THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Friday, April 7, 1995 TAG: 9504060125
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY M. ADELL HEALY, SPECIAL TO THE DAILY BREAK and KELLY CRAMER, HIGH
SCHOOL CORRESPONDENT
LENGTH: Medium: 89 lines
PAGEANTS AREN'T all glamour and smiles, and being involved in them has its advantages and disadvantages.
I've participated in pageants - 10 in the past two years - seriously since my junior year in high school. Some I've lost and some I've won. In the end, the pros of the pageant experience well outnumber the cons.
The most important of the pros is an appreciation of the spirit of competition. Competition is an experience that can improve or enhance one's attitude, talent, personality and poise.
Without competition, no one would strive to become the best.
Without competition no one would practice, dream or achieve.
Whether contestants place or not, the experience can help them in almost every aspect of their lives. Contestants must learn how to overcome the anxiety that comes with being watched by hundreds of people. They must learn how to deal with people and the public and, most importantly, how to be themselves, even when under incredible pressure.
In some cases, contestants must learn to gracefully accept defeat, to carry it off with sportsmanship.
I once was first runner-up in a pageant. I missed the title by one point. The reason: My escort was chewing gum. I wanted to kill him, but I didn't even yell at him.
I wasn't angry, I was disappointed. My experience in other pageants taught me to accept disappointments with grace. That is just one of the many things I've learned.
The varied experiences contestants have in these competitive pageants only makes them better people.
- Adelle Healy CON: IT'S BARBARIC TO GIVE ATTENTION TO THE FEMALE FORM
WHILE WEBSTER DEFINES beauty as ``the quality attributed to whatever pleases the senses or mind,'' he also describes it as ``a very good-looking woman.''
That seems odd in comparison with the cliche about beauty coming from within. However, beauty pageants support the shallow idea of beauty as a very good-looking woman.
The Miss America Pageant, along with its state and local counterparts, is a prime example of the barbaric attention given to the female physical form. Like well-conditioned circus performers, the contestants participate in a talent show, go through a personal interview and speak on a platform about some of their ideas.
``The objective of the pageant is supposed to be the presentation of the platform, but my roommate spent three times more energy concentrating on her thighs,'' said Rosemarie Buchanan, a recent graduate of Northwestern University who once roomed with a beauty queen.
Miss America Pageant officials have reduced the emphasis on contestants' bodies, but the evening gown and swimsuit competitions still exploit women. In fact, the women who endure the discomfort of glamorously taped breasts in the now stiletto-shoeless bathing suit competition are cheapening themselves, despite the scholarship money.
While the Miss America Pageant attempts to represent what Germaine Greer, author of the ``Female Eunuch,'' refers to as the female ideal, its efforts are futile because the ideal woman does not exist. Women, like men, come in all shapes and sizes with myriad personalities.
- Kelly Cramer MEMO: Adell Healy, 17, is the reigning Miss Teen Hampton Roads.
Kelly Cramer is a senior at Maury High School. ILLUSTRATION: Julie Elman photos
Erin Buchanan...Ashley Blalock...
Escorts watch a ballgame backstage...
Casey Cohen...
Jennifer Hartung...Kathy Thomas...Candace Young...Natasha Halsey...
Natasha Halsey...
Photos
M. Adell Healy
Kelly Cramer
by CNB