It was just last week that everyone was up in arms over a mother shown on Toddlers & Tiaras who put a padded butt and boobs on a four year-old to dress her up as Dolly Parton for a child pageant. This week, we’re treated to a little girl named Paisley (I can’t find her age, but she has to be around four or five Update: she’s three!) dressed up as Julia Roberts’ prostitute character from Pretty Woman and strutting on stage in front of a backdrop painted to look like the Beverly Wiltshire hotel. Another pageant mother, with a little girl dressed more appropriately in curls and a cute dress (but still wearing makeup, natch) narrates that it’s stunts like that which give pageant moms a bad name. Try to watch the clip above without your having your mouth involuntarily hang open.
In tonight’s episode of TLC’s “Toddlers & Tiaras,” little Paisley trots out on stage in a pair of thigh-high vinyl boots, spandex miniskirt and wig, identical to what Julia Roberts’ character, a low-rent Hollywood hooker, wore in 1990’s “Pretty Woman.”
The backdrop to the tiny streetwalker’s sashay was a cardboard facade of the Beverly Wilshire Hotel–where Richard Gere’s wealthy character kept his concubine for the flat rate of $3000 per week.
“I would never, ever do that to my little girl, ever,” says the mother of one of the other contestants. “Us pageants moms already take a huge rap for what we’re doing to our little girls, and it’s outfits like that that give us a bad rap.”
She’s not kidding. The Parents Television Council not only condemned Paisley’s mother, but the network airing “Toddlers & Tiaras.”
“We have a serious problem when a network formerly known as The Learning Channel features a toddler, who probably hasn’t even learned to read, dressed as a prostitute showing off her sexy strut,” The PTC said in a statement issued to TMZ.com. “There’s no question, TV executives are complicit in robbing these small kids of their childhood. For years we’ve seen adult sexuality being inappropriately and aggressively foisted on innocent young children, but children today are being sexualized at younger and younger ages. All available data suggests they will suffer for it later in life.”
[From FoxNews.com]
In what universe is this ok? I get that Pretty Woman an iconic movie from the 90s that this kid’s idiotic mom probably watched over and over when she was in grade school parked in front of the TV while her own mom was off getting drunk and sleeping around. It’s about a hooker, though, and she not only dressed her kid up as a hooker character, she had her walk around in front of a whole backdrop she painted, as if the child was working a streetcorner! It’s outrageous. This makes putting some fake T&A on a kid look like like a decent alternative.
Update: Several of you have commented that this little girl won the Ultimate Grande Supreme title. Also TMZ has an interview with the mom who did this to her daughter, and she claims this outfit isn’t that revealing and then she gets all defensive and says it’s better than forcing the kid into sports. Really.
Didn’t think this show could jump the shark anymore. OMG.
I’m too frustrated by that clip. What .. they dress her up as prostitute version Pretty Woman .. they even get a damned safety clip and stick condoms down her boots for ‘authenticity.’ But then they can’t even teach her to pole dance? FOR SHAME!
How can a mother do that to her own child?! Or to ANY child.
My Goodness.
And the look of worry in the other child’s face? She looked as if she was thinking: “Oh, no, they liked her better! Why am I all covered up?!”. Well, at least her mom understood that the whole thing was eww-inducing.
This show is just WRONG and disgusting. Look at the judges laugh as if it was a cute puppy doing some silly stuff: It’s friggin’ children, morons!
this is horrible.
WTF are these people thinking with all the pedophiles and childhood pornography out there, to think of having their children dressed so provacatively. I am against shows like this, because to me, what kind of messageS are they sending out to the SICK BASTARDS OF THE WORLD?????
Dressing up a young child as someone who sells her body for sex is WRONG. Just wrong.
And this crap is carried on THE LEARNING CHANNEL??? All it’s teaching is how to pimp out your little daughters and giving a thrill to pedophiles. The Learning Channel should be fined for carrying offensive stuff like this and the mothers should be jailed for parading their children around like little whores. Unbelievable how American culture and society has sunk so low.
The mother has s**t for brains.
I agree that it’s…nasty and wrong, but at the same time, she’s wearing more clothes than some of the girls whose parents put them in freaking bikinis and skimpy “gymnastic” outfits. At the very least, she’s covered up. Is it tacky and demoralizing? Absolutely. But, I reiterate-she’s covered up.
Also, WTF kind of store sells thigh high boots for children?
