Toddlers & Tiaras

noreply@blogger.com (Abigail) — Sun, 09 Aug 2009 02:20:00 +0000

Recently, I watched the premiere episode of Toddlers & Tiaras on TLC. For those who don't know, Toddlers & Tiaras is a show about children in beauty pageants. And yes, I know that I'm late because the episode first aired in late July. However, I was completely appalled to see how Jamie Sterling treated her beautiful little girl, AshLynn Sterling. AshLynn is six years old, and is a fraternal twin. Her sister is named BreAnne. Jamie Sterling clearly favors BreAnne, saying that BreAnne is the prettiest out of her five girls and more outgoing, while AshLynn is timid and has a bigger nose. She says that BreAnne takes after her mother. At one point in the show, they learn that AshLynn ripped the bottom of her dress, and Jamie talks about how it will be a hassle for her to fix the dress, while BreAnne is getting a new dress. Jamie never expects AshLynn to win the pageant. Her pride and joy is BreAnne and it's obvious. Near the end of the show, BreAnne wins second place runner-up, but was sleeping because she had been acting up. AshLynn won third place runner-up and Director's Choice. AshLynn was so excited that she had won, but instead of gloating, she tried to give her sister the balloons she had won. At the end of the show, BreAnne says that she was the real winner and that their "mommy had said so." AshLynn looks crushed.

While watching the show, I just felt like crying. Both of the girls are pretty, but I can already tell that AshLynn is going to have a very low self-esteem when she gets older, and she already seems to have problems now. She said that she doesn't like competing in pageants because it's hard to win against her sister. BreAnne says that she likes competing in pageants because she wins. Talk about sibling rivalry -- pitting two little girls (who are twins) against each other at a young age... What also bothered me about the whole beauty pageant for children thing was that children are extremely impressionable. When they stand up there to get awards and another little girl gets "Most Beautiful" or another little boy gets "Most Handsome," think about what a blow that can be. Or when another child gets almost all of the awards, and you end up with nothing? People put their kids in these pageants starting from when they are newborns. And I'm not trying to bash pageants, because I've actually been in two of them myself. But the pageant that I was in was different. They didn't let young girls wear makeup, they didn't have "Most Beautiful." The pageants that I was in didn't do things that would completely crush us. I mean, sure. It sucked to not win. But I'm not going to spend years of my life in therapy because I didn't (And the second time, I placed 13 out of 89. Not too shabby, in my opinion).

After watching the show, all I really wanted was to hug AshLynn. And maybe to yell at Jamie a little bit. Parents have a huge impact on children, and they have to realize that. As for the pageant, it may be all fun and happiness for the children who win. But for kids like AshLynn, who don't even have full support from their parents? Why can't people be supportive of all of their kids? I mean, if you're going to have a favorite child, go ahead. But don't show that favoritism to the rest of your children... because you might end up harming them more than you think.

Introduction

noreply@blogger.com (Abigail) — Thu, 30 Jul 2009 00:00:00 +0000

Violent Hiccups... random, isn't it?

You may have read a post or two from our previous blog, As We Are. Unlike that blog, Violent Hiccups really has no purpose. The name is random (more on that later) and we really had no reason to create a new blog, other than the fact that we wanted to.

What will be on this blog? Anything and everything. We hope that you'll get something out of it, but if you don't, that's okay too.

The Story Behind The Name (because every name has (or should have) some sort of story):
It was on a day a few weeks ago, where the late hours of the night were turning into the early hours of the morning. Shyla and I were videochatting, and had been doing so for about three or four hours, when I was struck with a particularly violent case of the hiccups. (Now, I know. I'm sixteen years old. But I still get the hiccups quite regularly and randomly.) Before that, we had been trying to come up with names for the new blog that we were planning on creating, thinking of things like Sweet Pea Mangosteen Panda and Raspberry Tart (don't blame us, we were tired). After the hiccups had finished, we talked about other names, but kept coming back to Violent Hiccups.... and I guess it stuck.

We hope you enjoy this blog with our random thoughts and writings.

Over & Out,
Abigail and Shyla

EDIT (@ 11:59 pm): Surprisingly enough, violent hiccups aren't all that uncommon. On Google, there are about 70,600 results for "violent hiccups".