Swe Zin Htet won the Miss Universe Myanmar title earlier this year, and last month she came out as a lesbian on Instagram. Some pageant fans know about it and they still support me but this is the first time I am able to talk about it in public. We should always have the freedom of choice and promote equality. In her country, homosexuality is illegal and can be punished with up to 10 years of prison.

A Pierced and tattooed skinhead; a ruby-lipped glamour-chick in elbow-length evening gloves; a busty supervamp. This is no ordinary beauty contest. And these girls don't just like travelling and meeting people. Cited among the contestants' various hobbies are eco-terrorism and boxing. This new event will demand both brains and beauty of its entrants and will be judged by specially selected celebrity judges, all of whom will be women.

By Christine Hauser. But in the brief, get-to-know-me videos posted on her official Miss Missouri Facebook page , there is scant mention of the main reason that she has attracted so much attention before the Miss America finale on Sunday in Atlantic City: Ms. The year-old from Missouri is being heralded as a trailblazer in the constellation of pageants, upending the notion that contestants are exploited in an old-fashioned, heterosexual-dominated forum that dictates how women should look, and what, or how little, they should wear. And individuals come in all identities.