Seriously, what is wrong with these people?! Every time I think about watching this show just for the shock/horror value, I see something like last week’s story & now this, and I just…can’t. I would be throwing things at my tv & we cannot afford a new one.
I have a 6 y/o daughter who people have been telling me is absolutely beautiful since she was a tiny baby & that I should enter into local pageants. I briefly considered what’s called the “Sunday Best” type of pageants (entrants are only allowed to wear Sunday best/nice clothes, no formalwear, and absolutely no makeup.) However, I can’t even bring myself to do that…heck, I have a hard time putting light makeup on her for her dance recitals, and I know it’s necessary due to the stage lights! I start to wonder if I’m in the minority though, when it seems like even little girl clothes are made to be form-fitting & bust-emphasizing (they don’t even have ’em yet-why draw attention to that area?!) and have glittery words across the butt.
Well, there’s a world of difference between teaching your 4 year old to be sexy and teaching your 4 year old to be slutty.
This sick mom is breaking the law by parading her child dressed as a hooker.
Federal Law “The Child Protection and Treatment Act” say that child abuse and neglect, at a minimum, is defined as “any recent act, or failure to act, on the part of a parent or caretaker which results in death or serious physical or emotional harm, or sexual abuse or exploitation, or presents an imminent risk of serious harm.”
http://www.cwla.org/childwelfare/fg02.pdf
Child pornography is defined by law as the visual depiction of a person under the age of 18 engaged in sexually explicit conduct. See 18 U.S.C. §§ 2256(1) and (8). This means that any image of a child engaged in sexually explicit conduct is illegal contraband. Notably, the legal definition of sexually explicit conduct does not require that an image depict a child engaging in sexual activity.
http://www.justice.gov/criminal/ceos/citizensguide_porn.html
It doesn’t matter what mom’s INTENTIONS are, she needs to be stopped immediately from harming her innocent, vulnerable little girl this way!
I wish we lived in a world where children can just BE children and laugh and run enjoying every moment of their youth. I’m not a mom myself, but the sound of children laughing and playing I find fantastic. Putting these girls through these type of shows breaks my heart as to what the parents really teaching them is important in life and pagents can not be that beneficial for a child. maybe somewhere it is, but this show is so very wrong for me.
Is this supposed to be the ‘talent’ part of the competition?
For god’s sake, if you want to dress up your child there are Dorothy costumes, Princess costumes, pioneer girls, etc..
My daughter is the white rabbit from AIW, for a dance solo.
Why can’t they go that route?
I cringe whenever I see the commercials for this show. (I watched a few minutes of it once and that was enough.) I just can’t understand how a mother can do this to her child. These women have such a distorted sense of importance towards these pageants. It’s frightening really.
The people in the audience cheering? The judges giggling? You people suck. This made me physically ill.
CB – This child is 3!! THREE YEARS OLD. Disgusting. I volunteer to beat some sense into her former-pageant-wanna-be-living-vicariously-through-her-child mother.
Oh my. Well, that’s horrifying. I won’t add anything about the hooker costume, since I think most of my thoughts have already been covered here.
I feel conflicted saying anything nice about this show. But, I actually thought the other little girl (the child of the woman who was narrating) looked quite cute. Yes, the make up was excessive and unnecessasry. But, the dress was exactly the sort of thing I would have wanted to wear at her age.
I was generally a tomboy growing up. I spent most of my days playing baseball and video games. But, when I did decide to have girly moments, I had REALLY girly moments. In fact, I even wanted to be in a pageant at one point just so I could wear a big, poofy dress like that just for one day of my life.
But then, I see this hooker child and I have to be grateful my parents shot all my pageant requests down. For every little girl who is out there having a fun “princess day” (as I used to call days that involved pretty dresses), there are five girls having a “psycho stage mom pimping out their child day” (as I currently call the mess above). All things considered, I probably dodged a bullet by not being exposed to this junk.
Okay, enough is enough. Somebody heat up the tar, I’ll bring the feathers, and we’ll get two strong guys to carry the rail.
I worked with these mothers & their little darlings for a decade. The mothers are some of the most cut-throat people I have ever met in my life. They don’t look at it as exploiting their kids. They just want to win.
I wonder if these pageant ‘moms’ know that they are delivering their children to pedeophiles via cable TV? Do they realise that some sicko is getting off on seeing their children all sexed up in front of the TV?
Chills, chills, chills.
Am I the only female who didnt like Pretty Woman? I thought the movie was lame and I just didnt buy the whole hooker with a heart who waits for a man to save her plot. Both my sisters loved that movie when we were girls, but I kept thinking ‘she’s a hooker, they give bj’s to sweaty men in cars and get strangled in allyways. How the hell is this romantic?’.
