Danish model Victoria Kjær Theilvig has been crowned 2024’s Miss Universe winner, causing political commentators on the internet (well, just X, really) to go into meltdown.
Son of the next president, Donald Trump Jr., X’d (?) out, “Biological & objectively attractive women are allowed to win beauty pageants again. WE ARE SO BACK!!!”
Likewise, Dutch right-wing commentator Eva Vlaardingerbroek made an X, “Wow. An actual European, blonde, blue-eyed woman won Miss Universe. That’s legal again? The tides are truly turning.” Similar comments of “nature is healing” and “a biological woman finally wins” flooded the site.
That’s a lot to unpack. Firstly, a transgender woman has never won the Miss Universe beauty pageant so it is unclear what nature has healed from, what tides have changed and who is so back and why. Theilvig is the first Danish woman to win so maybe it’s the Danes who are back? Maybe Mr. Trump refers to some secret, imminent Viking invasion??
Secondly, the winners of the Miss Universe beauty pageant have all been “objectively attractive”, since beauty (and you might need to sit down for this) is the primary criterion for a beauty pageant. What does Mr. Trump want? Will nothing please this man!
Oh, it’s racism.
Now the ‘r’ word gets bandied about a lot these days. It can be an ad hominem attack, falsely used to silence a detractor. But if recent previous winners have been non-white, the only thing that’s changed is that the winner is now white and someone says that’s better, what word would you use? When Eva said, “European, blonde, blue-eyed woman”, could she possibly be implying race? If a commentator implies that beauty is only in a certain race, what would you call that? Dang, if only there was a word we could use. Oh well.
But never mind! The Daily Mail has just explained that these Xs were jokes. Jokes! Lighthearted japes! They were in jest. My bad. My bad! I’ve been trolled. I got trolled. L. O. L. They pretended to be offended so I got confused so now they can say, “Haha, you’re offended” and we all laugh and do this again tomorrow.
Thankfully the Daily Mail, along with the New York Post, explained the joke to me. You see, a transgender woman was allowed to compete last year and the owner of Miss Universe is a transgender woman. Again, a transgender woman has never actually won, but you could imagine it happening. It’s plausible that if a non-trans woman won the Miss Universe beauty pageant that would be a federal crime, so, it’s all very funny.
For balance, some people on X also commented that they were tired of another white, blonde woman winning, saying of Theilvig’s appearance things like, “dis literally how 97.3% of white bitches look”, so, you know, people can be stupid both ways I guess.
I just don’t get it. Why is this even news? Why is this something political pundits have to weigh in on? Why does everything have to be politicized?? It’s a Mexican beauty pageant! And it’s not even universal! Now, there’s something to complain about. Where are the bug-eyed, green-skinned women from Glorpo Glorpo 7? Now that’s true beauty.
