Child Beauty Pageants

Welcome to the world of child beauty pageants.  To some, this is a foreign world; to others, an all-consuming world.  Over the past year, America has been introduced to this phenomenon through multiple television series such as Toddlers and Tiaras and Little Beauties.  Throughout this zine, I will explore different aspects of the child beauty pageant world and pose questions that I have encountered while watching these TV shows and researching the issue.  Below is a short video that gives a glimpse into the many aspects of the pageants: pageant moms, children, babies, fancy dresses, spray tans, temper tantrums, trophies, and crowns.

The Costs

Child beauty pageants can be extremely expensive endeavors. 

 First, to travel to a beauty pageant, one must calculate traveling and lodging expenses.  Let’s say you drive from Gainesville, FL to Charleston, SC and spend approximately $100 on gas.

 To stay in a hotel for 2 nights, let’s pick a mediocre motel and say $70/night. 

We’re already at $240… And the pageant hasn’t even started…

In Universal Royalty Pageant, the minimum cost to enter the pageant is $545.

And, if you want your little girl to have a shot of actually winning, formal training is highly recommended.  Madison House, based on Ohio, charges $495 for twelve hours of training.

…1,280…

Well, what is she going to wear?? And, of course, hair, make-up, spray tan, and her fake teeth (aka Flippers) all need to happen….

Formal gown: $300-$12,000

Flippers: ~$200

Spray-Tan: ~$40

Make-up: ~$20

Hair Stylist: ~$40/hour

The average cost to put a child through one beauty pageant is ~$2,000. That’s excluding the price of dresses and flippers because those can be worn for multiple pageants.  Children can compete in multiple pageants per year, totaling tens of thousands of dollars in costs. Some families have reportedly gone into debt or lost their trailers because of pageant expenses. 

Many parents claim that putting their children in pageants teaches self-esteem.  It seems like parents may be able to think of less expensive, and more dependable, ways of teaching their children self-esteem and self-confidence.  What about paying a couple hundred dollars/year for them to take lessons in a particular sport/musical talent that they enjoy and then giving them ample positive reinforcement at home on their abilities?

Little Miss Sunshine

Would this be an accurate depiction of what a kid would do without receiving extensive training for their pageants routines from adults? When I was younger, I loved to perform little dances I made up for my friends and family.  Although I never ripped off my pants and shirt, my self-choreographed dance moves were definitely more similar to Olive’s dance moves in LMS than in the real pageant world.  This movie is a hilarious, but true, deptiction of the disparities existing between more “formally trained” pageants girls and “informally trained” pageants girls. I wonder if Olive would ever win first place in a real pageant.

Eating Disorder Association?

Anna Wonderlich and Diann Ackard performed a study on 22 women, 11 former child beauty pageant contestants and 11 non-contestants, to evaluate the association between child pageant participation and the development of eating disorders. 

 Childhood pageant participants scored higher on body dissatisfaction, interpersonal distrust, and impulse dysregulation than non-participants, and showed a trend toward greater ineffectiveness. There were no significant differences between groups on measures of bulimia, body perception, depression, and self-esteem.

These findings suggest childhood beauty pageant participation may influence adult body dissatisfaction, interpersonal distrust, and impulse dysregulation, but not bulimic behaviors, body perception, depression, and self-esteem

To be fair, a lot of other activities that children engage in other than beauty pageants also influence body dissatisfaction and interpersonal distrust, like being teased at school or being overweight as a child.  However, because parents are voluntarily engaging their children in acts that may prove harmful, I wonder if the good outweighs the possible negative effects.

Re-touching

This short video gives a glimpse of the transformation these little girls go through during the pageant process.  The natural pictures are already so adorable, but the re-touched photos make the girls look like fake baby dolls.

I feel this kind of retouching reinforces the desire that some women hold to reach a degree of unattainable beauty.  Just like in Playboy magazines, we are fed images of airbrushed women with their true, real features covered up.  However, we are led to believe this is the perfect female body that everyone should strive for.

Although these aren’t pictures of naked women, are the pictures of these little girls faces sending the same message?

It’s also worth it to take a quick scroll down the website for “Glitz Retouching.” ->  http://www.photoretouchinglab.com/miss-teen-usa-pageant-photo-retouch-online-glitz.html

 

Natural Beauty

This video is not of a pageant child, but instead of a little girl, filmed in her natural state of childhood beauty, preaching self-acceptance and self-confidence. Even though she may not fully understand the impact of her words, if she continues to hear this message, she is likely to mature as a self-confident and self- accepting woman. This video and the video posted above appear as polar opposites.

Psychological/ Physical Harm?

