Rima Fakih has just one more week left in her reign as
Miss USA, but it's been a tough year for the first Muslim-American
holder of the crown. Like other beauty queens before her, Ms. Fakih was
no stranger to controversy. Pictures of her pole dancing (at an athletic
class!) caused a stir, and she came under fire for her allegedly
party-hard habits - cameras supposedly caught her coming home at 4 a.m.
Not surprisingly, but maddeningly nonetheless, she's also been the target of a fair amount of anti-Arab bigotry and hatred.Fakih doesn't appreciate the scrutiny.
"A lot of people don't understand that Miss USA is just a real woman," she told ABC's Good Morning America. "She's a real human being, who has her own opinion, who's an adult who can make her own, mature decisions."
Some argue that beauty queens are held to impossible standards, ridiculed for any and every indiscretion - and what 20-something woman doesn't have a night or two of partying under her belt? Others, however, say that as the face of a town, state or even a nation, a beauty queen is naturally subject to harsher judgement than a regular Jane. What say you, readers?
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