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Beauty, Benefits, And Babies?

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Beauty, Benefits, and Babies? America is a country that is filled with competition. Whether people fight for first place in sports, intellect, or beauty there can only be one winner. Success for any competitor in modern times requires hard work, dedication, and usually starting at a young age. For beauty pageants this is no different. Young girls that desire to participate and do well in pageants in the future should start at a young age. Savannah Morgan, a teen correspondent, claims that young girls should not participate in beauty pageants, however, this is argument is flawed because young girls can gain self-confidence at a young age, they can learn how to deal with stressful situations, and learn how to have a good attitude in failure. …show more content…

Young girls that participate in pageants will not lose self-esteem, but they will gain confidence. Most girls that are still in the adolescent part of life strive to gain the approval of others and the confidence that they need, whether that is from friends or family. A large majority of girls would openly admit that they feel better about themselves when they are wearing nice clothing and have their makeup done. Beauty pageants allow young girls to interact with other girls of the same age range and have an entire day of dressing to the best of their ability and getting on stage to show themselves off. The day is them imitating as closely as they can to the life of a princess. Even though only one girl at the pageant can actually win first place for the day all of the girls still get to display their beauty, talents, and intellect through onstage questions. The dedication it takes for a young girl to go through an entire day of changing and constantly putting on a show for judges proves that most girls participating want to be there and care about the competition. However, Morgan says, “While wanting parent’s approval is natural, coming out of a competition as runner-up – or with no that at all – can damage the child’s self-esteem” (1). A parent’s approval is important for a child, but not winning every competition does not destroy self-esteem. No matter what the competition is there is never more than one winner and this should be a lesson of how to improve for the next competition. One mother interviewed in, Pageant Princesses and Math Whizzes, states that “[n]o matter what profession or role my child chooses she will more than likely, at some point, need to be able to speak and conduct herself confidently in front of others-” (Levey 13). Pageants create a presence on and off the stage that will benefit the confidence of a young girl. One huge part of beauty pageants is how a girl handles

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