Even though there might be a lot of confidence on behalf of some of the children participants in the beauty pageantries, negative outcomes can also be presented in some other children participants, such as low self-esteem and serious health issues. When children compete with their opponents in a beauty pageant competence, confidence within the children may rise. Words of encouragement from their peers may be the only factor pushing them in order to feel and be better, as well as strive to be the winner of the contest. Confidence and high self-esteem can also be acquired when little girls, for example, utilize makeup and dress up in cute dresses, skirts, and even heels. While boosting confidence is great way for children, such as little girls, …show more content…
Since a lot of confidence is being emphasized throughout the contest to go out and be the best performer, it can be draining and damaging to a child’s confidence and self-esteem – even after the beauty pageantry. If the child loses the beauty pageantry, it can take a toll on them emotionally and physically. Losing a contest that the child has put so much focus and energy on, might make the child feel bad, not good enough, and even ugly. It can lead to doubt in themselves, not only in their everyday normal lives, but it can impact them for the rest of their lives. Feeling ‘not good enough’ due to losing in the beauty pageantry can also lead young children to severe depression, eating disorders, anorexia and bulimia, and image obsessions. According to Cartwright, “Many experts agree that participation in activities that focus on physical appearance at an early age can influence teen and/or adult self-esteem, body image and self-worth. Issues with self-identity after a child "retires" from the pageant scene in her teens are not uncommon” …show more content…
Being girly is always fun in the beauty pageantry world. When rocking cute outfits to catwalk in, girls become aware of their bodies and their physical appearance that they project while modeling. However, the beauty contest is all about competing with girls from all different shapes, sizes, skin tones, and nationalities. Due to every girl being completely different from each other, often time this causes awareness within the girl’s conscience because comparisons start being made and noticed. Beauty pageantries may be a hit-in-the-face realization when they become aware of how they look versus how they should look comparing their physical appearance to other girls in the competition, famous supermodels, and even the Barbie dolls they play with. Although thin waists, slim faces, contoured and defined cheek bones, and long legs are the beauty contestant girl’s idealization, their reality is far from it. The reality of their body complexion does not always live up to their expectation, which causes them to be self-conscious and aware of their body and physical
...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.
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.
“Pretty isn’t beauty. Pretty is how you look; Beauty is who you are. Pretty is in the face and body; Beauty is in the heart, mind, and soul. Pretty fades; beauty grows.” Michael Josephson emphasizes the difference between pretty and beauty. Unfortunately, the problem with young girls participating in glitz beauty pageants is that they are sadly being misguided. Glitz beauty pageants sexualize small children. Glitz beauty pageants exhibit “princesses by proxy.” Glitz beauty pageants sabotage young girls’ self-confidence. Furthermore, glitz beauty pageants are only harming young girls, not helping them.
Fake hair, false teeth, spray tans, and waxed eyebrows are just a few things that some of these girls have when preparing to compete. The competition consists of young girls competing for the crown of beauty. Attention starved moms put their daughters in older aged attire and layer them up with makeup and glam to compete for the winning title. The judges pick for the most beautiful girl wins the title, a sparkly crown, a trophy, and cash. Even though beauty pageants teach children to compete, child pageants are affecting children’s childhood because the children grow up faster than they should and it teaches young girls that their true beauty doesn’t exist and they should dress and act older to make people think they are beautiful.
Beauty pageant consists of five sections where all contestants have to perform in order to win. Those categories are talent, casual wear, long gown or evening dress, sportswear and question and answer section. The way contestants dress up usually depends on the type of pageant and system of competition. However, they are allowed to wear makeup, have different hairstyles and wear fitted outfits. According to proven statistics, approximately 5,000 child beauty pageants are held per year and about 250,000 child participate in this glittery, full of glam competition. Based on statistical records presented by Women’s News, 72% of 100,000 beauty pageants hire pageant coaches every year in the United States. shockingly, 6% of these beauty pageant contestants suffer from depression because of the pressure put upon the contestants (OCCUPYTHEORY, 2013). As Ioannou(2011) has pointed out, the percentage of girls hospitalized because of eating disorder has increased tremendously by 270% over the past 10 years. Even participants at the age of seven years old have been diagnosed with...
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.
Beauty pageants have caused an increase in mental and physical issues in young girls who participate. Participation and competition for a beauty prize where infants and girls are objectified and judged against sexualized ideals can have significant mental health and developmental consequences that impact detrimentally on identity, self-esteem, and body perception ("We must protect our kids from the catwalk of shame."). If young girls don't win, they might take it personally and get hurt feelings. The child might end up feeling unattractive or inadequate ("Child Beauty Pageants Pros and Cons.") which can lead to the development of disorders such as bulimia or anorexia. ("How Do Child Beauty Pageants Affect a Child's Development?") These are both eating disorders girls develop to lose weight excessively. Furthermore, the average BMI of a beauty pageant contestant as of 2010 is 18.3 (Beauty Pageant Statistics), which is classified as underweight...
Child beauty pageants have been a part of American society since the 1960’s (Nussbaum). The children that compete in these contests are usually between the ages of two and eighteen, but there are some cases where the contestants begin competing in child beauty pageants younger than the age of two, or as soon as they are able to walk. Divisions include sportswear, talent, casual wear, swim wear, theme wear, decade wear, evening wear, interview, western wear, and outfit of choice. The child contestants are judged based on poise, perfection, looks, capability, and confidence. The prizes of the child beauty pageants di...
This day in time body image is a common problem amongst pre-teen to teen females, as puberty is starting and the media portrays unrealistic body images for girls to fulfill in order to feel beautiful. Participation in pageantry at a young age has been linked to body image and self-confidence problems in future life. Martina Cartwright’s central claim in “Child Beauty Pageants: What Are We Teaching Our Girls?” is that participation in child beauty pageants will children to be affected by “The Princess Syndrome,” which means that pageantry will cause children to have the mindset that they have to have an unrealistic body type to be accepted. Swimwear in adult pageants are based off of physical fitness rather than, the thinness of the contestant.
Beauty pageants contests easily affect girls. By watching TV shows such as Miss America, Toddlers and Tiaras, young girls develop the desire to be like the participants they see on TV. Given that young people have incomplete psychosocial and cognitive development, they easily succumb to what is in their environment. Therefore, watching beauty pageants affect their attitudes towards their body. They, too, begin to practice what they see, as means to realizing the same body size and shape. In view of this, young girls begin to spend much of their time in trying to perfect their body. This poses significant effect in their lives given that they allow everything else to take a back seat. Unfortunately, the eventual outcome only proves to be counterproductive. As has been the case, beauty pageant contests create the notion of "The Princess Syndrome" among participants. This couples with unrealistic expectations to be slender, perfect, and physically beautiful. Participants seek to be attractive. They...
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)
Beauty pageants for young children are an ugly spectacle. The children are being judged on how they look and at such a young age everyone knows that looks change all the time as such a young child. As they get older these young girls may come to realize that being judged favorably on the basis of your appearance is the
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.
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.”
Can anyone actually justify judging someone by their physical appearance? Although parents enjoy seeing their little girls in the spotlight all dolled up, most children don’t enjoy the pageant experience as much as the parents, and this vicarious living is dangerous, and the pageants have the capability of exploiting the children. Beauty pageants have a background of treating women disrespectfully and as if they are not equal. Women’s bodies are seen as objects of beauty, as if we are just here to parade around for others. Today’s pageants are still set up in the same direction, even for the youngest contestants.