I dont think the outfit is all that bad, I have seen I alot worse. (the swimsuit section.) She is covered up after all.
I think because we know that she is dressed as the pretty woman we think that the mother is trying make up her child as a pro. Which I highly doubt is true. The mother probably thought that by dressing her child that way that judges would get that she was trying to be Julia Roberts.
That being said Pretty Woman was a bad bad movie, and ALL beauty contests should be avoided at all costs.
@Sam: Julia Roberts has been in many different movies. If the mother had just wanted to dress her up to look like Roberts, why on earth did she pick that movie?
You can’t defend the indefensible. Any mother who does this to her little girl is unfit to be a parent.
“Sexy” vs. Slutty”, really? “Covered up” makes it OK?
NONE of that matters here.
The fact is mom is dressing a 3 yo little girl as a prostitute and parading her in front of a hotel backdrop. It is the blatantly suggestive nature of Paisley’s ‘act’ that makes this child pornography.
This is utterly abusive exploitation by a sh*t excuse for a mother. That little girl understands absolutely nothing of the adult image she is being taught to portray. It is teaching this child to link their self-worth to such behaviour, which will attract predators to her long before she knows why. She is being set up to be a potential victim, emotionally, mentally and physically. She should be taken into foster care by Child Protection Services before it’s too late.
The only good that can come out of this disgusting program is that it will outrage enough people that it will be banned.
Time to clean up your act, America.
Original Bellaluna, I’m first in line behind you. Such a little sweetheart of a girl, she deserves so much better than her sicko mother.
@WickedSteppMom, I’m in a similar boat. I have an absolutely gorgeous 7 year-old child (think Shiloh Jolie-Pitt with long hair and loose curls), and people have been telling me since she was a baby to get her into modelling or pageants. At first I would laugh as if they were kidding. It was only after repeated insistence on their part that I realized that they were serious. There’s just no way that I could ever, ever do that to her. I could never be a part of something that teaches her that her looks are the only thing that matters. Like you said, Wicked, I have a hard time even putting makeup on her for dance recitals. Even then I skimp on the makeup — she gets some light pink lipstick/gloss, blush, and some sparkly stuff on her eyelids, and that’s it.
If she made a decision to pursue that sort of thing as an adult, then I would support her (providing she put her education first). But there’s no way that I would pimp her out as a child or teach her that appearances are all that matter.
@Cheyenne She probably picked that movie because everyone knows it.
Jumping up and down saying she is an unfit parent doesnt make it true.
The mother showed poor judgement for sure but ‘unfit’ is a huge leap.
@Sloane Wyatt: “Sexy” vs. Slutty”, really?
Actually, my comment about sexy vs slutty toddlers was pure sarcasm.
WickedSteppMom & GeekChic – Stand fast to your ideals. My daughter danced from 4 – 14 (injury), and one of the things I adored about her dance instructor (and studio owner) was her unwavering commitment to the age-appropriateness of the costumes, no matter the age of the performers.
From the time my children were very young, people said “Oh, you should get them into modeling/acting” and I always said “NO.” I don’t want that life for my children. When they get older, if they choose that life, that’s fine.
The part that’s really gonna blow yer mind is that this little girl won the Ultimate Grande Supreme title dressed as a hooker.
The article didn’t mention the worst part, which is that the little girl, Paisley, WON the Grand Supreme title, the biggest in the contest. That means that the judges totally approved of this!
I’m embarrassed to admit that I watch this show, but it is both fascinating and horrifying to me. Prior to the Jon Benet Ramsey murder I didn’t even know this child beauty pagent world existed. I’m from the suburbs of a major northeastern city, and where I come from girls are encouraged to excel in education, not prance around with spray tans and flippers. I realize that “Toddlers and Tiaras” is edited for dramatic effect, but what is shown, in my opinion, borders on child abuse. Parents feed their kids sugar and caffeine, make them practice routines when they’d rather be playing and make them look like overdressed freaks. Can anyone explain to me why some people think this normal?
Shut this shit down, this is child abuse. Are these moms so sick that they enjoy the fact that pedophiles probably watch this show and do god knows what when they watch their daughters on tv? As if we don’t have enough problems with pedophilia. This is just disgusting.
@ hatsumomo: Nope, you’re not the only one. I’ve never understood why so many women like that sh*tty movie. Plot is boring, typical BS about a woman who needed a man to rescue her. Why should I idolize a prostitute?
