will do anything to win even if it means exposing their child. Beauty pageants may bring the physical beauty out of your children but pageantry is only neglecting your child because it brings these negative effects and pageants are only teaching children that the physical beauty will get them anywhere in life.
" 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 ... ...
That’s just biased, putting women in different categories. Versing into a more extreme version of the beauty pageant is the one for little girls. These pageants are for girls aged six to eight, girls as young as four have entered. Just like the adult pageants they have to go through test that showcases their talents. Wearing full faces of make-up and short reveling clothing and swim suites. Their being sexualized at an extremely young ages. Should toddlers be allowed to be showed off as prizes, of who’s the prettiest? It is going to creating emotional and psychological problems in the long run. It is creating a false identity, that perhaps their looks are the most important part of them. As well as anyone with a television screen can look and can watch. There are pariahs out there. However one of the biggest points for competing in a beauty pageant could be the national pride, and being a part of a larger community. It shows cases women’s talents and attributes, not just deeming to how women look. They are also competing to win a scholarship, to become more educated in the long run. Beauty pageants for the
Restricting the age requirements on beauty pageants will take the pressure off children that do not want to participate in pageants and were forced to take part. Nicole Hunter wrote an article about the issues she went through competing in beauty pageants at a young age. Since she was four, she had been competing in high glitz beauty pageants all over the world unwillingly. She explains how it was not her dream but her mothers. She felt as though she did not have the option to say no. In a blog that she wrote about her experiences, she shares how to this day she still struggles with a low self-esteem, especially when she does not wear makeup. For many years now, she has been fighting anorexia nervous, and just now as an a...
Modern beauty contests started in the United States of America in 1880 with the first Miss United States bathing beauty contest held at Rehoboth Beach, Delaware. Since then, beauty pageants had been popular in many parts of the world. Miss Universe, Miss World and Miss International, participated in every year by more than fifty countries, ceaselessly attracts huge audiences and supporters. The biggest, the Miss World competition, had been running annually since 1951, and although it is less popular in the UK now than it was in 1968, when it attracted 27.5 million TV viewers, it still attracts an enormous worldwide audience of up to 3 billion viewers in 120 countries. [1] Although the main purpose of these pageants are to empower women, the crowned winners are also traveling around the world in order to support causes like HIV/AIDS and children's charity organizations. [2] Due to the success of these internationally produced pageants, various beauty contests for different classes of age, sex and sexuality stemmed up. However, even with the huge diversity, the content of each pageants have almost always been the same: all of them are comprised of the mainstream categories like swimwear portion and evening gown portion. With these content, beauty pageants gives out strong messages regarding what the ideal type of woman is, hence undermining the purpose of a beauty pageant: to empower women. Thus, although beauty pageants contribute to the entertainment of the masses, it promotes an ideal of female beauty that only a minority of women can realistically aspire, objectifies women, further advances cultural insensitivity among its candidates and uses up too much resources which is why it should be banned.
Beauty pageants demand that competitors spend large amounts of money in synthetic enhancement. This is a poor focus for vulnerable girls and destroys the girls at a very young age. Beauty pageants convince girls that outer beauty is more important than inner beauty, which is totally a false claim. In this paper, we are going to talk about the pros and cons, whys and woes of pageants and if they are manipulative or valuable to kids. Even though that beauty pageants are a good way for girls to make friends. Beauty pageants are harmful to young children and they should not be able to compete until adulthood because beauty pageants teach kids that outer beauty is more important than inner beauty and beauty pageants pose a threat to the safety of children.
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.