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Ah, Miss Congeniality. The film that brought us a new significance to April 25. It’s iconic, and one of my all-time favorites. 

It opens with Gracie Hart (played by Sandra Bullock), an FBI agent with a lot of dedication to her career. When there is a looming bomb threat for the upcoming Miss United States beauty pageant, her branch needs to take action in the form of an undercover agent. They decide to send Gracie.

A makeover ensues, as with many movies, and Hart is transformed into “Gracie Lou Freebush,” who will enter the pageant as Miss New Jersey. She is met with apprehension by the pageant chair and her coach. They are skeptical of her less-than ‘graceful’ habits, and she is skeptical of their perception of women as a whole. 

It is full of quips to poke fun at the women in the pageant, and Gracie participates in this distaste.

However, most of the participants greet her with open arms. 

Image from IMDb.com

Gracie, along with the audience, is given an arc to change our perception. Gracie befriends the other women and learns more about their intelligence and compassion. In the end, she gains respect for them and vice versa.

So, what is the message?

Gracie is a self-proclaimed feminist who immediately judges a group of women for their practices. She learns the fault in this, and thus the positive theme of the movie – women need to support other women. 

I, like Gracie, have held a lot of these same stigmas. How could someone participating in organizations like a pageant have self-respect? Are they not backtracking the progress of equality? It took me observing my role models and participating in a pageant-esque activity to fully understand that this is not the case. Making assumptions is the real action that puts us back. If we want to progress, we have to support each other. 

“If all girls were taught how to love each other fiercely instead of how to compete with each other and hate their own bodies, what a different and beautiful world we would live in.”

– Nikita Gill

As the sayings go, women should support women. Girls should support girls. It should go beyond this, too, to marginalized groups coming together for support. It comes down to the concepts and perceptions we are brought up with, and what we are willing to change in the pursuit of equality. 

Of course, it is tough when there are women who use the progress of those before to be a detriment to those of today. They are not supporting other women. These cases are a reminder of just how imperative it is that we support each other. 

Gracie Hart learns a little bit about the different types of women in the world. In doing so, she learns a lot more about feminism, and we can too.