TEEN PAGEANTS SHOULD BE BANNED

Later today, Miss Teen World 2010 (the title is post-dated) will be crowned in Houston, Texas. It's not the Ecuadorian run Teen Miss World pageant that once posed as Miss Teen World and was won on three consecutive occasions by the South African contestant.

It is also not the Miss Teen Worldwide pageant that was once Miss Teen World, but had to change the title because that title had already been registered as a trademark. It is not the Miss Teen World International pageant that was once.....God....I'm lost already. There are just too many to mention.

It is the "official" Miss Teen World pageant that is organised by a USA based organisation. But I thought Miss World and Mr World were registered in the UK and were the run by the Morley clan? Apparently not. It is "official" because they have registered the trademark whereas the other organisations had not.

Needless to say, South Africa is represented (contestant name unknown right now) at the Miss Teen World pageant that concludes in Houston today, just as we were at the 2009 (read 2008) edition. Our representative last year was one Alexa Kendrick (pictured above). I cannot find any Alexa Kendrick online other than a reference to a resident of New Orleans.

Perhaps she once visited South Africa on holiday or has a FaceBook friend who lives in South Africa or has a great-aunt who was an ANC refugee during the Apartheid era. Whatever claim she has to a Miss South Africa sash, I have yet to find reasonable evidence thereof online.

She isn't even one of the recycled beauties from that leading pageant organisation on the East Rand who's winners are often less attractive than the size of their daddy's cheque-books. (Thinking aloud: Something in the back of my mind tells me that one of the owners of that pageant organisation was involved in the abortive attempt to host Miss Universe 1996 in Johannesburg. Note to self: Investigate).

In any event, I don't understand the purpose of Teen pageants other than the desire of individuals who, but for the fact that they have no talent and want to make a quick buck, seek to be in the limelight by organising a teen/kiddie pageant. Each one "identifies a need or gap" in the pageant market for a pageant of this nature and has more integrity than the next. Yeah right.

The phenomenon is not unique to South Africa and most teen pageants are often shrouded in controversy. If it's not organisations bickering about the names of their pageants, there are allegations of financial mismanagement, prizes and sponsorships not being passed on to the winners, sexual harassment of contestants, and even that they are a front for kiddie porn and prostitution syndicates.

As I asked earlier, what is the purpose of a teen pageant? More often than not the winner is not the best looking contestant. Most of them are not particularly talented in the arts, academically or on the sporting front. Most of them are just pretty...average...nice girls. Whatever the purpose, beauty pageants ,in the purest sense of the word, they are not.

Teen pageants should be banned.