Miss Universe Australia finalist, Stephanie Naumoska
Australia recently held the annual Miss Australia pageant to select the country's representative for the Miss Universe competition. One of the finalists was Stephanie Naumoska, in my opinion an irresponsible choice. Contrary to reports from all over the world, Stephanie wasn't the winner of the competition, but she was indeed a finalist. These things don't usually interest me, but the controversy that surrounded this years entrants brought the pageant to my attention and got me thinking about society's perception of beauty.
Beauty pageants in general are an outdated concept. Women volunteering to stand up and parade around in bikinis to have their implanted, rhinoplasted, starved bodies and faces judged seems crazy to me. They're starting to all look similar, with hair colour being the only variation. It's sad and it's scary. These girls with their robotic smiles plastered on their faces are supposed to represent beauty in our society?
Models in magazines are airbrushed almost beyond recognition. Cosmetic surgery rates are soaring. People are risking cancer to be tanned, others are bleaching their faces to be lighter. Women especially seem to need to fight the natural effects of aging. Why don't men seem to feel they have to do this? From what I've seen it's because women in general are harsher on themselves and on each other. Not all women obviously, but enough of them to matter.
Physical beauty is subjective. What is aesthetically pleasing to me might not be to you. How much should it really matter? Can the way our eyes and noses sit on our face possibly make us better people? I don't think it can.
I'd rather see young women judged on their actions, if they're going to compete at all and I'd like to see it as publicised as a universal beauty pageant. Or better still, just a celebration of intelligence, humour, compassion and courage - these are the qualities I'd like to see in a role model for my daughter. These are the things that are beautiful to me.
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Comments
Do you not think so?
denese
about "a celebration of intelligence, humour, compassion and courage;" why don't we already have that?
Denese, she does appear sick and underweight which is what started the controversy. Stepanie claims she eats 6 small meals a day and has a very fast metabolism. Every time I look at the photograph, I'm amazed that her hair looks so healthy because the rest of her certainly doesn't.
JK, I look for beauty too. When I'm out and about I find it everywhere. Like you said, it's just rarely what I'm told is conventional.
Nana, I don't know. Maybe you should do something about it :)
I think these young ladies should be seen as ill and not judged (not that you are Nat). We should feel for them just as we do a junkie or a alcoholic.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2009/05/01/miss-californias-breast-i_n_194385.html
We should not eschew this aspect of beauty, which is part of our heritage as creatures and which is a natural celebration of life.
It is this animal aspect of beauty (which almost everyone experiences in youth) which we all on some level or other long for when we begin to age and lose it. This is where artifice enters culture, to fantastic effect. I do not disdain the spectacular culture of artifice, which is typically judged and resented by puritans, who are generally uncomfortable with all things that are instinctual and which do not fall under strict, rational control. Like any art form, artifice can be extraordinarily effective or abysmally failed in the eye of the beholder.
All that being said I am not a fan of beauty contests which display young women in swimsuits, but only because I enjoy animal beauty in subtler, more sophisticated forms. Televised beauties filing along a stage to martial music under surgical lighting is not my idea of subtle.
It's terrible that she made it to the finalists' group because now a lot of young girls are going to adopt her unhealthy weight as their template. And I don't believe for a nanosecond that she eats 6 small meals, etc. etc. Unless she counts a meal as a carrot.
My definition of beauty? My Wife.
I'm so against the pageants. Sure the girls are all Barbie doll perfect and I suppose most of them have been in pageants since they were two years old with those over demanding mothers that are trying to recapture what they could have been. Yuck. Give me a woman with some meat on her for crying out loud.
If I want to ride something hard and uncomfortable, I'll go ride my Harley. She acts up some times, but she don't talk back. (I kid, of course)
Cartouche, LOVE that quote. You have such grace and it comes across in everything you write.
Delia, I read about that. It's a bit dodgy that they invested in her before the competition, all other ethical objections aside.
Monsieur Chariot, I find beauty in youth too. Just like I find beauty in spring and probably for the same reason.
Odette, that was what I was trying to get across. I don't want my daughter growing up thinking this is healthy, let alone aspire to it.
MJ that's lovely.
Mrs Michaels, I don't think Stephanie and carbohydrates are friends.
