Preview

Child Beauty Pageants

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
958 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Child Beauty Pageants
Jesus Cifuentes
Professor Ashkiani
English 115
June 19, 2013 CHILD BEAUTY PAGEANTS Children are masters of fantastical ideas, and these pageants can be a plentiful playground for their fantasies to come to life. But these fantasies can come at a high price and self worth. Child beauty pageants are contests that feature children less than eighteen years of age. These competitions are categorized in talent, interview, casual wear etcetera; contestants wear makeup and elaborate complex hairstyles and fitted outfits to represent their routines. But how does it develop the child while they grow into becoming adults as these beauty pageants could harm the child’s well-being as the child looses their sense of their childhood. Sheldy Colene Pannell, a sociologist questions why parents would subject their children to gender socialization on TLC’s hit television series are specially criticized negatively influencing to children that their physical appearance will score them attention and win prizes and pageants. While child pageants are not inherently sexual there are types of pageants that create an atmosphere which heavy makeup emphasizes full lips and flushed cheeks. Syd brown a child and adolescent psychologist implies “when you have them looking order, for a lot of people that means looking sexier. I don’t think it’s a great idea for girls at that age to be focused so much on their sexuality.” There have been reports of children that have been sexually abused; these researches have shown that the sexualization of child beauty pageants is a contributing factor to these abuses. Also if the child wins constantly by her seductive looks she or he is more likely to develop psychological issues later in their lives, as they soon figure out that they could obtain what they want just on good looks. Lucia Grosorv in her everyday psychology article claims that a female child is very prone to develop eating disorders such as anorexia and bulimia as she focuses so

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Good Essays

    Lindsay Lieberman explains how child pageantry causes emotional, physical, and monetary effects on both the competitors and the parents; this is the central claim of “Protecting Pageant Princesses: A Call for Statutory Regulation of Child Beauty Pageants.” Minor claim number one is that pageants can cause detrimental effects on a young woman such as depression, eating disorders, and body image issues that accelerate into lifetime problems. Brook Breedwell competed in pageants as a young child, and she explains that this industry caused her to suffer from stress, anxiety, and body image issues as she was raised in the industry that requires females to be unrealistic. Lieberman also states the minor claim of explain that NC House of Representatives…

    • 323 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The author does not come right out and say, “Pageants are bad.” He draws the reader in with his descriptions of the activities of the children and their parents along with the pageant promoters. He opens by illustrating the transition of a young 6-year-old. Plenty of 6-year-olds have played dress up over the years by putting on mommy’s lipstick or high heels,…

    • 445 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Toddlers And Tiaras

    • 469 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Children should not look older than there age because it can cause harm in their life. Another psychological problem is anorexia and bulimia. Telling young children what beauty is, but all beauty really is is your natural beauty. Making young children to be insecure about their body image and their looks that they won’t call themselves beautiful anymore. In the article, “Toddlers and Tiaras” Beauty Pageants: Are They Good for Our Children?”…

    • 469 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Annotated Bibliography

    • 482 Words
    • 2 Pages

    Beauty pageants made their first appearances in America during the 1920’s, where women flaunted around casinos, determined to win a crown for their physical attractiveness. The owner of the casino where these activities occurred, figured that this would attract more tourists. Throughout the years, more modern pageants were formed, like Ms. USA and Ms. America. Following in the footsteps of its adult form, child beauty pageants merged into the 1960’s. Child beauty pageants usually consist of modeling sportswear, evening wear, and showing off any special talent they may have. Judges critique the girls individually, based on their physical looks, poise, confidence, and perfection. To the judges, this is called “the complete package.” Although the objective of most child pageants is to build confidence and self-worth, beauty pageants can be considered exploitive to minors by causing them to believe in unrealistic ideas about beauty.…

    • 482 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Better Essays

    When you picture young children growing up, you imagine girls being interactive in gymnastics and dance and boys are playing rough in sports. But days in this time and era have girls becoming involved in beauty pageants. Parents are enrolling their children as young as six months old into pageants all around the United States. Obviously, parents are the ones to blame and children really don’t have a choice in the matter. Toddlers and Tiaras is a show on TLC that shows exactly what children have to go through. They have to sit through many sleepless hours of getting fake hair, nails and tans to end up becoming someone they don’t even know after a look in the mirror. What is that image teaching a child growing up in today’s society? To physically look beautiful and have the perfect, fake body image? Beauty pageants don’t need to be intense. If parents took the time to slow down and understand how serious they were acting, they would see how these children are stressed out. Parents seem to worry more about pageant life then to actually put their kids into school. After so many years psychological problems start to develop within the child which can end up being disruptive to family relationships and harm the natural course of the young ones’ childhood.…

    • 1843 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    Girls as young as nine are roaming the internet finding pictures and videos of female living unrealistic lives and bodies. According to Polce, Barbara, etc. “Media's messages regarding what to wear, or more invasively, what to weigh and how to sculpt muscles, may relate to adolescent worries about physical appearance and self-evaluations. Additional empirical investigation of the association between contemporary media influences and self-esteem is needed, with attention given to age and gender patterns” (Polce-Lynch, Mary, Barbara J. Myers, Wendy Kliewer and Christopher Kilmartin. 2001) demonstrating that Media can affect young women in more ways than just one. It tells them to be up to date with all the latest styles, brands, and…