So many things wrong with this.
And that wig is atrocious.
This disgusts me…I would NEVER in a million years dress my daughter up like that!!
And did you hear the men in the audience catcalling? SICK SICK SICK.
This show makes my blood boil over. I work in policing and I had to look at at some child porn…. as part of the file review. That image will never leave me and it haunts me at night still. When I see these children I think of the little girl victim I saw. I wish every mother that does THIS to their child could look at it. These paedophiles DO get off on this, and actually think in their sick heads that the little girl is flirting with them and wants, yes, wants what hes go to offer. So these mothers are literally serving up their children on platters. AND then the judges rewards this behaviour.
Sorry Rant… but this issue is way to close to home for me.
Um, this is bordering on child porn and pedophilia. These people need to have their kids taken away from them and sterilized. Stat.
It really is the end of the world.
@sam: We will just have to agree to disagree. Any mother whose judgement is that bad is an unfit parent, IMO. Good parenting isn’t only about providing adequate food, clothes and medical care; it’s also about teaching your child a sense of values. And what she is teaching this little three year old is that parading around dressed up like a whore is going to get you somewhere in life, never mind that the “somewhere” will probably be a street corner.
someone’s mama needs to be bitchslapped and then afterwards, have social services come for a little visit.
@Cirque28: Thanks for clearing that up. Now I can leave my foaming at the mouth to my toothpaste.
I am astonished that some feel Paisley’s ‘act’ was not a big deal.
Unfit doesn’t even BEGIN to cover it. This mother needs to have that child taken away and get counseling to find out the REAL reason why she would even think this is apropriate behavior. I am so sad for that little girl.
@Cheyenne I doubt that the mother told her daughter that she was dressed like a hooker. But lets just pretend she did, its not like a 3 year old would have any concept of what a hooker was even if it was explained to her.
She is 3 years old. She will not be emotionally scarred by this. I doubt she will even remember this event in later years.
Its really easy to judge other parents for their choices. Not every parent makes the correct decision everytime. The occasional bout of poor judgement does not make a person an unfit parent.
Put down the pitch forks people.
BTW @Cheyenne if she does end up on a street corner I will be willing to admit I was wrong in this case.
Everyone. Every. Single. Adult. In that whorse and pony show ought to be lined up against a wall and executed. Not a single person in that room is fit to raise a child.
Disgusting. This joke’s not funny anymore.
@Sam: How would you like the idea of some pervert beating himself off over your three-year-old daughter dressed up like a hooker? Never mind that she’s too young to know what a hooker is. This sick excuse for a mother is turning her little girl into every pedophile’s wet dream.
What I want to know is, where is this little girl’s father, and if he knows what her mother is subjecting her to, why doesn’t he put a stop to it?
This show…I can’t even.
@Cheyenne I doubt that pedos would be just be beating off to just this little girl. I bet they beat off to children in KMart catalogues too. Not to mention pics of celeb kids, kids they saw at the park, the other little girls in the pageant.
My argument is that the child has not been harmed.
The fact that this little girl doesn’t realize that she is portraying a prostitute is just as bad in my eyes. It normalizes this horrifying behavior and then rewards it!
Cirque28-you shouldn’t teach your BABY to be either!
A child at age 3 should NEVER know what a prostitute/hooker/whore is, nor how one would dress.
It’s a PARENT’S RESPONSIBILITY to educate his/her children. That’s kinda part of the job.
@sam: For you to assume that the child has not been harmed because she is only three years old is mind-blowing. It’s exactly because she is so young that she has been harmed and will continue to be harmed as long as she is subjected to this. She is learning that the way for a little girl to succeed in the world is to bump and grind and dress like a whore. Is that the lesson you want to teach your children?
Speaking of which, I am guessing — make that hoping — you don’t have any.
on the bright side, at least the child didn’t actually have a “sexy” strut (which would have made this even more disturbing)
@ hatsumomo & CJ – thank you! Up until now, I thought I was the only woman who thought Pretty Woman was mind numbingly lame.
PS/was this really the talent part of the competition? all she did was sort of stomp back and forth while the music played
That toddler’s mom should be shot. You should be protecting your children from predators not flaunting them!
Ok, sort of embarrassing story. I had the carpet guy come take a look at the tattered carpet to fix it. I didn’t realize my 3 year old was naked because she’s naked all the time in the home. Can’t get her to wear clothes.
