JonBenet's personality

Perhaps this has been discussed before and I missed it.
So much has been said about JonBenet's exceptional beauty. Don't get me wrong, she was a pretty little girl. But as a mom of two girls, I find so much more beauty in pure innocence than in made up and dressed up girls putting on a show. My youngest, she is 5, looks a lot like JonBenet. Her favorite clothing consists of a pair of Mudd jeans or some overalls, and an I LOVE DADDY shirt of some sort. Also included would be one of her silly hats. There is nothing more beautiful than a little girl in denim and a hat chasing a butterfly, or blowing bubbles and then trying to catch them on her face. Yea, she likes to dress up, but it doesn't last long before she is back outside in her denim.
The greatest thing about being a parent is just standing back and watching them be them, grow and develop into themselves. Sure they need guidance and structure, but they need to be themselves too. They need to be free to discover themselves and learn for themselves what they like.
I have a lot of doubts about JonBenet wanting to be in the pageants, doing so many dance lessons and voice lessons. Girls that age have such short attention spans. They want to have fun and do their own things.
I have seen a ton of professional photos of her, and a few "candids" but not that many of the second. Ofcourse there is all of the video of her, but has anyone seen any video that isn't from a beauty pageant? I wonder what she was really like, who she really was. I wonder if Patsy even knows. I don't think JonBenet ever got to know herself and just be a kid.
I read that she was kind of bratty and spoiled. I don't think that was it. I think she was unhappy, and wanted to be herself instead of who Patsy wanted her to be. I don't think she had a say in much of her own life. That's enough to make anyone bratty!

I'm not charmed by the beauty pagents these young girls are put through. i feel they haven't been left alone to be chldren. made to grow up too quickly and to think superficial things (make-up, wardrobe) important before they are of an appropriate age.

but then again, i don't personally know any little girls who are in beauty pagents so i may have the wrong end of the stick.

Floh said:

I'm not charmed by the beauty pagents these young girls are put through. i feel they haven't been left alone to be chldren. made to grow up too quickly and to think superficial things (make-up, wardrobe) important before they are of an appropriate age.

but then again, i don't personally know any little girls who are in beauty pagents so i may have the wrong end of the stick.

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Being Southerners, beauty pageants are very common, with girls of all ages (and even little boys) participating. Pageants are literally everywhere. I'm not saying they are right or wrong; all I am saying is that they are cultural.The parents view it no differently than boys playing little league tee ball/baseball, or even other girls playing soccer/softball. I know many people whose little girls as young as 2 take all kinds of lessons. Again, it's obvious that there are parents who take anything to an extreme, be it sports, beauty pageants, racing, good grades, etc... There are always those cases. Was Patsy one of those extremists? I don't know. Perhaps having money allowed her to participate in a different level than others. I sense that having been through the pageant circuit herself, it was an important part of her life and one that she wanted for her daughter. I have friends whose daughters started out the same way, but by the time they were ten/twelve the girls lost interest in pageantry and got into other interests. Sadly, no one will ever know if JB would have chosen other avenues.

I've said it before, but I really think a person has to be a part of the Southern culture to fully understand that pageants are a way of life for many many people here.

Nehemiah said:

I've said it before, but I really think a person has to be a part of the Southern culture to fully understand that pageants are a way of life for many many people here.

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Yeah, I can agree to a point. One thing that really bothers me, though is the message it sends to small children. Five and 6 year old children don't need the subtle message that they are not pretty enough NATURALLY. I believe highlighting or bleaching a small child's hair in order for them compete in a beauty pageant is telling them people (namely pagent judges) will like them better if they just change this. I think there is no excuse for this.
Such lessons for a small girl are AWFUL.

I realise that we are a world full of made up women. I wear very little make up, or a lot of make up very rarely. I wonder if it had anything to do with my upbringing? At 16, if I wanted to go somewhere with my Dad, he did a face inspection. No make up for me. My father was not a tyrant, this was just something he felt very strongly about. My mother only ever wore make up for a very special occasion (eyeshadow to match her dress and shoes, etc.......LOL).
I am one of 5 girls....only one of us is a full time 'beauty queen'!!!! The rest of us are usually bare faced.

Nehemiah said:

I've said it before, but I really think a person has to be a part of the Southern culture to fully understand that pageants are a way of life for many many people here.

