I nearly fell out of my chair when I saw the picture of the runner-up in this year's Miss England pageant. Her name is Chloe Marshall. I don't mean to be rude or anything, but she's got to be the fattest woman ever to win anything in a pageant. It's one thing for a beauty contestant from England to have jacked-up teeth. We all expect that. It's not even their fault. I think it's the water over there. But for her to be obesely overweight, that's a bit too much.

OK, put that aside for a minute and let me give you my thoughts on beauty pageants. I think it's old, it's played, and it's tired. Someone should take it out back and put a bullet in it once and for all. I can't believe that anyone still thinks beauty pageants are cool. Oh, let's round up a bunch of girls, put them in bikinis, and have judges grade their boobs and butts, while at the same time degenerate dudes gawk and drool over them watching it at home. What the hell century is this?

Now, if you are going to do it, do it right. I believe it's called a beauty contest, not a fat woman contest. You can't have a woman 80 lbs overweight not only competing in the thing but ripping 2nd place. What the hell is that? To be fair, I understand what they are trying to do. They are looking to make a statement. That chubby chicks can be hot too. I would agree with that, but they are just not hot enough to be in the top three in a beauty contest. Besides, it sets a dangerous precedent. If you let fat women in, who are you going to let in next? Are you going to crown someone with a face full of zits? What, people with blemishes aren't beautiful? What about women with excessive facial hair? There are actually women out there who rock their 5 o'clock shadows proudly because they do not conform to what other people think. Good for them, but should the next Miss Universe have a mustache then? We've got to draw a line somewhere...

I agree with you. Someone's been drinking too much of the feel-good kool-aid.

This lady's pretty, but she doesn't take enough care of her own body to be considered a beauty queen. End of story, as far as I'm concerned.

she maybe overweight but not obese

Nordic-kulta, Pidän sinusta oikein paljon. Kiinalaisten ja suomalaisten lapsista tulee kauniita!

I bet she has a Great personality!!!

Good for her, I say! Frankly, I have to applaud anyone who challenges the public to re-evaluate their standards of beauty. Whether or not you find her beautiful, you still have to respect what she's doing.

And frankly, isn't that what we all hope for on this board with guys like Yul Kwon, Aaron Yoo, Tony Leung and so forth? Asian men who will go out there and challenge the public to accept AMs as a model of male beauty as well? Beauty is temporal and provincial--what's beautiful in one time and place can be vastly different from another. It's in a gradual state of flux, and gets re-defined by the efforts of women like Ms. Marshall.

So if you're dissing a plus-sized woman for pushing the envelope of beauty, then you have no right to complain about all those people out there who say Asian men aren't beautiful.

An asian male is not a fat chick. Your comparison is fundamentally flawed and offensive.

I'm obviously not saying that they're the same thing, so there's no need to make gross reductions of my posts into stupidly simplistic statements so that you can try to make me look bad. I'm saying that there are similarities in the way that society treats both Asian males and plus-sized women as second-class citizens in the dating world, and I'm saying that it's a good thing any time anyone can shake up the status quo. And I'm also saying that anyone who complains that they're not given a fair shake because of society's ephemeral standards of beauty, and yet goes on to criticize others who are similarly discriminated against, is being a hypocrite.

(Likewise, I'm sure there are plenty of people who think it's pretty offensive that you think being compared to a 'fat chick' is offensive.)

yul kwon, Aaron Yoo, tony leung, never recieved blatant public ridicule about their race. they were generally accepted by everyone.

i think a more valid comparison, would be when william hung went onto american idol.

like william hung shunned by the asian american community,
im sure that this girl competing in british beauty pageant is recieving similar ridicule on british media tabloids and whatnot.

but the comparison becomes less valid with the amount of support given to william hung as compared to this plus sized beauty pageant. because plus sized women tend to flock together and defend eachother, as opposed to dorky asian guys who tend to disassociate themselves amongst eachother and are in denial.

but atleast that comparison is pointing more to the right direction in terms of comparsion.