According to Danielle Cardall, child beauty pageants are thought of as a dream to most children. The idea of being made up and dressed up is every childhood dream, right? The shocking answer to this is no. Children are forced to play roles of young adults from young ages and are simply transformed into mini women. Danielle states, "The lifestyle of child beauty pageant participants has proven to be one full of stress and negative self-evaluation which can ultimately lead to a number of mental and physical disorders as the children become older. While it is clear that beauty pageants can be damaging to its participants, especially ones who begin their career of pageantry at a young age, nothing is being done to solve this problem." 


This article written by Danielle Cardall helps showcase the stress and unhappiness put on young children. Children who are entered into these pageants are always entered by parents or a guardian. This shows that the decision for a particular child to be in these stressful contests were made by the parents and the children have little to no say in whether they would like to participate. Overall, these pageants not only cause unhappiness for children at young ages, but lead them to living lives of depression and mental illness. 


Reflection Questions: 
Why do parents enter their children into these pageants?
Why isn't anyone taking action to help solve the problem of young contestants being entered into these pageants?


Citation:
Cardall, D. (2008, July 30). The negative aspects of child beauty pageants. Retrieved from http://voices.yahoo.com/the-negative-aspects-child-beauty-pageants-1719427.html?cat=69