Theo, diversity is what I love about people. The differences in what attracts us, the ability to see and appreciate what others might find displeasure in.
Thank you, Trudge.
Michael, we don't really have those child pageants here, but every time I see one I remember Jon Benet and it saddens me.
L&P, the hair just doesn't seem to match the rest of her. I wonder what it says about me that I first looked at her hair and nails to check if they were brittle as a sign of malnutrition.
Mal, I wasn't surprised at them calling it a beauty pageant. Beauty is what they're selling. Just not my definition of it.
This young lady needs some help.
And, the hands. Ohhhhh, the hands.
Why do we think we have to torture our bodies to look better when we are all beautiful the way we are.
Great post and very well written I like your points of view and agree totally.
And this young lady was a finalist? She must have some real talent because she is incredibly emaciated looking? Denial all around, I guess.
I am intelligent, have a great sense of humor, am compassionate, and am working on the courage thing. But all these qualities are just as subjective as the beauty one. Even though I have these things, I am very, very concerned with losing weight and have been for the past eight years. Just as some people don't find my body or face beautiful, some people don't find the things I say funny or the things I know about, intelligent.
I completely agree with the fact that this girl is clearly underweight and that 99% of women on these pageants are surgically enhanced and at least pretend to be mentally deficient. But maybe someday "real" beauty will come back into style. And people (like me) who have DD's and the actual rest of the body that comes with them can be on those shows. Because as of now, these women look like nothing more than a bunch of different body parts stuck together on a skinny template: little nose and big lips, big boobs, tiny waist, tiny hips, and long legs. Those things don't typically come together on real people.
looks like a corpse or concentration camp survivor.
About beauty being skin deep, my wife's beautiful both inside and out, and I've been with here for almost 24 years, and will be married for 20 this month. To keep that sort of commitment you have to make a conscious effort to value her beyond superficialities. She's the mother of my children and all that, yes, but beyond all that there's another human being I honor and respect, I would not even use the word love because it is so overrated and over used, but moreover, because we only truly love through our actions.
Sorry for the rant, yes, I fully agree with you, our eyeballs definitely should not be a judge of beauty, our heart should be.
By the way Sarah, these contests supposedly are Miss Universe Community Service Pageants. When they win the first ting they all tend to say is that they want to devote there reign to world peace, or to eradicate poverty, save the rain forests, or something along that line. Beauty with a purpose, with the emphasis on external beauty, being the general motto nowadays... Please!
The solution needs to come from us, the buying public. Men and women need to stop following this dangerous trend and make is socially unacceptable to be unhealthy, whether by underweight or overweight.
The constant pursuit of artificially-defined beauty diminishes us all.
But beauty or the concept of it is very subjective. She might be a very caring and aware person who would be the best person that you could ever have as a friend. Much of beauty is projection. I'm not defending the twiggy look by any means. She is probably mentally ill but then who isn't. Our society seems to measure itself on the human wreckage that it creates.
I have a similar reaction to overly obese people. I know many people, many obese people, that have a problem dealing with stress and anxiety. Instead of reaching for a carrot, taking a walk, a spoonful of Chubby Hubby, a few chips or a small handful of M&M's, they gorge on it. The whole tub of Chubby Hubby disappears. A whole bag of chips. An entire 'pounder' bag of M&M's...
I worked with a woman that would eat more in one day at work than I'd ever eat in an entire day both at and after work. She was fat. I mean OBESE. And she railed at anyone that she thought was slighting her for her right to be three times as large as anyone else. Both anorexia and obesity are mental illnesses if not driven by a medical condition. And like this opinion, beauty is in the eye of the beholder...
People are judged in their looks everyday though, and rarely on what they are as a person. If the latter were true, the current Miss California would still be a small chested insignificant whining little bitch in California rather than a fake titted 'born again' example of why beauty pageants are so morally and ethically brain dead and an example of how anyone with less than half a brain can still get their moment of fame in this country and pander to other whining ignorant asses in the most powerful nation on the planet.
But I digress...
Is it all fake? Yes. It's also an interesting sociological idea I'd think. Here we are, so connected, so 'involved', so 'advanced' and yet so desperately alone...
