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The 80-year-old contestant -

Choi Soon-hwa, an 80-year-old South Korean woman, is set to make history as the oldest contestant in the Miss Universe pageant. She qualified for the Miss Universe Korea competition and aims to represent South Korea at the international final in Mexico, in November. Choi's participation comes amidst recent changes to the pageant's eligibility criteria, which now allows women of all ages and marital statuses to compete. If she wins, she will be the oldest contestant in Miss Universe history.

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Miss USA and Miss Teen USA relinquish their titles in the same week -

Back in May both the Miss USA and Miss Teen USA 2023 winners relinquished their titles just days apart. Miss USA, Noelia Voigt, announced her decision on Instagram in a long cryptic post citing her mental health as one of the reasons. Fans noticed that the first 11 sentences seemed to spell out, "I am silenced." Voigt's resignation letter to the Miss USA organization was obtained by CNN and revealed allegations against CEO Laylah Rose, including "bullying" and a "toxic work environment." She accused Rose of building a culture of fear that was the antithesis of female empowerment, as well as failing to provide safeguards to protect titleholders from dangerous situations. Voigt referenced an incident where she was left alone in a car with a man who harassed her. Noelia Voigt was the first woman to voluntarily relinquish a title in the competition's history.

Shortly after Voigt's announcement, Miss Teen USA, UmaSofia Srivastava, 16, shared that she too was stepping down and returning her crown.

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Miss USA and Miss Teen USA relinquish their titles in the same week -

On Instagram, she wrote that her values "no longer aligned" with those of the organization. Neither Voigt nor Srivastava have given interviews or commented further. Instead, their mothers have come forward on their behalves, claiming their daughters are bound by strict lifelong NDAs. Barbara Srivastava said that both titleholders were “ill-treated, abused, bullied and cornered" during their year as winners, which should have been a dream come true. The Miss USA title was transferred to runner-up Savannah Gankiewicz from Hawaii, but the organization had trouble finding a new Miss Teen USA. The runner-up, New York’s Stephanie Skinner, declined the crown in a public statement. The position remained vacant until Addie Carver, a 17-year-old dance teacher from Mississippi, was crowned Miss Teen USA in August 2024.

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Miss Universe goes bankrupt -

The financial collapse of the company that owns Miss Universe was announced just before the 2023 finale. The media distribution company JKN Global Group which owns the Miss Universe pageant filed for bankruptcy. The Thai firm purchased the Miss Universe organization for US$20 million in 2023. JKN reportedly missed a US$12 million loan repayment in September due to a “liquidity problem" and is working towards restructuring its debts.

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Miss Kentucky goes to detention - Ramsey Bearse, née Carpenter, became a teacher in West Virginia after winning Miss Kentucky in 2014. She’s most definitely passed her peak, however, as she was charged with four felony counts of distributing or displaying obscene matter to a minor.

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Miss Kentucky goes to detention - Bearse was arrested for sending at least four photos of her naked to a 15-year-old former student via Snapchat, over a period of three months.

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Alicia Machado must cut down or be cut out -

Alicia Machado won Miss Universe in 1996, and under this new burning spotlight, the public was quick to notice her weight gain following the competition. Pageant officials threatened to revoke her title if she didn’t lose the weight.

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Alicia Machado must cut down or be cut out - Donald Trump, the former owner of Miss Universe, took it up a notch by calling Machado an “eating machine” live on 'The Howard Stern Show.' Machado did lose the weight and kept her title.

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Armi Kuusela gave up the Universe for love - After the Finnish model won the very first Miss Universe pageant in 1952, she took a trip around the world and fell in love with a Filipino man. Unfortunately her title prohibited her from getting married, so she gave up her reign for love.

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Miss Puerto Rico 2008 sabotaged with pepper spray -

During a Miss Universe pageant, Ingrid Marie Rivera's dress was doused in pepper spray, leading to a severe allergic reaction. She was initially accused of lying, but it was later revealed that a pageant volunteer had tampered with her dress.

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Steve Harvey’s massive tiny mistake - In one of the most cringeworthy moments on television, Harvey accidentally crowned the wrong Miss Universe—Miss Colombia—in 2015. She did the traditional grand wave to the crowd and Harvey returned to the stage to deliver the devastating news. One can actually see them take the crown off Miss Colombia’s head and put it on Miss Philippines.