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But pageants did not even begin to become a way of life for Patsy until she was in her very first pageant at the age of fifteen, which I think even the most diehard pageant opponents on the forums can agree is at least an age when the participant is better able to make decisions about the process herself rather than being under the complete control and influence of her parents and their decision-making on her behalf.

And the statements that pageants are part of Southern culture and therefore were an intimate part of Patsy's family's life does not seem to wash much, either. Debutante balls are also a part of Southern culture, but I have found not a shred of evidence that Patsy was a debutante and came out to society. John Ramsey's daughters Melinda and Beth were raised in Southern culture, and neither became a pageant participant. Patsy's sister Paulette did not become a pageant participant. Most Southerners do not become pageant participants. To say in essence that JonBenet was almost fated to be in pageants because she was born in the South is to take the responsibility for that decision away from Patsy, and that should not be done. Patsy is the one and only person who was responsible for JonBenet's pageant career. She paid the fees, she filled out the forms, she arranged the travel, she organized the costumes, she changed JonBenet's hair to be more pageant-judge-attractive, and she trained JonBenet in the exact timing for the talent performances (all pageants JonBenet was in have a strict time limit for the talent portion and the participants are not allowed to go over or points are taken off) (except for the Sunburst pageants, which had no talent portion, and John Ramsey had every right to be offended with Patsy for having put his daughter in a show he did not approve of for that reason).

I think the whole pageant topic can be summed up as follows: JonBenet had a right to express and have her wishes heard as to whether she liked being in pageants. But she was a young child, and changed her mind from day to day, which is what childhood is for. It was not her choice to have one of her many, many momentary whims paid attention to and committed to as a career. Instead, it was the responsibility of her parents, especially in this case Patsy, to exercise intelligent and mature adult wisdom and their perspective on the Big Picture, and not to pick one day out of all of JonBenet's days, and say to her, "You said you wanted to be in pageants, so we will make you be in them until you explicitly have the authority over us of your own ability to make the mature decision to stop."

And for God's sake, can everybody at least also get on board with the common fact that pageants are the single most useless activity any child can participate in, given that they do not have even the benefit gymnastics and soccer and Little League do of making a child healthier through physical activity? Can we also all agree that child pageants are run by adults, judged by adults, the rules are set by adults, and that the children in them literally have no choice except whether to cooperate with the adults or not?

Why Nutt -


Very well stated and I concur.
PS
I am about as southern as they come ! :crazy:

Nehemiah said:

Being Southerners, beauty pageants are very common, with girls of all ages (and even little boys) participating. Pageants are literally everywhere. I'm not saying they are right or wrong; all I am saying is that they are cultural.The parents view it no differently than boys playing little league tee ball/baseball, or even other girls playing soccer/softball. I know many people whose little girls as young as 2 take all kinds of lessons. Again, it's obvious that there are parents who take anything to an extreme, be it sports, beauty pageants, racing, good grades, etc... There are always those cases. Was Patsy one of those extremists? I don't know. Perhaps having money allowed her to participate in a different level than others. I sense that having been through the pageant circuit herself, it was an important part of her life and one that she wanted for her daughter. I have friends whose daughters started out the same way, but by the time they were ten/twelve the girls lost interest in pageantry and got into other interests. Sadly, no one will ever know if JB would have chosen other avenues.

I've said it before, but I really think a person has to be a part of the Southern culture to fully understand that pageants are a way of life for many many people here.

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Thanks for giving me a little more understanding on this subject, Nehemiah.

pageants really don't sit well with me, but i have no idea of the culture.

I just don't think it's right to judge another culture by your own standards - which is why I tend to refrain from pageant discussions. I look at my own culture where the menfolks play a game called shinty - very seriously. It's like hockey - but played in mid air and extremely brutal.. All the male members of my family play/played shinty and they are all pretty beaten up from the game. They get their eyes burst open, their teeth knocked out, their skulls cracked, their noses broken. Many's the Saturday when I've run up and down the sideline to hand out wet sponges to clean up the cuts and gashes (I hated that job but it's expected of the womenfolk). I'm pretty certain that other cultures might think they are a bunch of primitive wildmen and perfectly nutz to play such a game, but it's regarded as quite normal here. Another thing that is normal is men wearing kilts. You can go into town anyday and see men wearing kilts - especially on a weekend as our men often wear their kilts to football games - even to the pub to watch football on tv. A man in a skirt might cause a stir in downtown Manhattan perhaps, but nobody pays the blindest bit of notice here because it's so commonplace.

