Sunday, February 26, 2012

Response: Douglas and Toddlers & Tiaras


Over the course of this year, I have been told countless time that I must see the show Toddlers & Tiaras.  When I heard about the Little Miss Sunshine-esque premise of the show, I was immediately freaked out by the thought of watching little girls in beauty pageants as I recalled how scary and superficial Olive’s competitors looked in Little Miss Sunshine.  After reading Douglas’ chapter “Sex-R-Us”, I finally decided to check out some clips from the show to see what it was all about. One of the clips I found, which I later read about all the controversy in the news over it, featured one of the three year old stars of the show, Paisley, dressed as Julia Roberts’ prostitute character from Pretty Woman (thanks to her mom’s genius idea!).

As Paisley struts around on stage after being introduced as Julia Roberts in Pretty Woman, the show cuts to commentary from another pageant mom who says that she would never dress her daughter up like that and that instances like this are what give pageant moms a bad reputation for putting their daughters through these beauty pageants.  After this episode aired, people finally began asking if beauty pageants have gone too far.  What’s ironic is that it took a three year old dressed up as a prostitute to get this debate publicly started.  Clearly the show is extremely exploitive and harmful to not only the girls in the pageants, but also girls around the country watching.  Furthermore sexualizing a three year old girl who has no idea what she is representing and then showcasing her to be judged is pretty sick and twisted.  To Douglas’ point, girls are being exposed to sexualization at a much earlier age and the sexualization itself has become more provocative than ever before.  The question of whether or not the show should remain on air is floating around, but at the end of the day, people will still watch this garbage and people will still profit from it.  At a personal level, the only pro-active response I can have to it is to follow a path of least resistance that rejects it and questions fans who are entertained by it and laugh at it. 

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