One Utah

On August 15, I had an opportunity to serve as one of five judges for the Miss Salt Lake County Scholarship Contest.  Before you ask, yes, this was once known as the Miss Salt Lake County Pageant and yes, is it actually a preliminary for Miss America.  As a result, the contest followed strict rules concerning the judging process which helped create an impartial process - as judges we were not allowed to discuss our scores with one another; we submitted our scores to a group of auditors who tabulated them. The contestants were not rated against one another but in terms of themselves - i.e. each contestant could get up to ten points for the On Stage question but they weren’t ranked against each other - so we didn’t say, Contestant 1 was the best and she gets 10 points, contestant 3 was second best so she got 9, and so forth.  The process guaranteed that as judges we were not able to have a favorite contestant and sway the other judges into supporting her. 

If you are a contestant, family member or friend of a contestant reading this, I’m afraid I won’t reveal any secrets or insights.  First, to do so would show disrespect for the contestants; second, as a judge I agreed I would not; third, there’s nothing I could say that would really help.  Here’s why - this was one of the most difficult things I’ve ever had to judge.  The contestants were, without exception, intelligent, articulate, talented, and excellent role models for girls and women.  Any one of these women would be an excellent Miss Salt Lake County and would represent our community extremely well.  No matter which contestant won, I was absolutely confident we would have an excellent Miss Salt Lake County for the next year.  I would say even the “weakest” (I use that term carefully - none of the contestants were weak) of the contestants stands head and shoulders above her peers in school or the working world.

Watching a contest like this, I was forcibly reminded of a number of things, including male privilege.  In the broadest sense having privilege means we can choose to not think about an issue and certainly men have a privilege - we never have to think aboout gender if we choose not to.

Femininity and masculinity are socially constructed.  The ideal female, as defined by the Miss America includes many aspects that are indistinguishable from what could constitute an ideal male - intelligent, articulate, poised, comfortable with large groups or small.   It also includes aspects that are not necessarily consistent with our idea of the masculine.  The distinction between the feminine and the masculine seems largely to rest in the question of appearance and talent - we expect Miss America to be able to sing and dance and look nice in a swimsuit, while in the ideal masculine singing and dancing are, if anything, considered ancillary, even un-masculine.  While appearance is important, the idea of of male fitness, as Hugo Schwyzer has often written, is the body as performance machine - a fit man can run and jump and climb and play ball.  The lifestyle and fitness (in a swimsuit) competition for women emphasizes not fitness or lifestyle but the ornamental nature of feminine fitness - fit women are pretty women who are slender, have nice hair and nice breasts.  Now, this part of the contest counted for a small portion of the final but every point counts.  I also think women are judged more harshly on their appearance than men.

Miss America (and it’s preliminaries) actually pretty accurately reflects the ambivalent nature of America’s idea of what is feminine.  The contestants I saw were encouraged to share their intellectual gifts in what were pretty grueling interviews - a panel of five people firing questions on a range of topics.  The contestants were intelligent across the board and certainly comfortable with public speaking.  Nevertheless, as they were being grilled, they were dressed “professionally” - including extremely uncomfortable high heels.  While expected to hold their own intellectually, these women were expected to be pretty.  In this aspect of the competition, I could see a corrollary of the pressure on working women - hold down a full time job, but still manage to cook and clean and be a perfect wife.  Women’s roles in our society are not really in flux so much as stuck between two models. 

The portions of the contest the audience was able to see short-changed the contestants.  The on-stage questions, written by the judges, were relatively light weight compared to those asked in the private interviews.  The private interview was quite in depth even though it was only 10 minutes long - contestants were asked about things near and dear to their hearts and also given an opportunity to demonstrate their intellect.

The form of femininity presented to the public is highly stylized - a woman who is ornamental and entertaining, whose intellect is non-threatening.  My closest female friends are possessed of inspiring and fearsome intelligence - women for whom appearance is important but who prefer to be judged on their accomplishments and intellect first, appearance second - as is the prerogative of men in our society.

This entry was posted Friday, August 17th, 2007 at 10:23 am and is filed under People Are Nuts, Society, This Blog. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.