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“What is the one thing our society needs? That would be harsher punishment for parole violators, Stan. And...world peace” -Sandra Bullock in the movie, Miss Congeniality image courtesy of www.haro-online.com |
Pageants and beauty contests have always been and will always be controversial. It is scowled upon by the advocates of feminism, saying that the contestants are being treated as pieces of meat parading half-naked around a chauvinistic audience. That it objectifies women. That it creates an unrealistic and stereotyped standard of beauty and femininity. Detractors say that contests like these are outdated and have no social or cultural significance whatsoever. The world is filled with problems bigger than what a cliché final question can answer. However, those who are into such pageants would argue that they do not demean women, in fact they celebrate them. These contests are a form of women empowerment in which they are represented not just as creatures of beauty and grace but of intellect as well. They show that women can look good in a two-piece bikini yet still answer hard-hitting questions. But then some would ask, why do women have to do this and prove their worth in these contests, why not men?
No matter how many people try to criticize beauty pageants, they are still able to get the attention of people on a worldwide scale. And we still continue to be fascinated by them.
In the Philippines, not to be informed about the results of the Miss Universe pageant is impossible. It’s inevitable like a Manny Pacquiao match. Everybody talks about it. I only happened to catch a few glimpses of the recently-concluded Miss Universe contest because my older brother and his girlfriend were watching it. And my Facebook newsfeeds were all about who was included in the top 16 and who was not. Who was gorgeous to stand a chance and who people think won’t make the cut. After the contest, the evening news had a thirty-minute special about it. It became the headlines of the newspaper the next day and the topic of many blog posts (like this one). When I went out for a walk, people in the streets were still talking about it.
I find the fascination of the Filipino people over contests like these very enthralling. Everyone’s glued to their TV screens, people are shouting their lungs out if the country’s representative makes it to the final 10 or wins a trivial award like Miss Photogenic (to which we have set a record of winning seven times.) We express disappointment, fear, excitement and anxiety as if we are the contestant themselves or as if our lives depended on it. Sometimes, it brings out the racist in all of us. Funny that we often complain that we are the victims of racial discrimination yet we have racial slurs and tongue-lashings of our own to those who happen to be better than our representatives. It’s an amazing spectacle to watch people’s reactions over something they can only see on TV and only happens once in a year.
The Miss Universe pageant can be compared to a Manny Pacquio fight in the sense that our country makes it its goddamn business. The only difference is that there are no boxing gloves and we don’t see bloodied and bruised athletes. Instead, we have insanely gorgeous women in skimpy bikinis and frilly long gowns. If we lose, then something’s wrong. If we win, then we rejoice proudly. If we lose, we were cheated and it’s luto[i]. If we win, we make that single person’s achievements our own. If we lose, we are discriminated because we’re Asian and if we win, we identify ourselves and we become proud Pinoys. But really, do we have the right to feel proud? Aside from the online voting (which proved to be pointless since Miss Portugal won the online semi-final slot) and the supposed prayers that we as supporters gave, did we play any part over Shamcey Supsup’s success? Did we all train her to answer that way or coached her on how to walk like a tsunami? The achievements are that of the contestant and hers alone.
Which brings to question, why do Filipinos fascinate over beauty pageants? Or Manny Pacquiao boxing matches or Azkal football games for that matter? Well, the good side of it is, it brings a superficial sense of “nationalism” among people, that no matter how different our views are regarding politics, religion or the RH Bill are, that we can have something in common to root for — that is for our country to win. It diverts our attentions from the corrupt government, the rampant poverty, or the war in Mindanao only for a second. For a brief moment of glory, it gives us a reason to not be disgruntled about the Philippines so much. It’s a breath of fresh air and that it brings hope to people. After all, other countries have their World Cup fever and the Olympics clamour, and so we have Ang Pambansang Kamao and the Miss Universe to be happy about.
That’s all fine and dandy. There is nothing wrong with celebrating victory. It’s embedded in out genetic code to relish on winning and I’m far from saying that it’s wrong to celebrate an accomplishment. But do we have to make it a point that we offer a grand hero’s parade for their homecomings and idolize these winners to the point that they become mainstream pop culture deities? Why do we rely in them so much to feel good? Why do we need victory so much? Is the situation in our country always that dismal that we need a constant morale boost from Pacquiao or nearly-crowned Miss Universe beauty queens? Is it a way for us to affirm our worth as people in the eyes of the international community—that we Filipinos are still good at something no matter how poor and corrupt we are? If that is so, then it’s a saddening fact that we think of ourselves so poorly that we still need validation of our worth as a nation from the international community to feel good about ourselves. If we continue to have that kind of mentality, then we won't move forward with progress.
We all have very different reasons why we watch them. We may put our entire hopes on them, we may not. In the end, we are left with two words to answer our lingering doubts regarding our fascination on the supposedly most magical night in the entire universe:
World peace.
(to be continued)
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