Some groups purport that child beauty pageants are actually a form of child abuse, as defined by the Child Abuse Prevention and Treatment and Adoption Reform Act…

“the physical or mental injury, sexual abuse or exploitation of a child under circumstances which indicate the child’s health or welfare is harmed or threatened.”

Exploitation is the word that catches my eye.  Are the 4-month old babies, or even the seven-year old girls, capable of making their own sound judgments on whether or not the pageants are detrimental to them psychologically? Of course, parents need to help their children make decisions as they mature, but it’s difficult to drawn the line between collaborative decision making and coercion for personal gain on the part of the parents.  When their children win at 4 months old, who is reaping the benefits of the situation? In the best case scenario, the parents contribute the cash prizes to a college fund for their children.  However, with pageants costing parents up to two thousand dollars, will there even be any winnings left over for that college fund if the parents reimburse themselves for their contributions?

Now, who is the reaper of the personal gain? In my opinion, it is the proud parent who gets to hear over and over how beautiful her baby is. Shouldn’t parents already know their baby is beautiful without a panel of judges telling them so? Sounds like the desire of bragging rights to me.

Beauty pageants are exempt from enforcing federal child labor laws, because these children are not seen as “working.” The argument could be made either way.  The most dedicated pageant girls practice six to seven days per week for hours at a time. Hair, spray tanning, and make up can take up to 4 hours before the pageant.  And, if the child is deemed a winner, she is paid for her “work” with cash prizes.

As demonstrated within the first 3 minutes of this video,  Asia’s grandmother is treating the pageantry as more of a business endeavor instead of plain fun.

And I quote, “…They’re giving away, I think it’s 5 cars. Asia could possibly win this car… And she’s got a real good shot at it. And grandmother needs a car.”

Please note the opening lyrics of “Hey Big Spender” being belted out by toddlers. Yikes.

Flippers- Fake Teeth for Kids

The transformation from cute kid to beauty queen

Dental flippers are a must-have for children taking place in beauty pageants… if they want to win, that is.  Flippers can cost anywhere from $200- $300 dollars. Missing baby teeth are apparently viewed as “gaping holes” that must be remedied.  When I see a little kid on the street with a front tooth missing, I immediately think “Aww, how cute!” It’s an endearing trait of children, in my opinion.  However, these children aren’t really expected to look like children.  Make-up, spray tans, and false, adult-like teeth transform these children into mini-women.

To teach self-confidence and self-worth, I think having these children show off their natural beauty, inner and, if you must, outer beauty would be a more effective approach.

A Little Comedic Relief

Chelsea Handler may be articulating what is on many peoples’ minds while watching these T.V. shows. Of course, we are shown a biased snippet of the day of the little girl screaming and crying. I am sure she does not spend her entire day crying, and probably enjoys putting on pretty dresses- sometimes. Most little girls enjoy playing dress up… but is it still fun when it becomes your “job?”

It’s difficult to say whether these little girls are “being shown” against their will. If someone watched this video alone, it sure would look like the mother is forcing beauty pageants upon her daughter. If the little girls are not enjoying this process, I wonder why the families choose to add a tremendous amount of stress to their lives. Like Chelsea says above, maybe it’s to fulfill their shattered dreams as kiddie beauty queens. Many parents live vicariously through their children. However, just because many parents do something, it doesn’t make it right.

Hopefully when this little girl gets old enough to actually formulate a sentence, her mother will keep her promise and stop the second she says, “Mommy, I don’t want to do it anymore.”

Teaching self-confidence, that “you’re just not quite pretty enough,” or that outer-beauty means everything?

The recent surge of shows on TLC and other television channels exposes America to the world of kiddie pageants like never before. Sure, we’ve all heard of the horrendous case of Jon Benet Ramsey. And, if your mom had you in a pageant when you were little, this may not come as that big of a surprise, either. However, for a lot of people, the extremes to which these children and families go to win a crown is almost incomprehensible. At least for me it is. While watching the shows, I hear the pageant mothers purport that their children are learning invaluable lessons of self-confidence. If they are constant winners, maybe they are becoming extremely self-confident young ladies. Alright, that’s all good and well, but will feelings of superiority based on outer beauty become a fixed part of these girls’ lives as they mature? And, if they are not regular winners, will they grow up believing they’re never “quite pretty enough” because a panel adult judges tells them so?

Either way, in my opinion, the children are learning that outer-beauty is the single most important factor in determining their worth as humans. Yes, boys partake in pageants, too, but not as overwhelmingly as little girls.

What values are these pageants teaching the little girls who will grow up to be adult women in society?

When the T.V. shows first aired, I was admittedly fascinated. When the initial curiosities wore off; however,I began to ask myself the questions like the ones posted above.

I ask you, is it teaching self-confidence, that “you’re just not quite pretty enough,” or that outer-beauty means everything?