beauty pageants for young children have become very popular in this day and age. personally i find this to be quite a disgusting display. what about you how do you feel about child beauty pageants?

three reasons why i am against them is:

1. i feel they are forced by parents to do it. they are usually to young to say no anyway.

2. they promote bad stereotypes of what beauty is to young girls. is that really how we want our children to present themselves to society.

3. they cause emotional problems such as low self-esteem, eating disorders, and depression.

whats your opinion?

I think it's just stupid. Why would you judge a bunch of children to see who's the most beautiful? All kids are beautiful in their own right. It's cruel to set them up to compete and try to best each other at something so redundant. It's mostly for the mothers so that they can hang out together and have a common interest, gossip, try to make their children 'the best they can be' (like you can't do that with just parenting your child), and just have a way to get their kids out there. It makes me think of bored housewives with nothing better to do than put their daughters through a bunch of hoops and trials to hopefully feel more validated in their life.

Also, you're correct in that it teaches really shoddy values to the kids. Usually teenagers are really hit with the social anxieties of having to look, eat, and act in certain ways. Putting those stereotypes and ideals on kids when they're young and just starting to learn how to act and who they can be as they grow is really harmful, I think. It'd be one thing if a girl was really into dress up and having pictures taken of her and she saw something on pageants and said, hey, I'd like to try that! So they do one once in a while, they both have a good time regardless of how it turns out, and it's just fun experience. But these mothers who do it pretty much back to back are just crazy. It's a lot of unwarranted stress and I do think it's harmful.

Again, my thing is that it's just stupid and needless. Children have no business in that sort of thing and industry. It's cruel and kids are great no matter what, they don't need to be trussed up and set out to be judged by a bunch of middle aged peons.

I'm sure on an upside it *can* provide a bonding experience with the child and the parent(s) if it's something the daughter is actually interested in and they instill good values in her along the way. But mostly it seems like a bunch of braindead, stupid parents that force their kids to do it for either something to do or just to live vicariously through their children and have a brief moment of spotlight to lord over their peers.

I can barely stand adult beauty pageants right now. There is no way that I approve of child beauty pageants and that goes in a deeper level. It is just plain useless and stupid to me in general.

Beauty pageants basically teach that only physical beauty is the best instead of what is really important, the inner beauty and personality inside of you. They also have these high standards of what is beautiful and what is not. That limits everything! We should open our minds to all different kinds of beauty from everyone. Forcing certain acts, personalities, style, and what seems right is not the way to go. If everyone acted the same and looked the same, I would not want to live in this world.

When it comes to kids, it will make them grow up to be really snobby and spoiled. The kids are still exploring more about themselves and forced acts will disrupt their natural ways. These acts will surely ruin a kid's life and what a kid missed out on childhood.

Let your kid grow up and experience on their own but guide them through it. All kids will grow up to be beautiful and special in their own unique ways especially when they came through on everything on their own.

I find it gross. Your childhood is when you are most impressionable. Children who are put into these things are basically being raised to be shallow, superficial, and bratty. The very few episodes of these things I have bothered watching, I saw 1 of 2 things every time. 1) The kids were either miserable and crying, clearly not wanting to do it, and having a bunch of caffeine shoved down them to keep them up. 2) The little girls ALREADY had the worst attitudes, and you know they are going to be horrible people. They are already acting like stuck up little b****s and are going to end up being the next Snooky and J-Wow.

But on top of that, but parents that put their kids into it are basically inviting every pervert to oogle them with open arms. I was watching a segment that focused on how many sickos travel to watch these shows just to get their rocks off watching kids. There are actually a lot of people in that audience who are single middle-aged men with no kids who just want to 'watch'. And it doesn't help that nowadays, the 'parents' dress their kids like little prosti-tots and make them dance in ways that are way too old for them. Why don't these parents just take a bunch of 'sexy' pictures of their kids and send them to everyone on the sex offenders list? I really don't see a difference.

rcarter2 :
I agree with you on your last statement.
That gives me shivers and creeps thinking about these old geezer perverts on loose. I am getting goosebumps just thinking about it. Shallow and snobby children won't know about the dangers that lurk especially when they are used to their physical appearance. The lack of moral and common sense just goes down the tube from these kids who are in beauty pageants which will increase the chances of perverts kidnapping them and all of that horrible stuff. I can barely stand what some of the teenagers that I see are wearing today. It is just appalling and unmoral with no sense of style. Common sense and alertfulness are slowly going down the drain as time goes on now.

There is a scene in bad grampa that deals with child pageants. 
I agreed with it. 
It's just sexulisation of minors.
Id add everyone in attendance to a register frankly.
It also teaches children a very bad life lesson. 

I feel they're disgusting sexualizations of underaged children that shouldn't exist. Not only that, but the parents usually force them to do it, the kids either hate it or are stuck up jerks, and the kind of perverts that LIKE this sort of thing run rampant throughout the world, making it a very dangerous scene for these exploited children.
It's appalling and wrong. It's like eating a flower before it becomes a fruit. Why would you do that? It isn't ready for that sort of thing yet! It's still developing, and wanting to eat it before it's a fruit is disgusting and in the end will just leave a bad taste in your mouth.

Just... why would anyone let/make their kid do that sort of thing?

Wow theres a lot of negativity on this, I guess Ill give my view to show the other side of the argument. My sister recently went into a child beauty pageant and it was actually really good. All natural beauty, no heavy make-up or anything sexualized, and the pageant was mostly judged based on the personality of the kids and their speeches rather than their looks (Although of course it still did play a small part). I didn't really notice any creepy looking men, just some community members and parents. The pageant really helped out my sister from becoming a snot nosed brat really, since that was what she was before the pageant. After the pageant, the winners of it spent the year doing stuff for the community like ribbon cutting and parades, and I can say it really made my sister a better person. Although this is the only pageant I've seen, at least it shows that child beauty pageants can be a good thing if done right.

I am against , but not strongly. Ihad cousin who put her two kids in them.