Anyways he’s being very respectful and all but I turn to right and realize my daughter is standing there naked. I totally freaked out and shooed her into the bedroom. I was beyond mortified. I felt like a such a horrible mom. ugh
I can’t watch this show. I think it’s so degrading to women and to those poor children.
She’ll probably be pregnant by the time she’s in middle school. Why do women do this to their children? Stop living vicariously through your children!
What a sick-sad-world. There’s so much wrong going on here that it’s almost too much to even began.There’s a special place in hell for these mothers
Poor kids, my heart goes out to them.
I don’t want to offend certain parts of the USA but why are all of the parents/children from the South/MidWest? Doesn’t seem like a lot come from the NE or west of Colorado.
The “more fabric = automatically better” POV seems a bit Taliban-esque. Kids in shorts and a tank when it’s hot outside are being normal kids. A child could be covered head to toe but if she’s being taught to look seductively into a camera lens, surely THAT is where the line is crossed.
@Sloane Wyatt: Cheers. I was reacting to the woman in that clip who seemed to think that because her daughter was not literally dressed as a prostitute, she wasn’t still being fetishized, objectified and pimped out.
This story makes my heart hurt…I have so much to say but I lack the articulation due to shock and horror.
Well, that’s TLC for ya. The same channel that brought us Psychotic Kate and her freaked out 8 kids. Also don’t forget that family with 19 kids, that guy with four wives and like 30 kids, those people that spend hours a day clipping coupons and buying 100 boxes of pasta that overtakes their home, not to mention people that almost die (and animals die) because their home is filled to the ceiling with crap. So having little girls parading around looking like prostitutes is nothing new for TLC.
Obviously TLC knows it’s within legal limits and just wants to rile all you soccer moms up.
@Cheyenne You too are making assumptions.
As for lesson learnt, I think in this 3 year olds head it goes something think this:
Mommy entered me in a pageant. I got to dress up and walk around on stage. (Remember she doesnt know she dressed as a hooker nor did she have a ‘sexy’ walk. Also she wore other outfits, not just the hooker one.) I won. Now I have a big trophy.
Personally I think calling her mother ‘unfit’ and saying that the child will end up on a street corner is harmful. This child has now been labeled for life thanks to the media, and those of us commenting. One day in the future this child may look herself up on the net and read what we have all written. The words written judging herself and her mother will be extremely hurtful.
LATEST UPDATE on the outfit: It’s being donated to GA Right to Life: “. . . an anti-abortion organization Dickey refers to as “Paisley’s charity” and says the young beauty queen has represented. GRTL states their mission as “Protecting innocent life from fertilization until natural death.” http://today.msnbc.msn.com/id/44447330/ns/today-entertainment/
Look, I’m adamantly pro-choice but I can understand why people are against abortion but many of the anti-choice groups go off on women being immoral & slutty and dressing slutty as part of their immorality so this just represents a bit of a disconnect to me. [For the record: I did work as an escort at PP and another local clinic when I was in grad school and we had quite a few of our “abortion is murder” protesters who would come in and have an abortion (or would be the child of a protester) and then be back on the picket line at one of the local clinics for the next big protest. They, of course, rationalized how their situation was different and they weren’t immoral sluts like everyone else terminating a pregnancy. . .]
American TV censors a ‘wardrobe’ malfunctions (OMG A NIPPLE!!!!) and a s***-storm the size of an hurricane is caused and yet crap like this gets aired?
Wow…
WTF.A hooker fur real? I wounder does Paisley know what she was dressed up as? Anyway that s*** is wrong.
I was told when my children were 2-5 years old that they could be models. So was I, when I was 4. My parents were terrified of pedophiles hunting me down. I felt the same about my children..no modeling. When I was almost 5, I was in a national newspaper in Canada..a friend of my dad’s called to tell him I was on the front page of the sports (I was a runner) section. Less than two weeks later..someone tried to steal me from the front of our new home. (In Toronto). My dad put our house up for sale several days later. If a Pedo wants you, he will hunt you down like a wild animal. These mothers are bizarre, trying to attain fame & money by exploiting their precious children. Disgusting.
BTW, a construction worker saved me..I was screaming & kicking. I would not be alive without him. He could not speak fluent English, but he understood shrilling screams. This Italian fellow was working 2 lots over from our new home. My mum was so traumatized, and so was I. I refused to go to school, or go outside. My father relocated our family, worked two jobs to support us. I worship my parents for all the sacrifices they made to keep me safe. Safety=love. Exploitation is Abusive.