“You just need to go out of home to meet beauty queens” is the common saying about the popularity of beauty contests and the chaos of beauty titles.

The fact that two beauty queens were crowned just after one night was not a surprise to people. The finale of the Miss Sea Island Vietnam 2022 and finale of the Miss Vietnam Globe 2022 took place on the same night.

Some people think the mushrooming of beauty pageants is good news in the new normal after the pandemic. They don’t care about the high number of pageants, saying that events with low quality and little audiences won’t be able to continue to exist.

Meanwhile, many are worried about the ‘deformation’ of contests, which makes light of the titles of beauty queens. 

Some contests don’t bring benefits to society, except polishing the image of contestants and providing profits to entertainment companies.

The major purposes of beauty contests are advertised as discovering and honoring the beauty of the bodies, soul, virtue and talents of women. But in fact, many contests are organized because of illegitimate motivations of organizers and sponsors.

Running after vainglory and fame are the reasons behind the chaos of beauty contests.

Beautiful girls don’t need to win first prizes at the contests, but just need to fall into the top 10, or top 20 girls to have the chance to have a new life. In many cases, people doubt the transparency of the contests. 

They gossip that some girls ‘buy’ the titles of beauty queens with money. Meanwhile, there are not many beautiful girls who can show talent and intelligence, as well as positive influences on the community.

Even though many beauty queens have been named, it is still difficult to find girls representing the country to attend international beauty contests. Very few beauty queens like H’Hen Nie and Nguyen Thuc Thuy Tien can show their stuff when attending the international contests. The lack of confidence and immature experience of Vietnamese contestants in the international beauty arena is a concern.

With the 60th position on the world’s beauty map, it is now the time for Vietnam to tighten control over beauty pageants to ensure high quality pageants and the true value of the ‘Miss’ title. Beauty pageants must not be just entertainment events.

Nguyen Van Thieng