Major international pageants like Miss Universe and Miss World are mostly treated like the Olympics, with countries sending their best candidates to raise their flag on the global stage of beauty pageants.
With this, aspiring beauty queens go through rigorous mental and physical training to fit a mold that some pageant organizations impose on candidates. These standards, most of the time, do not sit well with critics and mere observers.
With all these qualifications, Miss France is under fire for claims its selection criteria are discriminatory.
According to reports, three failed beauty pageant participants have joined a feminist group that is suing Miss France for alleged discrimination based on the appearance of the contestants.
The “Osez le feminisme” (Dare to be a Feminist) group, along with three failed contestants, said they were targeting the Miss France company as well as Endemol Production, which makes the annual TV program screened on the TF1 channel.
It also states that the pageant’s rules are illegal since French labor law forbids companies from discrimination based on “morals, age, family status or physical appearance.” The suit cites various occasions where contestants were removed from the competition for acting “contrary to good morals, to public order or in the spirit of the contest, which is based on the values of elegance.”
The case will now be heard by a judge, who will have to decide if the law applies since contestants might not be considered employees of the pageant and/or production company. While contestants don’t sign any employment contract, the pageant might still need to obey the law. In fact, in 2013, a judge ruled in favor of contestants of the Mister France pageant, who sued for similar reasons.
Miss France turned one hundred years old this year. Critics argue that the beauty pageant is antiquated and is a leftover sexist event from a different era in French culture. Nevertheless, the beauty pageant is still a very popular television program in France. Millions of people tune into TV channel TF1 in December to see the final national vote to reveal the winner.
“For all our protests every year against this vehicle for sexist values, nothing changes,” said Alyssa Ahrabare, head of the Dare to be Feminist group. “We have decided to use the law to advance the cause of women.”
The case, filed at a labor court in the Paris suburb of Bobigny, will hinge on whether magistrates recognize Miss France contestants as de facto employees of the organizers and TV company.
Beauty pageants have been a subject of conversation and debate for years—do they empower women to have a voice for their advocacies and foster confidence, or do they send the wrong message of conforming to unrealistic beauty standards?
Source: AWM
EXCUSE ME, but contestants are not considered employees of the pageant and/or production company and order to participate they must meet certain criteria set by the organizers. So, the Osez le feminisme” (Dare to be a Feminist) group, along with three failed contestants want the criteria to be abolished in order for any slut with no morals, aptitude or appearance be allowed?