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Picket-line demo gets under skin of student beauty contestants
Terry Kirby10 Dec 2008
THE contest was condemned as misogynistic and degrading - not to mention thoroughly old-fashioned - but that did not stop students from King's College flocking to last night's final heat of the Miss University London.
Contestants and their supporters had to walk past a picket line of placard-waving protesters at the Crystal Club, Marylebone, where the heat was being held. While demonstrators outside waved banners with slogans such as "Every woman at King's is a queen" and "Our bodies are not for sale," inside the club, the contestants donned glamorous gowns and applied their make-up generously before parading in front of the judges.
Hundreds of female students from the University of London have applied to take part in the competition, which is organised by the events company, 121 Entertainment.
Students can enter online, although some scouts from the organisers have trawled campuses inviting others to sign up.
The competition has divided students, with contestants arguing that it is just a bit of glamorous fun while the National Union of Students say it distorts the aim of being judged on academic abilities, rather than looks.
121 Entertainment say women find it "empowering" and that the protests come from a minority of feminists. Similar demonstrations have greeted the earlier heats, for the London School of Economics, School of Oriental and African Studies, Queen Mary College and Regents College, which have been held at West End clubs over the past few weeks.
Protesters have created an anti-beauty competition page on Facebook, entitled Miss-Ogynist University of London and passed angry motions at student unions.
Winners of the heats go to the final in February, where they will be joined by applicants from other colleges which have not held individual heats.
The competition, now in its second year, is sponsored by drink and cosmetic companies, but also by Cancer Research. Keelin Gavaghan, 19, an accountancy student who was named Miss LSE, is reported as saying: "It was so much fun. It was more about having a great time and raising money for breast cancer. I fail to see what is wrong with feeling glamorous for one night. We hardly sold our souls."
Reader views (12)
Know what you mean about the beret Todd, she's probably there out of pity for her ugly mates.
- John-Paul O'Neil, Kent, 11/12/2008 11:37
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Maybe its really saying a lot about the futility of a university education.
- Nu, london, 11/12/2008 11:33
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the one in the red beret is well fit
- Todd Swift, Maida Vale, 11/12/2008 09:29
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The really funny part is that the men who are protesting are only doing so in order to score with the women protesters. They will of course fail because nobody likes an ugly killjoy.
- Jimbob, Kensington, 10/12/2008 14:12
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Have to agree with the above statements.
NOTE TO THE PROTESTERs
GET A LIFE, there's more important things in the world that need sorting out first.
- Malc, London,England, 10/12/2008 13:45
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We seem to be slowly but surely approaching the time when everything must either be compulsory or forbidden.
- Patrick Griffin, Dalston, London, 10/12/2008 13:24
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The fuglies have to protest, it is the only way they get noticed.
- Tom, Watford (UK), 10/12/2008 13:23
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The whole point of beauty pageants is to reward "wholesomeness". This is a concept of its time, decades ago, when beauty pageants were in their heyday. It gets short-shrift now. But it was never about a meat market. The idea of "wholesomeness" is to celebrate the whole person, body and soul together. Reducing a woman to a body is certainly degrading, but it is no less degrading to deny the part that physical appeal plays in the presentation of self in everyday life. Old-guard feminists are guilty of imposing a narrow, brainy self-image on young girls which meets resistance with each new generation. Hence the popularity of "girl-power" promoted by pop-feminists like the Spice Girls, Britanny Spears and Madonna. Hence the seemingly constant exasperation of the Leader of the House.
- Bloke, London, 10/12/2008 12:56
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I looked at the phot above and thought "if that is the standard they've come up with, then I'm not sure what all the fuss is about". Then I realised they are protestors. The beards should have given it away...and the presence of men.
I'm just so glad that the enlightened protestors are happy to allow fellow humans, regardless of gender, to exercise their freedom of choice, hard one, in part, by other women.
Why don't they just grow up, and pluck their eyebrow.
- Md, London, UK, 10/12/2008 12:24
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Looking at the state of them I feel they're disgruntled that they'd never have an opportunity to even enter one.
- Steve, London, 10/12/2008 12:09
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Is it just me or was it just the ugly and mishapen protesting ;-))
Sorry, I meant the aesthetically and morphically challenged of course.
- Al, Reading, UK, 10/12/2008 12:09
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Surely being judged on academic abilities will come at the end of their lives at university, if and when they receive their qualifications?
Shame they do not have compulsory module on 'lightening up'. I wonder if Harman was demonstrating with them?
It's the hormones don't you know!
- Frank, Home Counties, England, 10/12/2008 11:37
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