But you wanna see what I think "beauty" means... look at Natalie's avatar. It's not the WAY you look, Natalie, it's what's BEHIND your look. Don't get me wrong, you're a beautiful woman, but there's "a look" in your eyes and in that secret little smirk that's captivating beyond your physical attractiveness, and THAT'S real beauty... the part that shines through, the part they can't bottle.
Let's hope they never figure out how :)
The thing that surprises me is that generation upon generation grow up and present themselves as a mass of ignorami willing to absorb and respond at all to this type of indignity, and still pretend they are intelligent, humane creatures.
Ok, I'll stop now. Thanks for putting a sane voice on something that is so absurd.
Stephanie does possess very pretty eyes and a beautiful smile, for whatever that is worth.
And my very first reaction on reading the title of this post and seeing the picture echoed what Skip had to say - your beauty, Nat, stands in stark contrast to that exemplified by any beauty pageant contestant.
Long may you reign.
My second reaction: how bad an example this sets for other young women who look at her and think "I would like to look that thin, just thin enough that I don't die."
In Susan Faludi's book "Backlash: the Undeclared War on American Women" she argues that part of the backlash against the women's liberation movement was to get women to think that they had to be stick thin to be attractive, turning their attention inward, rather than outward to the oppression of women.
Men, too, are in recent years being told that they have to look a certain way to get women - six pack abs, and all that - not as severe as the injunctions to women and girls, but a part of the general trend.
There is that twinkle, that smirk, that lifted eyebrow, that subtle glance, that giggle, that laugh, that toss of the hair, that 'look' can say so much... Skip a heart, stop a sentence, stop a thought, stop a stride. It's not even something like flashing fake tits and capped teeth...
Some people that are so determined, so over playing their 'sexuality' over play it and ruin it. Many people can tell fake from real. So many beauty pageant participants are driven out of a fear of not being 'all that'. Very few people really are 'all that' to others unless they are 'all that' for themselves.
To fearless females everywhere. Tell your mom we thank her... ;-)
I find as I am aging that I also find my reaction to young people is changing. Now that I'm nearing the 'harmless' point of a man's life, I find that I can look more and actually see the beauty in women easier.
I still don't know what that means...
I am old enough to be many of these women's father so that takes me out of the running as a sexual interest but I can fantasize, right?
I have always been shy around beautiful women and that still plays a large part in my interactions but I am getting over it. It's kinda weird to admit to still being awkwardly shy around women and I'm nearly 50... No wonder I was a 'late bloomer'.
EEK!! Look at those knives that someone calls her hips. Ouchie.
Rated
to me, beauty is beautiful, is it not?
its strange that someone so beautiful as you would be opposed to beauty. or the appreciation of beauty. or....??? I dont know exactly what it is you're opposed to, but you're certainly passionate about it, wink :p
I think you are a bit mixed up & need to embrace your own beauty and that in others. and embrace the beauty of M/F dichotomy which your writing shows some harshness.
also, everyone who feels strongly about beauty should learn more about evolutionary psychology. it answers a lot of riddles about why we find [x] or [y] beautiful. its a young field that is coming up with many surprising, excellent, unintuitive insights into everyday human behavior.
just remember, yin & yang go together like yin & yang, wink
However, just because there are (increasingly not watched) beauty pageants doesn't mean we don't have celebrations of positive traits, they're just not pageants. My mother just finished selecting a winner for her charitable organization's scholarship. She called me a number of time to tell me how hard it was to chose because all of the young women were so deserving. My niece competes in dance/cheer contests. Other young women compete in sports or are participate in things like Model U.N. and debate. There are plenty of ways in which young women and men are celebrated for their actions and talents rather than their appearances. They just don't happen to be beauty pageants.
Mr Handsome. "Why not?"
Stephanie. "I might break."
Rubens had it right...... all his women models wore frame flesh. Totally cuddle-able without fear of cracking.
If there were to be no more beauty pageants - I would demand one for none physical beauty. The millions of beautiful women in the world, the intelligent, the witty, the caring, the taught & firm, the loose & saggy, the women who smile from the inside out could share themselves on the 'Forever Pageant' and there would be no single winner.
Ban self imposed lunatic frailty - Demand what is what it's all about.