On the subject of Beauty Pageants

Someone once said that in Puerto Rico, there are three main sports: boxing, politics and pageants. Such a strange combination… I wonder what that says about our people. Passionate? Violent? Trivial? Every now and again, I will watch one of these events. I only watch until the semifinalists are announced. If Puerto Rico makes that cut, I will continue watching until the Puerto Rican candidate is eliminated. A few times, they have won and I have sat on my couch for two hours, sometimes just to see a train wreck in progress. Not the best use of anyone’s time. I must admit it is rather fun to get together with some of your friends and criticize the heck of out what is being fed to you on the set, over a few drinks and snacks.   As Jill Conner Browne says, every girl (and woman) should declare themselves the Queen of whatever they choose for it is the behaviour that makes them queens, not a tiara given to them by a set of strangers.

The reason I bring this up is because last night I watched a portion of the Miss America Pageant. For the first time in 50 years, a Puerto Rican contestant competed for the coveted crown… pardon me…the $50,000 top scholarship. It is amazing what these contestants, sorry, “scholarship seekers” put themselves through for fame and money. I do not deny that the experience of visiting another city or country, and being exposed to other cultures and new friends has its merits, but beyond that, I wonder why we continue to glorify physical beauty over brains. The Miss America organization at least tries to include some semblance of intelligence and talent in their choosing of a “queen”, but what about those other organizations that are out there just to exploit a young lady for her looks? I remember the days when being Miss Universe meant a lot more than having a killer body and great catwalk skills. Those were the Pre-Trump days of MU.  Back in the days, if you were Miss Universe, you travelled around the world as a representative of UNICEF, doing charity work, not posing for photographer after photographer. The modeling was a very small part of the job.

What got me last night, after much pondering is, why was there a contestant from the US Virgin Islands and one from Puerto Rico in Miss America. Are we to expect a contestant from Guam next year? That would be silly, or would it. This only proves one thing to me. All this is for the most powerful lord there is in our society today: MONEY. It is no secret that the Miss America organization has been loosing money as of late and in order to keep things going, they need more ratings, which translates into more money.

But I ask you, does the Miss America Organization think that most people are stupid? Can one of their board members seriously tell me that if Miss Puerto Rico or Miss Virgin Islands would have won last night there would not have been hell to pay with viewers? Let’s face it. Most Americans cannot tell you where Puerto Rico or the Virgin Islands are. How then, can one of these girls, I mean, ladies, could have represented the ideal of the “All-American-Girl”? Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands are territories..colonies to some…which are not part of the USA in earnest. They pay some taxes, but they are not states nor do they have voting representation in the US Congress.

I am glad these two ladies from Puerto Rico and the Virgin Islands had a great experience, but I hope for their sake that they knew going into this, that their changes were cut in half from the get go. Can anyone seriously think that Rush Limbaugh, one the judges, and one of America’s best well known bigots would have allowed them to be Miss America? I am sure that to him, that would have been the equivalent to treason… Rest Assured…