SALT LAKE CITY — Though Meganne Ferrel felt she was a good candidate for the position of Miss Utah when she competed for the title in 2017, she was repeatedly told it was impossible to win if she didn’t wear a bikini.
“Since this was against what I wanted to do from a religious standpoint, I had to sacrifice my chance for the title so that I could uphold that. I was happy to do that, but … I feel like (the swimsuit competition) was outdated,” she said.
Though she believes the Miss America pageant system can help empower young women, the swimsuit portion conflicted with that ideology, Ferrel said. When Miss America chairwoman Gretchen Carlson announced Tuesday morning that the nationwide Miss America pageant would officially retire the swimsuit and evening gown competitions, Ferrel was ecstatic with the changes.
“One of the tenants of modern feminism is that we should not be viewed as objects — which is actually one of the popular platforms that young women chose to promote during their term — but rather that we should be valued for who we are as people and not for our bodies. But that is not what is shown in actions by walking around stage in a swimsuit,” she said.
Though Ferrel said she was willing to “walk around stage in a swimsuit” because she strongly believes in the focus of the pageant system, she is glad the organization is now moving toward a “more modern evaluation of excellence.”
While the Miss America organization confronts a harassment scandal and tries to find its place in the #MeToo era, the institution has decided to end a focus on outward appearance and focus more on talents, intelligence and ideas.
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