If the goal is in fact to value traditionally feminine accomplishments in a way that empowers all women, it’s fair to ask why the contestants are, for the most part, being judged according to a very narrow standard of physical beauty. Is it actually empowering women as a class? Or is it empowering a small group of individual women who have a good time competing in pageants because they fit the brief?
The leaked video of Jakrajutatip’s meeting puts the lie to Miss Universe’s mission statement in the same way that the swimsuit competition does. It shows an organization that uses empty rhetoric about inclusion and diversity as a cover for the same blinkered vision of womanhood it has always pursued: a pageant queen who is thin, cis, and very young, a Barbie doll pre-epiphany.