The great homo hoo-ha

You may not have noticed, given that it has about as much contemporary relevance as a 'duck and cover' safety leaflet, but the Miss USA pageant has been fanning the flames of controversy recently. Celebrity judge Perez Hilton, a man more nauseating than a bad hangover on a cross-channel ferry, asked Miss California for her opinion on gay marriage, and was somewhat displeased with the response he got.

To be fair to Carrie Prejean, who certainly is stunning in a bleached-hair, porcelain-veneered, fake-tanned, overly-aerobicised sort of a way, she answered honestly, if somewhat disingenuously. She said “In my country, and in my family, I believe that a marriage should be between a man and a woman." Obviously, syntax and relevance aside (who else's country would she be talking about in a Miss USA pageant?), she's spoke from the heart, if not the brain. And who cares if it's a heart that's been dulled by the indoctrination of the church? Perez asked her for her view, and she gave it. Like so many millions of others in her country, she preferred to let her religion answer for her, which was entirely her prerogative. I personally believe all beauty queens should be neutered because stupidity is hereditary, but again, that's just my view.

So I'm a little surprised by Hilton's vicious response just hours later, when he posted a video blog accusing Prejean of being a 'bitch'. In his angry rebuttal, he argued that anyone with half a brain would have answered "It's up to the states to decide." But that's not the answer she should have given, it's just the one he wishes she'd given. there's a big difference. We have to accept that we don't always hear what we want to hear. And anyway, he can hardly express surprise that her answer was stupid - she was up for Miss USA, not the Nobel. Admittedly, there's a certain irony in the fact that the prize for the winner is a scholarship, given that most of the contestants seem to have barely finished a primary education. Let's not forget this YouTube gem from the Miss Teen USA pageant:



If Perez really wanted to fight back, he should perhaps have picked up on the fact that there's an inherent hypocrisy in a devout Christian celebrating her vanity (still a sin last time I checked) by parading in a swimsuit and heels. Especially since, when interviewed after the contest, Prejean claimed “...I was raised in a way that you can never compromise your beliefs and your opinions for anything.” Unless there's a prize and fifteen minutes of fame thrown in.

So where do I stand on all this? Well, admittedly, it's like trying to pick sides in an Alien Vs Predator movie. Perez is a graceless, unsympathetic hack, and Carrie Prejean is the kind of person who would rather pray for someone with a differing opinion rather than try to understand it. So I'm going to side with Perez, if only for daring to introduce a frisson of timely politics into an otherwise vacuous and hopelessly outdated contest.