Fresh Air Miss America ‘68, women’s lib, and the politics of beauty
22 snips
Aug 3, 2026 
Micki McElya, historian who reexamines the 1968 Miss America protest, and David Bianculli, TV critic reviewing a Big Bang spinoff. They explore the 1968 boardwalk clash of feminists, Miss Black America organizers, and pageant defenders. Topics include the bra-burning myth, how beauty became political, racial tensions in the women’s movement, and the pageant’s links to modern culture and politics.
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Miss America Became A Postwar Symbol Of Patriotism
- Miss America evolved from a 1921 marketing stunt into a postwar national symbol linking beauty with patriotism.
- By the 1940s the pageant presented white women as objects representing American ideals and wartime demobilization culture.
The Protest Revealed A Racial Fracture In Feminism
- Feminist protesters borrowed language and tactics from the Black freedom struggle while often overlooking black women present at the protest.
- That omission revealed a fracture in second‑wave feminism that McElya calls foundational and enduring.
Trump's Roots In Pageant Culture
- Donald Trump became embedded in pageant culture through his Atlantic City casinos and later by buying Miss Universe in the early 1990s.
- He attended Miss America, judged pageants, then purchased Miss Universe/Miss USA franchises.
