I have always found it ironic, if not hypocritical, that feminists champion prostitutes but condemn beauty queens. Because I think a liberated woman should feel free to be either one.
Frankly, that feminists identify more with prostitutes suggests that they may have more psycho-social and sexual issues (of repression) to deal with than women who participate in beauty pageants.
At any rate, I see a connection between this feminist attitude and the prevailing reaction to the political spectacle that unfolded during the Miss USA 2009 contest on Sunday night.
Specifically, all indications were that Miss California, Carrie Prejean (21), had it won until the last moment when openly gay judge Perez Hilton asked this question:
Vermont recently became the fourth state to legalize same-sex marriage. Do you think every state should follow suit? Why or why not?
Prejean answered as follows:
Well I think it’s great that Americans are able to choose one way or the other. We live in a land where you can choose same-sex marriage or opposite marriage. You know what, in my country, in my family, I do believe that marriage should be between a man and a woman, no offense to anybody out there. But that’s how I was raised and I believe that it should be between a man and a woman. Thank you.
Now, here’s what is most interesting about her answer:
Prejean seemed ignorant of the flaming fact that people in her own state of California do not have the right to choose same-sex marriages. And if I were judging, this mistake, not her opposition to same-sex marriages, would have caused her to lose my vote. Of course she probably could have done without injecting her narrow-minded, Christian family values into her answer.
But there’s no denying that her view on this controversial issue is shared not only by the majority of people in this country but also by the purportedly liberal president of the United States, Barack Obama.
Therefore, the vitriolic and visceral backlash against her can only be explained by the same irony that explains the attitude of feminists towards beauty pageants: politically correct double standards.
As a principled supporter of same-sex marriages, I regret that the spokesperson for this cause is now the aforementioned Perez Hilton– who seems to think it’s politically correct to refer to Prejean as a “dumb bitch” just because he did not like the answer she gave to his provocative question. But I regret even more that none of the feminists and liberals commenting on this spectacle has bothered to condemn him for dismissing her with such misogynistic and chauvinistic contempt.
Meanwhile, even though Miss North Carolina, Kristen Dalton (22), appears to have won by default, it should be noted that she too was confronted with a politically sensitive question about using taxpayer money to bailout corporations deemed too big to fail.
No doubt she benefited, however, from the stentorian voices of bipartisan outrage against these bailouts, which could be heard all over the country last week at latter-day Boston tea parties. Because it was a no brainer to echo their voices – as she did – to give a politically correct, even if economically flawed, answer.
All the same, I think it bodes well for beauty pageants that it now takes beauty and a little brain to be crowned the winner; especially since Prejean and Dalton actually look like cosmetically enhanced clones of each other….
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