"I'm hot, you're not"

I just watched a rather traumatizing episode of Mini Miss UK and it is hands down one of the most disgusting features I have ever watched on telly. To be clear, I am very critical of parents who enroll their children in beauty pageants and would honestly want to try and understand why they do it. Seeing a bunch of girls on TV dolled up in make up, spray tans, hair extensions, false nails and £1,000 dresses is something you would expect from an episode of The Bachelor, not on girls as young as 7 battling each other to win a child beauty pageant.

Of course we’ve all heard (and read) the arguments in favour of beauty pageants; they encourage girls to be healthy, athletic, poised, charitable and accomplished. Those are laudable goals; I just think there are better ways of achieving them.

As the American phenomenon of the children’s beauty pageant hits the UK, the Mini Miss UK documentary uncovered a surreal new world where 9 year olds get fake tans and 7 year olds wear contact lenses. But I realized that every family had a different reason for wanting to take part. For some it was a glamorous world away from normal life on a council estate; for others it was a way to give a child a chance the mother never had, to deal with the baggage of their own childhoods. In their own way all the mothers were trying to do “the best” for their children.

****** One of the parents Moya, 40, a beauty therapist and single mother, lives in Glasgow with her children, Leah-Brooklyn, 14, and Madison, 9
"We're born-again Christians, and we believe God has given Madison this path," she says. "Before the pageant our church prayed for our heavenly Father to give Madison confidence, that he would make her be pretty and beautiful. We make "believe boards" of our aspirations - Madison has one that says, "I want to be bigger than Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell, and help animals."

"I made up the dance routines for Madison, and we hand-embellished her shoes with Swarovski crystals to give them a bit more bling. I spent about £1,000 on her outfit. Every day Madison cleanses, tones and moisturises, and she has a face mask applied after she's been playing and sweating. For the pageant I applied acrylic nails, she had a fake spray-tan and a hairpiece, and her toenails were painted - nothing major. Some people say having a hairpiece at nine is ridiculous, but it's not like I do her hair and make-up every day. When I'd finished with her she actually looked like Fairytopia Barbie. I've been told Madison has the face of a doll - the American look."******

In the real world I live in, girls that age should be busy playing with rag dolls and having tea parties with Barbie and Ken; not spending sleepless nights in an attempt to ‘look the best’.

At the age of seven, I was busy climbing over walls, counting my scars and was never worried about my looks or how much I weighed.

 It is very unfortunate that many parents are plain selfish and try so hard to make up for their lifetime failures through their children. My two pence is that these pageants sexualise children, damage their self-esteem and lead to possible mental illness down the track