WUNRN
FRANCE - SENATE VOTES TO BAN CHILD
BEAUTY PAGEANTS
By
Angela Charlton, The Associated Press
France's Senate has voted to ban beauty pageants for children under 16 in an effort to protect girls from being sexualized too early.
Anyone who enters a child into such a contest would face up to two years in prison and 30,000 euros in fines. A pageant organizer lamented that the move was so severe.
The Senate approved the measure 197-146 overnight, as an amendment to a law on women's rights. The legislation must go to the lower house of parliament for further debate and another vote.
Such beauty pageants, involving girls of all ages often heavily made up and dressed up, regularly elicit public debate in France and elsewhere. While such pageants are not as common in France as in the United States, girls get the message early on here that they are sexual beings, from advertising and marketing campaigns — and even from department stores that sell lingerie for girls as young as 6.
"The foundations of equal rights are threatened by the hyper-sexualization that touches children ... between 6 and 12 years old," said conservative lawmaker Chantal Jouanno, who authored the amendment.
"At this age, you need to concentrate on acquiring knowledge. Yet with mini-Miss competitions and other demonstrations, we are fixing the projectors on their physical appearance. I have a hard time seeing how these competitions are in the greater interest of the child."
She
noted the amendment is primarily focused on protecting girls. "When I
asked an organizer why there were no mini-boy contests, I heard him respond
that boys would not lower themselves like that."
The amendment's language is brief but sweeping: "Organizing beauty competitions for children under 16 is banned." It doesn't specify what kind of competitions would be covered, including whether it would extend to online photo competitions or pretty baby contests.
It would apply to parents or others who enter children in such contests — but also anyone "who encourages or tolerates children's access to these competitions."
The amendment says it's aimed at protecting children from danger and being prematurely forced into roles of seduction that harm their development.
Michel Le Parmentier, who says he has been organizing "mini-Miss" pageants in France since 1989, said he's disappointed that the draft law involves an overall ban. He said that he has been in discussions with legislators about regulating such pageants but wasn't expecting such sweeping language.
The senators debated whether to come up with a softer measure limiting such pageants, but in the end decided on an overall ban.
The Socialist government's equal rights minister, Najat Vallaud-Belkacem, suggested Wednesday that the Socialists may push for a compromise measure when the bill goes to the lower house of Parliament in the coming weeks.
Some pageants make an effort to de-sexualize the competitions. One recent pageant in the Paris region specifically banned makeup, swimsuits, high heels or anything inappropriate for the child's age.
In the same debate, the Senate rejected an amendment that would have restricted the use of models under age 16 to modeling for products or services destined for children.
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WUNRN
http://www.people.com/people/article/0,,20527816,00.html
Child beauty queens
are taking the pageant world by storm with pushy moms, temper tantrums, spray
tans, fake teeth, and risqué costumes. This week's special double issue of PEOPLE examines the popular TLC reality TV
series Toddlers and Tiaras,
which has reignited controversy over a culture made notorious by the Jon Benet
Ramsey tragedy. Critics of the child pageant industry warn that the stresses of
competition, coupled with an extreme focus on physical appearance, can have a
negative effect long before these girls will be eligible for Miss
The parents behind these pageants continue to go to extreme lengths to win.
Their behavior, broadcast each week to more than 2 million viewers, is often
outrageous (waxing screaming children's eyebrows; booking pre-pageant
chiropractor visits), and, to some, alarming. In an August Tiaras episode,
Lindsay Jackson outfitted daughter Madisyn Verst, then 4, with faux breasts and
padding for her derrière to more convincingly portray the curvaceous Dolly
Parton; a week later, Wendy Dickey dressed up her 3-year-old daughter Paisley
in Julia Roberts' streetwalker costume from Pretty Woman, complete with cut-out
dress and over-the-knee boots. (She won.)
Many critics of the show, which has long showcased the behind-the-scenes
tantrums and controversial onstage moments, were outraged. "This is the
most blatant example of sexualization of a child that I have seen," says
Melissa Henson of the Parents Television Council, which is calling for the
network to cancel the series. "There has to be a lesson here. This has
gone too far." The network, for its part, denies any wrongdoing.
"Some of the costumes the families come up with may be deemed
inappropriate, but we're just observing and documenting. We're not costuming
the kids," Amy Winter, TLC's executive vice president and general manager,
says of Tiaras. "We're not passing judgment and we're not condoning
anything."
Madisyn's mother, Lindsay Jackson, herself a former pageant queen from
"You are always going to have that one person who takes things too
far," says Annette Hill of Universal Royalty, a Texas-based "glitz
pageant" featured on the series. "This is sensationalized because
it's a TV show. People want to see outrageous," she adds. "These are
just costumes. The kids are fully clothed. What girl doesn't want to play with
Mom and do dress-up?"
But child development experts point to a difference between playing dress-up
and making a career of it. "Little girls are supposed to play with dolls,
not be dolls," says Mark Sichel, a NY-based licensed clinical social
worker, who calls the extreme grooming common at pageants "a form of child
abuse." Playing dress-up "is normal and healthy, but when it's
demanded, it leaves the child not knowing what they want," he says.
Accentuating their appearance with such accoutrements as fake hair, teeth,
spray tans and breast padding "causes the children tremendous confusion,
wondering why they are not okay without those things."
Conversely, many pageant parents argue that there's no better confidence
booster than winning a pageant. "My daughter is much more confident and
outgoing than other kids her age," says Dickey, who first put
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