"Little Miss Perfect"

Spending the last two days rotting in a hotel room fighting a viscious stomach flu has reaffirmed my decision to forgo spending a small fortune on television. There is so little worthwhile to watch, but sitting in this cramped room staring at the walls with only the sound of my piteous moaning was not a fun option.

One show that I came across totally and absolutely freaked me out. Called "Little Miss Perfect", it documents self-described beauty queens and their journey to win the crown, or at least their attempt. These beauty queens aren't teens or young adults, though, they're barely walking and talking toddlers and young girls. I'm not trying to start a war on this subject; I know there are people firmly rooted on both sides. That said, holy crap that show freaked me out!

I think my daughter is Little Miss Perfect, but I hope to all that's holy I never feel the need to give her a spray tan, false teeth, hooker-worthy makeup, and dragster-quality wigs, and combine that with a mini-Britney style outfit and let her 'shake her thing' in front of a crowd of adults and let them judge her against a lineup of her similarly freaked-out peers in order to prove that to me or to her. There was no part of that show or those families that didn't disturb me, especially the mom that kept explaining that her daughter just "wasn't competitive enough", and was "apparently okay with being average" since she wasn't dedicated to her rehearsals. I just cringed watching those little babies cry when they didn't want their hair teased, or their ribs squeezed by their dresses, or when they find out that they're not "Little Miss Perfect." I cringed even more watching the more pageant-saavy ones throw winks to the judges and performing dance moves that should come with parental warnings for a man touted as a "premier" pageant judge, who skeeves me out just watching him stare at these innocent dears. The gay director, who loved the sound of his own voice enough to write a song that he feels the need to sing at each and every pageant, was the piece de resistance. Watching him tell the girls to "own it" was more than I could bear.

I admit it. It is absolutely beyond me why any parent would do that to their child, except those that are trying to live vicariously through their genetically gifted offspring. I hear them say that the pageants give their girls "confidence", but I see a troup of girls learning to present themselves for judgement based on how they look, how they dress and how they stack up next to their friends. One parent explained that it's a fact that "better looking, more attractive people do better in life, make more money and go farther than those who aren't". Tell me this thing isn't a beauty contest, flat out.

I hope to God that my sweet, happy, stunningly beautiful, amazingly intelligent little girl never feels the need to compare herself to anyone else to know that, in my eyes,in her daddy's eyes, in God's eyes, and anyone else who matters, she will always be perfect.

For now, I'm going to go back to bed and writhe awhile and see if there is anything else nearly as pointless on the tube.