I was raised in Northern Minnesota with two older brothers whom I wanted to be just like. However my husband was raised in the south with two sisters and a brother. His sisters were never in Pageants. They didn't need makeup, hair dye, voice and dance lessons to feel good about who they were. Soccer, softball, cheerleading, track, swimming, wrestling, these were some of the sports that they (and all of their friends) were involved in. None of which demanded nearly all of their time and energy at the age of 6, placing massive amounts of emphasis on outer poise and beauty. We were all well rounded kids. We had our activities, but we had time to be kids. And none of us changed or altered our appearances. My sisters in law are incredibly gorgeous women, and were always very popular. They have massive amounts of self esteem. AND they always had time to be kids. My mother in law is a doctor, these kids always grew up in the "very well to do" neighborhoods and schools. None of their friends were ever in pageants.

one more thing.
It wasn't my intent to attack the morals of pageants. But more so just to vocalize my view on the need for these kids to be kids. I am so incredibly saddened that this little girls WORLD was pageantry.
If there was a balance between the two, pageants and childhood, then I could see it as ok.... though I still don't agree with the way they are portrayed. But there never is that balance with pageantry.
The reason that I wouldn't still see it as okay is because these little girls don't need to be parading and moving around in ways that I don't think are age appropriate. These sequin tight dresses have no innocence. All of the makeup, and the mature hairstyles are unneeded and take away from innocent beauty.
That aside, there is still no balance.

Jayelles said:

I just don't think it's right to judge another culture by your own standards - which is why I tend to refrain from pageant discussions. I look at my own culture where the menfolks play a game called shinty - very seriously. It's like hockey - but played in mid air and extremely brutal.. All the male members of my family play/played shinty and they are all pretty beaten up from the game. They get their eyes burst open, their teeth knocked out, their skulls cracked, their noses broken. Many's the Saturday when I've run up and down the sideline to hand out wet sponges to clean up the cuts and gashes (I hated that job but it's expected of the womenfolk). I'm pretty certain that other cultures might think they are a bunch of primitive wildmen and perfectly nutz to play such a game, but it's regarded as quite normal here. Another thing that is normal is men wearing kilts. You can go into town anyday and see men wearing kilts - especially on a weekend as our men often wear their kilts to football games - even to the pub to watch football on tv. A man in a skirt might cause a stir in downtown Manhattan perhaps, but nobody pays the blindest bit of notice here because it's so commonplace.

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Jayelles, you are hereby given permission to judge our pageant culture as much as you wish

Your example is not at odds with the point being made. Shinty is an all-in game from the sound of it. Boys, young men, older men, whoever, everyone who wants to play does, and the nature of the game is to play by the rules, not be arbitrarily judged as a winner or loser in the game by how handsome a player looks. Pageantry has no rules. It is *all* arbitrary. If a male judge has a liking for blonde little girls, then blonde little girls will win. If a female judge has a liking for the work of a particular pageant-dress designer's work, then any child wearing that designer's work will win. In pageantry, children are treated like props, and the relationship to the JonBenet Ramsey murder case is that JonBenet herself was treated like a prop in a murder scene. She was killed by someone who was capable of seeing her as a mannequin to be dressed in a ligature and posed with arms overhead. In my opinion, pageants are not a causative factor in JonBenet's murder, but it certainly ought to be included as a factor in determining who, in her life, was capable of seeing her as merely a mannequin.

I can understand what many of you are saying. Not every female in the South is involved in pageantry! I didn't say that--just that it is a very popular thing all around and it is a part of the culture. There is a "Miss" everything...or a "Little Miss" Everything.

What we are handicapped in is that probably no one here personally knows Patsy, or the Ramsey family. We just go by what we view and what we read about her (them).

I am not personally involved in pageants in any way (well, I have judged some). But I have a heck of a lot of friends who are.

But what about "don't knock it till you've tried it?" (I'm sure there will be an American translation for that!). I might regard pageants as a bit bizarre, but since I don't live in a pageant culture, I think it's none of my business. I don't think burkas are attractive, not that I regard myself as being any great beauty and some might wish I would wear a burka but what gives me the right to judge another culture by my standards?

Then there are African tribes who self-mutilate in the name of beauty. Do we judge them by our standards?

