Beauty contests are harmful.

first, as suspected, let me point out that this debate is entirely plaigarized. i google'd the introduction and it turns out that this summary as well as my opponent's contentions all come verbatum from a website (found here: http://www.idebate.org...). that is pretty low, without citation. i affirm that my opponent is a big fat cheater :o) however, i will debate this anyway. this is because my opponent was actually dumb enough to not only copy and paste the arguments for one side of the issue, but she copied and pasted the arguments for MY side of the issue as well! so basically, she has already negated her own points, however, i will continue to argue them IN MY OWN WORDS, meaning double negation, meaning an automatic win for my side, imho. ~~ here we go ~~ "Beauty contests promote an ideal of female beauty to which only a minority of women can realistically aspire" so do magazines, tv shows, the movies, and the media in general. so what? to argue this point would mean that this same argument is applicable to all forms of media and entertainment. the point is that nobody forces anybody to watch or believe anything. people who watch beauty pageants essentially enjoy them. and nobody says that people have to conform to society's standard of beauty. "Judging women, but not men, primarily on their looks contributes to the subjugation of women" who says that only women are judged? there ARE male beauty pageants or something similar thereof. moreover, it is an ignorant assumption that only females are subjicated to pressure from society to look or act a certain way. guys are under immense pressure to be "buff" and exhibit "masculine qualities," so to assume that women are the only group who is oppressed is a fallacy. "they can still only do so if they take part in the swimsuit competition, which may well not be considered appropriate dress in their culture." then very simply, they don't have to enter. this is a PRIVATE competition and doesn't affect any country in an economic or political way. nobody is forcing a country or group of people to enter. if they do so, they do so under their own inclination to participate in the aspects of the competion as-is. if the asians or anyone else have a problem with it, they can create their own similar pageant. "Beauty contests fail to challenge harmful political attitudes to women." on the contrary, these pageants require that a woman have a certain level of political knowledge; to be without it will not get you far. a perfect example is the criticism miss california received from perez hilton and others for her answer regarding proposition 8 and gay marriage. had she been kept out of the loop or ignorant to politics (like women have been in the past), she would have been humiliated and not taken seriously. being in a pageant requires a certain amount of political correctness. that includes pc recognization of feminism, liberalism, women's rights, etc. "by reinforcing looks as the most important feminine quality, they harm women's liberation in general" i disagree. consider the feminist groups of the 1970s. lesbians or butch women were kicked out of women's lib groups because the women didn't like the reputation of being "butch" or "dykes" simply because they aspired for equal rights among the genders. i think being politically active, talented, etc. all while retaining aspects of femininity IS empowering and helps to remove sterotypes about how feminist women look and behave. "The fact that the organisers of Miss World 2002 had no problem with holding the contest in Nigeria at the same time as a high-profile case in which a woman was due to be stoned for adultery exposes the competition's hypocrisy" uh, what does a culture's punishment for a crime like adultery have to do with the ideals of the competition? ~~ good luck, pro. ~~