VANCOUVER, Canada – A Canadian beauty pageant contestant who was disqualified after the Miss Universe Canada organizers discovered she was transgender has been allowed to compete.
Jenna Talackova, a 6-foot-1-inch-tall blond model, was one of the 65 finalists selected to contend for the title of Miss Universe Canada and the honor of representing her country in the Miss Universe competition, but she was disqualified because organizers said Talackova had lied about having undergone sexual reassignment surgery and did not meet requirements for the pageant.
“As with any competition, the Miss Universe pageant has rules which apply to all of its franchises around the world. Such rules include, but are not limited to, citizenship, age, and marital status requirements. Additionally, the rules currently state that all contestants must be naturally born females,” the Miss Universe organization said.
Those rules are not mentioned on the Miss Universe Web site.
After the disqualification drew worldwide headlines, ABC News reported that the Trump organization, which owns the Miss Universe competition, said it would not attempt to keep Talackova out of the competition.
“The Miss Universe organization will allow Jenna Talackova to compete in the 2012 Miss Universe Canada pageant provided she meets the legal gender recognition requirements of Canada, and the standards established by other international competitions,” Michael D. Cohen, Trump’s executive vice president and special counsel, said in an email statement announcing the change.
But the change was not enough for Talackova and her attorney, Gloria Allred, who called the statement “confusing” in a high-profile news conference this week in New York. Talackova wants pageant organizers to go further and drop eligibility rules she calls discriminatory.
“Mr. Trump, admit that you are wrong and get rid of your Trumped-up rule,” Allred said during the news conference.
“I did not know that she had a lawyer and especially Gloria Allred,” Trump said Wednesday. “In fact, had I known it was Gloria Allred, I probably would not have reversed my decision because, you know, Gloria is easy to beat.”
“The fact is we went by the laws of the country and the laws are very clear and, based on that, about two days ago, we decided to let her compete,” he said of his organization’s decision.
What has this world come to? Just goes to show how twisted of a society we live in. Totally disgusted.
I have nothing against transgender people, but I hate it when they say that their problem is not that they care so much about fitting in to people’s perception of the gender binary roles or attracting their preferred sex, but claim that it arose because they feel that they were born female and are really normal girls inside, and then get crap loads of plastic surgery and giant implants and don’t even look like a natural or typical girl.
I don’t even follow beauty pageants so I’m not criticizing this girl directly, and in fact I’m glad that they have more rights and are getting recognition, but I feel doubtful when I see them go so over the top, or when I see them act so much like a stereotypical girl that they’re just following stereotypes and it’s kind of insulting. Like, suddenly they have to always shop constantly and talk about looking beautiful. But I guess everyone’s definition of being a girl is different………..<..> Anyone can get tons of plastic surgery, doesn’t that kind of defeat the purpose of these pageant things? Like I said I don’t follow them though so maybe I’m wrong.
whoops part of that disappeared in the “” o.0; uh, between “everyone’s definition of being a girl…” and “anyone can get tons of plastic surgery” I said: Anyway I hope this girl is doing so well in these pageants not because she’s 98% plastic but because of her inner woman beauty.