Thank you for sharing your genuine experience having fun at the pageants when you were little. You explained very well how the experience was
for you and it was easy to see how much you enjoyed the fun and excitement with the pageants.
I greatly appreciated you sharing this because I don't know anyone who was in pageants so you showed a snapshot of how it was for you.
It sounds like you had fun and looking back you didn't see any sexualization with the costumes and the choreography. Sounds like
that was not the atmosphere when and where you were during the pageants you were in. Maybe it was more like dress up and fun.
However some pageants are more mired in sexualization with costumes and choreography. Also, some of them include makeup and
hair and costumes that can make a five year old look like she is thirteen. I don't know why they do this other than sexualizing all of it.
JonBenet may have been a bit of a tomboy but in the photos she has her arms stretched out in a superstar pose. Maybe this speaks
more to her age - posing like a "superstar."
Perhaps she liked the spotlight but not all of the preparation for the pageants. Perhaps she went along with the pageant world as she instinctively knew
that that was the other way to get "close" to her mother. It is evident that her father was very proud of her winning the pageants so
this may have been a factor to her so that she could feel close to her father, who was usually absent from the home.
Most things in life are never quite clear to us and many times we only see what snapshot is offered to us. How JonBenet genuinely felt
about all of the pageant atmosphere well we will never know, unfortunately.
It is my feeling that Patsy felt joy in preparation and the whole atmosphere of pageants with JonBenet. In my opinion it looks like this was
the only atmosphere where Patsy felt "joy". Perhaps this was a distraction for her in the way that some people turn to substances. I don't know,
of course. But we do know that her husband was rarely at home and we know that Patsy pushed the fantasy of a "perfect family" towards
people outside of the family.
I tend to think that perhaps this was not JonBenet's view of the pageant atmosphere but it looks like there was so much denial in that
home that perhaps JonBenet grabbed this opportunity to get out of the house and the atmosphere there.
As for Patsy with the pageants - I feel that sometimes people reach out for a different world because it is less painful than to acknowledge what
is actually going on in the home. I am acknowledging the human condition.
When you shared your positive experience with pageants I could see another side of it. Thank you for sharing this with us because all I know of pageants
is what I read about and on tv they love to show us the most sensational aspects (sexualized aspects) of the pageants. It certainly looks like the pageants
you were involved in were not like this. You gave us a different perspective and we each have our own unique perspective and experience.
Unfortunately because most of the pageants now sexualize the children with the costumes, make up and choreography, in order to win
these competitions this is now the status quo. It is so sad. It is obvious from your experience that this was not the case in the
pageants you were in.
My view of pageants is that children are given a message that "beauty" counts more than anything. This is why I am not a fan of them.
But that's just me. Plus, I have never had experience of being in a pageant nor do I know anyone who has been in them. That's
why I appreciate you sharing your experience.
It is not easy to share an experience with something that so many people have negative connotations with and so thank you for the courage
to explain how your experience with pageants was.
Thank you for sharing your unique experience on this.
or did the new season of the The Killing Season change from Nov. 5th to Nov. 12?????? :thinking: