Pageant Appearances ! What’s more important an appearance for your charity/platform or attending a p

Some of my favourite appearances !

So during lockdown physical appearances have stopped so I’ve been doing more online appearances than ever before for my lockdown weekly blog ! I thought this was a good way to share everyone’s online campaigns so more people can take part. But this got me thinking about appearances more in-depth and what’s more important, an appearance for a charity/platform or attending a pageant to watch ?

In my personal opinion I think that an appearance for a charity or you platform is more important than just attending a pageant. I do understand we want to support sister queens 👸 which I love but overall the charity appearances for me are what a true Queen/Role Model is.

I will put my hand up and say that I often don’t go to pageants to watch them (I live stream usually from my bed) this isn’t because I don’t want to support them it’s because I’m a mum, I work and normally they are hours and hours away. So I concentrate on charity appearances, maybe if they were closer and I had more free time I would attend them but at the moment I do struggle.

I always try and work with my local charities not just by taken part in an event or appeal but also by trying to raise awareness by putting together press releases (I did a separate blog post about how to gain more exposure through press).

I do believe that even if I could attend them that I would still do more charity ones as they are more important to me and my platform. Being a pageant queen allows you to speak about your platform or chosen charity to a larger audience so for me it’s essential that we do. But it is also important to support the pageant community by attending events such as pageant finals where possible. In relation to charity pageants which is a different subject if you can support these either by watching or taking part it’s amazing that you do as these can raise vital funds for charities ! For example Miss Diamond ran one this year and raised over £1000 for Breast Cancer.

In the past when I have competed and there hasn’t been publicity award or extra points I still did appearances as they are important for the system that you represent, if no ones knows about the system or sees you out representing it then not as many contestants will apply the following year.

Now because I wasn’t sure about even writing this post incase it offended anyone I decided to get some other pageant girls involved and here’s what they had to say.

First up we had Hannah Golding who runs Sparkles and Rhinestones and who wrote The Pageant Manual ! I’ve been lucky enough to be interviewed twice by Hannah for Sparkles and Rhinestones and for those that don’t know, me and Hannah met at an International pageant back in 2014.

Young Miss International Spokesmodel

Hannah’s take on this question “Charity appearances for sure, anyone can turn up to watch a pageant but when you are actually using your title to help, I would say that one was the better quality one. (charity appearances) The only exception would be if you were helping out so maybe helping backstage or something like that as you are volunteering your time” We did have quite a few comments regarding this question so we did go onto to discuss the publicity award and extra points and who would be more deserving for it someone that has just done charity appearances or someone that has just watched pageants and I love the response “The publicity award should be awarded on who made the most physical appearances with their sash that made a contribution to the community, pageant and real life community.” Hannah did also mentions that without pageant girls attending pageant finals then there would be a small audience which is true as we are a small community and we do need to support each other.

We also got a talking about how creative we are being during the lockdown such as podcasts, Skype interviews and written interviews and I would love things like this to continue after lockdown as they are amazing at gaining exposure for you and your system as well as gaining some interview knowledge !

Next we have another YEMI Queen !

Young International Ms 2019

“Charity/Platform to me are more important. I think using your platform as a finalist/queen to raise awareness of what’s personal to you speaks volumes. Don’t get me wrong, we love to support our fellow pageant sisters too – but what we do in our own time and the effort put in is quality appearance.”

I have to agree with Domanique Savage-Ramsay comments about this subject completely.

Next up with have Adrianne Robinson who is Miss Derbyshire Inspiration who responded with “Definitely charity and platform” as she holds it close to her heart.

Next up we have comments for a Royal U.K. Miss Queen Chloe Shannon Brookes.

She says “Platform 100%. Royal International Miss doesn’t actually award points for appearances, it’s more about your platform plan and what you would do with the title. When we do our “international appearance award” we are not allowed to include attending pageants as has been removed from the list of included appearances”

Now I never knew this about the international appearance award not classing attending pageants as appearances and I found it quite interesting that they have put this in place. I can’t comment too much as it’s not an international system I know too much about as when I completed in Royal U.K. Miss and won Royal U.K. Miss Role Model for the Ms category it was ran by a different U.K. director and I never went onto compete internationally.

Next up we had some input from the newly crowned Mrs Galaxy U.K. 2020 Natalie Pav Natalie Paweleck.

Natalie believes that both kind of appearances are important which I do agree with.

“I personally think both are important and I don’t like it when people put down attending pageants. Our community is so small, it’s really important that we support each other’s and each others pageants.”

“My definition is always, Supporting the pageant community, supporting your local community and supporting wider charities”

I love her definition as it really sums up what pageant girls/women are and do !

Next up we have some comments from Elle who was suppose to have competed in YEMI last year but has some exciting pageant plans coming up !

She agreed with a lot of the comments that were mentioned. “Pageants to me are less of an appearance and more of a social aspect of pageantry, where your charity and/or platform promotes your cause, gets your message out there and makes a difference. Pageants are just a celebration of all of the hard work everyone’s put in through their competition year.”

I like her take on separating pageant appearances and charity appearance as social and charity as promoting your platform. As Mrs Galaxy U.K. said we are a small community and we need to support each other as much as possible by attending events such as pageant finals.

But (my words) should attending a pageant final as a guest (not helping back stage or comparing or crowning or selling raffle tickets) be classed as an appearance or a social occasion ?

We have the lovely Ruth Wade up next with her comments. Ruth is the director of International Junior Miss United Kingdom and a previous Miss Galaxy U.K. Pictured on the right.

“I think the most important thing is to do appearances that you enjoy and really have a passion for. My opinion is that it is a hobby and I don’t like seeing girls doing certain things because they think that they have to and then not enjoying the journey. If your platform is mega important to you and you love working on it then go for it, if you love watching your friends compete then go and do that without worrying about doing the “right thing”. Don’t lose sight of the fun of competing and growing as a person by taking advantage of all the different opportunities that you can.”

I do love Ruth comments as you have to enjoy being a pageant girl whether it’s attending an event and getting dressed up to doing things out of your comfort zone like skydiving and muddy runs ! As long as you enjoy it you should be proud !

Finally we have another Yemi finalist Ms Lincolnshire Kayleigh Louise Mansfield with her comments.

“I personally think both because you can get your platform out there even more when you attend pageants and different events”

I also got some comments from another Diamond, Rach Rigby who is a finalist in the Mrs/Ms Diamond U.K. system with me.

“In my mind charity/platform all the way as that is what I would want to strive to support and help. I don’t mind attending pageants but I don’t think it should make up the most of your appearances”

With all the comments my little post recurved it seems that we’re all in agreement charity/pageant appearances are more important but without our pageant community supporting each other at the finals of pageants we might be walking on a stage with no one to support us which would be incredibly disheartening ! I think having a mix of both appearances is the perfect way to go.

Finally I just wanted to thank everyone for there input ❤️ Love Ms Diamond South Yorkshire 2020