NEW YORK (AP) — A New York girl is difficult the longstanding guidelines of Miss America and Miss World that disqualify moms from their magnificence pageants.
Danielle Hazel mentioned Monday that she’s all the time dreamed of coming into the competitions however was devastated to be taught that she’s now not eligible as a result of she had a son when she was simply 19 years previous.
“After I informed Zion, who’s now 6 years previous, about these guidelines he had an instantaneous intestine response: he mentioned that these guidelines are silly,” she mentioned, talking on the Ladies’s Rights Pioneers Monument in New York’s Central Park. “His sense of equity at solely 6 years previous tells him that that is unjust and is unnecessary.”
Hazel’s lawyer, Gloria Allred, mentioned a grievance despatched Monday to the town’s Fee on Human Rights seeks an finish to the necessities as a result of they deny and exclude moms from an “essential enterprise and cultural alternative” merely due to their standing as dad and mom.
“As we acknowledged in Danielle‘s filed grievance, this exclusion is degrading to Danielle as it’s based mostly upon the antiquated stereotype that girls can’t be each a mom and be stunning, poised, passionate, proficient and philanthropic,” Allred mentioned.
Spokespersons for the Miss America and Miss World pageant organizations didn’t immediately respond to emails seeking comment Monday. A spokesperson for the human rights commission said the agency does not comment on open investigations.
Allred noted that she previously had success challenging a similar rule for a California mother denied eligibility to compete in the Miss California pageant, which is part of the Miss Universe and Miss USA organizations.
The discrimination complaint filed by Andrea Quiroga with the California Civil Rights Department prompted Miss Universe to eliminate its 70-year-old rule, which was imposed worldwide through its affiliated organizations, Allred said.
“Being pregnant or being a parent is not a crime and should not exclude an individual from employment or business opportunities,” Allred said. “An individual’s status as a parent should not carry a stigma and no person should have to feel embarrassed, humiliated, or degraded because they have become a parent.”
The two women were joined Monday by Veronika Didusenko, who was crowned Miss Ukraine 2018 only to have the title stripped when the Miss World organization learned that she had a child.
Didusenko, who has since created an organization advocating for an end to beauty pageant bans on mothers, said she lost her legal challenge in Ukraine but is seeking relief from the European Court of Human Rights.
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Follow Philip Marcelo at twitter.com/philmarcelo.
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