Child Pageants

How would you feel if you were just a small child being told you aren’t beautiful naturally? Would you enjoy being made up with fake teeth, better known as flippers in the pageant world, fake hair, fake tan, plastered in makeup, and even fake nails? How would you like it if you were shoved in skimpy outfit after skimpy outfit and had to strut around a stage with it on? Would you have fun with your mother, father, coach, and other relatives putting constant pressure on you to be the best, to be perfect? Imagine all this while still trying to be a child, running around in mix matched clothes and making mud pies out back. But let us go even farther. Think about growing up with that distorted image of perfection and what beauty is, always thinking …show more content…
In fact, today’s society’s conventional beauty ideals, such as being thin, transfers over into the young pageant world. According to former pageant star, Marly Ramstad, pageants were a way to assure her that she had attained the perfect figure (Goode 3). Marly had already been suffering from an eating disorder, Anorexia, and this was her way of validating her weight, therefore perpetuating the baneful, unhealthy concept that only thin is beautiful. Sadly, this happens a lot more than one may think in the children’s pageant world. “A report by the American Psychology Association found that the hypersexualzation of young girls is strongly associated with eating disorders, low self-esteem, and depression” (5 Reasons Child Pageants are Bad for Kids). This can be seen in another study that showed out of one hundred and one girls that are involved in pageants, twenty-six percent reported having an eating disorder (Lindsey 8). As one may now plainly see, pageants are more than just a little harmful towards young girl’s vulnerable and developing