    • 1069 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Powerful Essays

    Positives in Pageants

    • 1807 Words
    • 8 Pages

    The debate about beauty pageants is as varied as the kind of beauty pageants which are in existence today. Pageants go anywhere from the traditional late teens, early twenties, type pageant; to children’s pageants; to pageants for the disabled; and pageants for everything in between. No matter what kind of pageant it is, beauty is always a factor in determining the pageant’s outcome. That does not necessarily mean exterior beauty though; some pageants focus on inner beauty and strength.…

    • 1807 Words
    • 8 Pages
    Powerful Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Most individuals believe that children are forced to attend these pageants, when in reality they have an option on whether they want to do it or not. No one obligates them to go to pageants. Children are not required to wear makeup, dresses, or heels there are natural pageants. It is all based off of the child’s opinion. Girl’s attend pageants to learn from their experience and experiencing loss gives them a guide on how to better themselves.…

    • 439 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    The idea of child pageants creates much conflict and discouragement to others whom do not have children. Young girls whom participate in this activity are portrayed as sex objects just as women are as models because they are subjected to looking older and much more sensual. However, in some cases having children in child pageants creates social skills along with comfortability performing in front of others. The idea of little girls being entered into child pageants is intimidating to most people due to the fact that children are not supposed to look like adults until they are old enough. Many people frown upon the whole concept of a child being exposed to older men and women having them wear makeup and flirtatious outfits. As older women are also involved in beauty pageants, they too go through extreme acts of body changes making it harder for parents to fathom. Restricting little girls from engaging in beauty pageants or contests protects them from dangerous people along with remaining pure with their self-worth, learning to live as a child and not a woman, and retaining a healthy emotional mind.…

    • 1117 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    The saying “Never judge a book by its cover” simply means don’t judge a person based only on appearance; however, in a beauty pageant it is hard to follow that phrase. In many of the glitz pageants, children are seen wearing heavy make up, spray tans, fake eyelashes, hair extensions, and flippers. Having contestants endure in all these beauty changes, demonstrates how natural beauty is not pretty. In Laura Agadoni article “How Do Child Beauty Pageants Affect a Child’s Development?” TV talk show host and psychologist Phil McGraw told pageant moms to explain to their children that a beauty pageant is a fantasy (Agadoni, 2003). McGraw said, “Children can easily believe after competing in pageants that they should concentrate too much on external…

    • 221 Words
    • 1 Page
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    People who are against the pageants complain that they should be eliminated because they exploit children and place them in harm’s way. They claim because of major dangers; no one under the age of eighteen should be placed in a beauty pageant. The children who are in the pageants are dressed up in adult’s clothing, have piles of make up on, and are harming their bodies. They are harming their bodies by putting the make up on and tanning. By putting make up on at such young of an age, their face ages faster. By tanning, they begin to get that urge that some adults have to tan, which makes their skin age and have wrinkles early. It also puts them at the risk of having skin cancer at an early age. They say it also appeals the children to sexual predators. When a child is half naked on stage and sometimes on TV, these sexual predators see them and may even try to meet them. Sexual predators are only part of the problem. Studies show that every child who may benefit from the competition, hundreds of others suffer damage to their self-esteem and have warped self-vision of themselves and their bodies. Many times, they use JonBenet, a young child who competed in these pageants at the age of six. She was murdered in the basement of her home by a sexual predator. The suspect claimed he became aware of her by the pageants being on television.…

    • 559 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Child Beauty Pageants

    • 578 Words
    • 3 Pages

    What do beauty pageants necessarily entail that makes them immoral, that makes it seem horrible to the populace? The ideas I seem to find most interesting for me to answer are many which I will list and the reader will read as they are introduced, which is to say they will not all be announced in one clump. Now, for someone to be an apologist or attacker of this topic, a description ought to be provided which I do so here “A child beauty pageant is a beauty contest featuring contestants under 16 years of age. Competition categories may include talent, interview, sportswear, casual wear, swim wear, western wear, theme wear, outfit of choice, decade wear, and evening wear. Depending on the type of pageant system (glitz/natural), contestants…

    • 578 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    This article focuses on the effect of child beauty pageants has on the young girls and sometimes girls participating. Many problems rise from participation such as self-esteem issues and also problems with self-identity. “Education takes a back seat,” says Cartwright, author of the article, presenting another issue. She also concludes that the vigor of these pageants can be too much for these young children and that the parents either don’t care or don’t see it. This article is credible being that it’s written by Martina M. Cartwright, Ph.D., R.D., in Food For Thought. It’s also credible in that the website, Psychology Today, is where the article is found. This website is solely focused on issues in the psychology realm. This source was helpful also providing me with extensive detail and presenting the difference of society’s views and the pageants mom’s views on the topic.…

    • 2645 Words
    • 11 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Stereotypes In Pageants

    • 2146 Words
    • 9 Pages

    Many girls are put under so much pressure that they face many issues of depression if they don’t win. These reasons are why we need to have an age limit on pageants and not let girls compete in glitz pageants when they are younger. The glitz pageants should only be offered to girls who have had a makeup routine and are old enough to get fake nails, spray tanned, and their legs…

    • 2146 Words
    • 9 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Societal influences have the potential to negatively impact one’s body image, particularly through participation in a Child Beauty Pageant. This “extracurricular activity” introduces unrealistic ideal images to children at such a young age; children, particularly females, are impacted psychologically and physically from this controversial practice, as well as from the undesirable parenting behind it. Society as a whole is also impacted by the airing of sexualized shows such as Toddlers and Tiaras. The early introduction and exposure to a sexist and sexualized competition will ultimately damage that child’s mental health in the future. This will result in a prolonged, destructive sense of self leading into adulthood. In Henry A. Giroux’s article,…

    • 825 Words
    • 4 Pages
    Good Essays