Read Online Being Miss America: Behind the Rhinestone Curtain (Discovering America) by Kate Shindle - Free Book Online Page A
Authors: Kate Shindle
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. . . sit down and make yourself at home!). But for a much greater percentage of the people you meet, it’s a more simple give-and-take. Like, “you were handed this great position, based partially on your performance in a swimsuitcompetition—so you must understand that America will naturally assume you’re a bimbo, right?”
Well, no, actually not right. Here’s how it actually happens: I work my balls off to become what I believe a young woman should aspire to be. I develop my talent, my brain, my physical fitness, my ability to speak intelligently in public on just about any topic you can throw at me; I focus on my adeptness at becoming, overnight, the public face of a multimillion-dollar corporation. I’ve given speeches to people in the upper echelons of education, world health, non-profit work, the media, the entertainment industry, and the legislature of our country—and not only have they listened, but they’ve given me awards for the things that I say and stand for. I’ve gotten a standing ovation at the World AIDS Conference just for talking passionately about HIV education, and another from a skeptical DC insider crowd when I read my needle-exchange-related open letter to President Clinton during my two minutes at the podium
.
I have come here, to your town, not just because you invited me and paid for my flight, but also to tell your students and your news anchors and anyone else who will listen all about this thing called AIDS, which will kill them if given the chance. I’ve researched and touched this epidemic in ways you will never bother to do, not only to help you, not only to build a fortress of credibility that gets me through this very moment almost every day, but because I believe that individuals who are placed in positions of substantial influence have an obligation to do something more than talk about their effing outfits for 365 days. I say all this not to brag, but to express to you in the most solemn fashion I can muster that if I have done all this before the age at which I can legally buy alcohol, your decision to pass judgment on my character—cloaked in humor as you may think it is—is completely out of bounds
.
But, of course, I will never actually say this. Because that would be rude. And you don’t become Miss America withoutinternalizing at least some of the rules of the road. For example, that Miss America is—duh—not rude
.
In the end, I don’t blame those people very much at all. I actually place the responsibility squarely where I think it belongs—on the Miss America Organization’s continued failure to re-brand its own product responsibly and consistently. Why, for example, does anyone still believe that Miss America is some kind of arm candy, ten years into the pageant’s singular focus on the platform issue? Why haven’t they crafted more effective messaging, or, at the very least, hired someone with that ability? I don’t need to be “FAMOUS, famous”; I’m way more comfortable giving HIV talks at high school assemblies than working a red carpet at a movie premiere. I hold court at summits and conferences far more effectively than I do—still, to this day, in fact—at a nightclub or a photo shoot. And I also find it hard to argue that this kind of work isn’t just a better use of everyone’s time. But you know what they say about a tree falling in the forest, if no one’s around to hear it
.
No wonder Bess Myerson went off the deep end
.
SIX
Once television changed Miss America (and Miss America, in a relative sense, changed television), the pageant had few options but to try to move forward. Certainly, there was a new level of interest from both the public and the advertisers; for the first time, Miss America herself became as famous as the institution she represented.
As more Americans acquired TVs, more Americans tuned in to the pageant each September. In 1958, the telecast had moved from ABC to CBS and was expanded by thirty minutes. An
Well, no, actually not right. Here’s how it actually happens: I work my balls off to become what I believe a young woman should aspire to be. I develop my talent, my brain, my physical fitness, my ability to speak intelligently in public on just about any topic you can throw at me; I focus on my adeptness at becoming, overnight, the public face of a multimillion-dollar corporation. I’ve given speeches to people in the upper echelons of education, world health, non-profit work, the media, the entertainment industry, and the legislature of our country—and not only have they listened, but they’ve given me awards for the things that I say and stand for. I’ve gotten a standing ovation at the World AIDS Conference just for talking passionately about HIV education, and another from a skeptical DC insider crowd when I read my needle-exchange-related open letter to President Clinton during my two minutes at the podium
.
I have come here, to your town, not just because you invited me and paid for my flight, but also to tell your students and your news anchors and anyone else who will listen all about this thing called AIDS, which will kill them if given the chance. I’ve researched and touched this epidemic in ways you will never bother to do, not only to help you, not only to build a fortress of credibility that gets me through this very moment almost every day, but because I believe that individuals who are placed in positions of substantial influence have an obligation to do something more than talk about their effing outfits for 365 days. I say all this not to brag, but to express to you in the most solemn fashion I can muster that if I have done all this before the age at which I can legally buy alcohol, your decision to pass judgment on my character—cloaked in humor as you may think it is—is completely out of bounds
.
But, of course, I will never actually say this. Because that would be rude. And you don’t become Miss America withoutinternalizing at least some of the rules of the road. For example, that Miss America is—duh—not rude
.
In the end, I don’t blame those people very much at all. I actually place the responsibility squarely where I think it belongs—on the Miss America Organization’s continued failure to re-brand its own product responsibly and consistently. Why, for example, does anyone still believe that Miss America is some kind of arm candy, ten years into the pageant’s singular focus on the platform issue? Why haven’t they crafted more effective messaging, or, at the very least, hired someone with that ability? I don’t need to be “FAMOUS, famous”; I’m way more comfortable giving HIV talks at high school assemblies than working a red carpet at a movie premiere. I hold court at summits and conferences far more effectively than I do—still, to this day, in fact—at a nightclub or a photo shoot. And I also find it hard to argue that this kind of work isn’t just a better use of everyone’s time. But you know what they say about a tree falling in the forest, if no one’s around to hear it
.
No wonder Bess Myerson went off the deep end
.
SIX
Once television changed Miss America (and Miss America, in a relative sense, changed television), the pageant had few options but to try to move forward. Certainly, there was a new level of interest from both the public and the advertisers; for the first time, Miss America herself became as famous as the institution she represented.
As more Americans acquired TVs, more Americans tuned in to the pageant each September. In 1958, the telecast had moved from ABC to CBS and was expanded by thirty minutes. An
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