Heather French Henry and Eleanor Smeal on beauty pageants and today's society

(CNN) – The 50^th Miss USA pageant is being held on Friday, March 2, in Gary, Indiana. Although there is still public interest in this and other major beauty pageants, viewership has been steadily declining over the years. Also, feminists groups are still protesting the pageants as demeaning to women, while pageant organizers try to place more emphasis on the scholarship awards made to participants.

Eleanor Smeal is currently president of the Feminist Majority Foundation. Previously, she served three terms as president of the National Organization for Women.

Heather French Henry was crowned Miss America in September 1999. The daughter of a disabled Vietnam veteran, she spent her reign advocating for homeless veterans. French married Kentucky's lieutenant governor shortly after her reign ended.

CNN Moderator: Welcome to CNN.com, Heather French Henry.

Heather Henry: Hello, everyone!

CNN Moderator: In this new millennium, what relevance do beauty pageants have?

Heather Henry: Miss America has been able to change the advocacy for numerous populations of people throughout her reign. I, for instance, advocated 25 million American veterans who had no advocate, so I consider her very relevant to today's needs in society.

Question from chat room: Mrs. Henry, do you consider yourself to be a feminist?

Heather Henry: I agree with equality in the workplace, equality in pay rates, but I don't agree with the judgment that feminist groups place on me for my right to choose my route of advocacy by becoming Miss America.

Comment from chat room: Hello, Ms. Henry! Thank you so much for helping homeless veterans. I work for Pete at the Veteran Administration's Office of Homeless Veterans Programs, and we all have you to thank for putting these issues on "the map," so to speak!

Heather Henry: It has been a privilege and an honor as a veteran's daughter to shed a spotlight for our unsung heroes. And tell Pete I said hi!

Question from chat room: Don’t you think that the pageant is highly outdated? I mean, look at how many people watched last year.

Heather Henry: Actually, Miss America had the highest ratings since the last decade, and we outscored all the other networks on our night of Miss America, and I thank all the veterans for watching!

Question from chat room: Heather, how do you feel that pageants changed your life, both positively and negatively?

Heather Henry: As the first member in my family to graduate from college, I thank the Miss America organization for offering me scholarship opportunities to further my education and the opportunity to grow in confidence, so that I could stand and testify in front of Congress to help our nation's veterans.

Question from chat room: Ms. Henry, why do you think modern society has come to desire such thin women as the ideal? It wasn't always so.

Heather Henry: I don't consider myself thin. I consider myself healthy, because I stress nutrition and a healthy physical routine, as do most Miss America contestants, and as most Americans should.

Question from chat room: Why is it so important to have beauty pageants?

Heather-Henry: It's important in our day and age to have positive young role models who are involved in the community, from the local level to the national level. And it's important to give proper credit to young individuals who are doing that great work.

CNN Moderator: Miss Massachusetts says that although she loves the glamour, she is concerned about the message these pageants give to young girls about the apparent importance of having an ideal body image. Do many contestants have mixed feelings about the pageant?

Heather-Henry: I can only speak for the Miss America organization, which doesn't stress body type, but stresses academics, scholarship and platform. I can't speak for the Miss USA system.

CNN Moderator: What did you learn from competing in pageants that has served you well so far?

Heather-Henry: One of the most important skills is speaking ability, public speaking ability, and composure, grace under pressure and being a professional working young woman. And work ethic is also important.

CNN Moderator: Thank you for joining us today, Heather French Henry.

Heather-Henry: Goodbye and God bless.

CNN Moderator: Welcome to CNN.com, Eleanor Smeal.

Eleanor Smeal: Hi. How is everybody out there?

CNN Moderator: If a woman enters a beauty contest voluntarily, what is wrong with her participating in a beauty pageant?

Eleanor Smeal: We take more issue with the pageant than the contestants. The pageant is still emphasizing far too much on looks, bathing suits and appearances, and, of course, the pageant system takes girls in at very young ages, little girls, 4, 5, 6, on up. It's the system of the pageant and what it emphasizes that is what we object to.

Comment from chat room: Women do not compete the same way men do. There are physical and emotional differences that cannot be overcome with political correctness. Pageants offer a chance, in some cases the only chance, for a girl, women to be competitive and learn how to compete. Instead of running down pageants, we should encourage them for the good they do.

Eleanor Smeal: In the first place, women today, because of the work of the woman's movement, have many opportunities to compete -- sports, debate, academics, professions, many, many ways of competing. It used to be the pageant was one of the only ways -- when in 1945, when they began to offer scholarships -- the tragedy was so few others did, but they only offered token then.

Because of the work of the woman's movement, the pageants have changed so they offer far more scholarships, and they emphasize more professional opportunities for women after college. But still, they are in many ways a throwback to that time when women could only compete with their looks.

Comment from chat room: Wonderful Eleanor, keep the good fight. I am sick of being judged by my looks and not my brain. I happen to have both, but the latter rarely ever counts.

Eleanor Smeal: Good. That's why we're still protesting, since women's brains, which they've been put down for, should be valued. One major reason I wanted to do the show is because of our cultural influences. Too many women believe they must have a certain body image to succeed, so millions diet unnecessarily; anorexia and bulimia and eating disorders are very serious among young women. For older women, the constant attention to appearances causes much misery, as well. It doesn't stop at a certain age.

Comment from chat room: I don’t feel children should be pushed into the pageant world, but myself, by working at a local high school, I know that a lot of girls enter because of the scholarship award.

Eleanor Smeal: The pageant system has sort of a program by which little girls start competing at a very young age, and our research shows that very few contestants really start in high school. They're being pushed to start in elementary school and junior high school, in a very exploitive way.

Comment from chat room: Ms. Smeal, it seems as if these pageants are really actually "job interviews."

Eleanor Smeal: Our movement has tried to make sure that job interviews don't emphasize just looks. And they may protest all they want, looks here still play a dominant role. But there is no question that we want more scholarships, and we want more empowerment of women, and we encourage them picking up those aspects and downplaying the ones that are exploitive.

Question from chat room: Do you think that the public is getting sick of Miss USA?

Eleanor Smeal: Yes, they're very dated, and one of the reasons they're so dated is because the modern woman and girl is seen more fully, with a wide array of attributes and talents. So, they're a throwback to the past, and their audiences are decreasing.

CNN Moderator: Isn't the feminist movement all about choices, especially more choices rather than fewer. Why shouldn't women be able to choose whether she wants to participate in a beauty pageant?

Eleanor Smeal: I have not been criticizing the women; I have been criticizing the system. What we are trying to do is raise consciousness among women and men about the exploitive nature of a pageant that overemphasizes appearances. Our research shows, by the way, that pageant winners tend to be so thin that their body mass index is lower than what the world health standard is for undernourished -- that's a Johns Hopkins study in the year 2000. That's the kind of thing we're worried about.

CNN Moderator: If fewer and fewer people are watching pageants, why don't you let the market work and have these pageants die off because of lack of public support?

Eleanor Smeal: We are, and we're helping give it a push.

CNN Moderator: Thank you for joining us today, Eleanor Smeal.

Eleanor Smeal: Thank you.

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