Peope make lifestyle choices of all sorts. Some have strong religious beliefs and enforce them on their children. Is that wrong?

What about gays and transexuals who adopt children? I know, I know - can of worms but it's exactly the same as the discussion at hand. We've all made lifestyle choices which would be deemed unacceptable to certain other groups of society.

I might disapprove of my neighbour's lifestyle choices and he might disapprove of mine but it's a happier world if we live and let live.

Our men don't play shinty for the exercise. They literally knock lumps out of each other - try to KILL each other on the pitch. They think rugby players are a bunch of fairies ;-)

I know what you're saying about placing emphasis on beauty instead of talent - but who is to blame for the success of that? We are - when we buy the glossy magazines and buy the designer clothes. The fact is - beauty does matter. It opens all sorts of doors. Maybe that's wrong, but it's a fact of life.

What do you mean by playing in "mid air"? I can't begin to describe the visual I get from that.

It is not really the pageants I have problems with. I sponsored a friends daughter(age4),meaning I helped collect money for the dresses and travel.She only entered twice and it seemed she liked it. however the dresses were frilly and girly (and expensive) and her hair was tied with ribbons. I believe she did a little dance routine.BUT she did not look like the pictures I saw of JonBenet !! She was dressed provacitively and at times downright sexy. Look at some of her photos, she is pouting like an adult and looking like a Vegas show girl. That is the real reason most people are upset, not just being in the pageants.

I don't have a problem at all with the idea of pageants. What I do have a problem with,is dressing young girls to look sexy. That's just wrong. To a point, I blame the people running the pageants,for not having age appropiate guidelines.They know how some parents go over the top ... and it wasn't just Patsy and JonBenet,there are a lot of little girls in those pageants dressing the same way.

capps said:

I don't have a problem at all with the idea of pageants. What I do have a problem with,is dressing young girls to look sexy. That's just wrong. To a point, I blame the people running the pageants,for not having age appropiate guidelines.They know how some parents go over the top ... and it wasn't just Patsy and JonBenet,there are a lot of little girls in those pageants dressing the same way.

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Well capps ,we posted at the same time and I see we agree!

simplesimon said:

Well capps ,we posted at the same time and I see we agree!

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Simplesimon,

LOL .... great minds think alike!!

simplesimon said:

It is not really the pageants I have problems with. I sponsored a friends daughter(age4),meaning I helped collect money for the dresses and travel.She only entered twice and it seemed she liked it. however the dresses were frilly and girly (and expensive) and her hair was tied with ribbons. I believe she did a little dance routine.BUT she did not look like the pictures I saw of JonBenet !! She was dressed provacitively and at times downright sexy. Look at some of her photos, she is pouting like an adult and looking like a Vegas show girl. That is the real reason most people are upset, not just being in the pageants.

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I have to agree, the pageants at such a young age are bad enough, but Patsy was over the top, not just in the provocative outfits she put JonBenet in, but also dyeing her hair blonde, and to top it off- the worst for me- bright red lipstick on a 6 year old!!!:furious: No wonder John saw her as a minature woman to be sexually abused!

I agree with the rest on no problem with pagents just clothing that makes a child appear sexual and make up.

A lot of pics of JonBenet were darn cute and innocent, but some made me shudder. She even appeared to have occasionally tried to give seductive looks.
Some parents fill their kids lives with dance lessons on certain days, music on others, girl scouts and soccer. And some kids like it.
Being a step mom to a daughter who's mother had her enrolled in something everyday of the week I got worn out and there were times my step daughter was tired and cranky and just did not want to go. She needed a break and so did I. I just wasn't that kind of mom. My sons each had soccer and baseball or football but only one thing at a time. They were like me, enjoyed kicking back in the evening or visiting a friend.
If an intruder killed JonBenet I can only think they saw her dressed up and chose her. But truly, just ten years ago I rarely thought about pediphiles going to watch children at their activities to stalk them. I mostly worried about them being yanked into a car or going to a restroom in a store alone.
My son went to a restroom at a National Guard Armory we and about 300 other people had evacuated to during a hurricane. He actually went with his older brother but his brother left him instead of staying with him. My son ran out and the guy tried to get another boy. The National Guard arrested the man. He was on drugs and had a knife telling the little boy he was going to cut his penis off when they ran in to get him. My son and the little boy were crying and hysterical. The other boys parents were so scared. They had been standing right outside while this guy could have cut up their child.