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Miss Teen USA tweets racial slurs -

Karlie Hay made headlines shortly after her 2016 victory when previous tweets surfaced in which she’d used the N-word multiple times. Somehow, she was allowed to keep her title.

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The 2017 scandal that changed Miss America - Several leaders of the Miss America Organization resigned after emails leaked revealing that they had sent derogatory messages to the contestants, including references to their weight.

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A new Miss America - A new all-women board scrapped the swimsuit portion of the competition, and moved towards including and celebrating women of all sizes.

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Miss Protesters -

The 1968 Miss America pageant was met with 400 female protesters who chanted, “Ain’t she sweet, makin’ profit off her meat,” and crowned a live sheep. They also dumped a huge amount of mops, aprons, dusters, cosmetics, and bras into a “Freedom Trash Can.”

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Miss Protesters meet Mr Protesters - A counter-protest erupted with hundreds of men on its side, and when the MC Bert Parks was asked what he would do if a protester crashed his signature performance, he infamously said, “I'll grab her by the throat and keep right on singing.”

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Laura Zúñiga: model, pageant queen, and drug trafficker? - The 2008 Miss Hispanic America was soon arrested along with others for racketeering, drug trafficking, weapons charges, and money laundering, when the Mexican police caught them carrying a load of guns and cash. She claimed she had just been going shopping, but was sentenced to 40 days in jail. The case was ultimately cut short due to lack of evidence.

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Marjorie Wallace's relationships - Wallace was Miss World 1973 for less than four months when she was stripped of her title. Her behavior, including dating high-profile men like Tom Jones and George Best, was deemed unfit for a crown.

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Rima Fakih could be nearly naked, but she couldn’t be on a pole -

Fakih won Miss USA in 2010, which involved her strutting around in a tiny bikini, but when photos surfaced of her dancing fully clothed on a pole in 2007 during a radio contest, suddenly everyone was upset. Fakih kept her title, but the controversy hindered her in the following Miss Universe contest.

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Selfie caused a stir -

A simple selfie of four Miss Universe contestants in 2015 would have gone unnoticed by most people, except that this selfie included both Miss Lebanon Saly Greige and Miss Israel Doron Matalon. With tensions high between Lebanon and Israel, Greige later wrote that she was “cautious to avoid being in any photo or communication with Miss Israel," and she claimed that Matalon had just walked into the photo.

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Suspicions about Nia Sanchez - Soon after becoming Miss USA in 2014, people began to question her state of origin. It appeared the reigning Miss Nevada had previously competed to be Miss California three times, and suspicions were raised as to whether she faked her Nevada residency to compete in an easier pageant. Nothing ended up coming of it.

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Miss Pennsylvania calls in sick - Former Miss Pennsylvania Brandi Weaver Gates was forced to return her crown and sash in 2015 after she was arrested for faking a cancer diagnosis and using it to raise money to pay false medical bills and treatments.

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Helen Morgan was a mom - The Welsh Miss World 1974 winner was forced to resign four days after being crowned when the media found out that she had an 18-month-old son. She was still unmarried, so she wasn’t breaking the competition rules, but she was pressured to resign anyway.

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Amanda Longacre dethroned for being too old - Miss Delaware 2014 was stripped of her title two weeks later when pageant officials decided she was too old to compete in the upcoming Miss America and told her she couldn’t keep the crown or her scholarships either.

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Amanda Longacre dethroned for being too old -

Longacre sued both pageants with claims that this act of disqualifying winners was a strategy used for fundraising and appearances. She did eventually get her scholarship money back, Delaware Online reports.

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The Morgan Elizabeth Woolard conspiracy - Miss Oklahoma came in second in the Miss USA 2010 pageant, and some conservatives believed the reason she lost was because of her support of the controversial Arizona law SB1070, which involved heavier control of illegal immigrants.

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Bert Parks’ ungraceful discharge - The host of Miss America from 1955 to 1979 allegedly found out that he was fired from a newspaper. The pageant wanted to attract a younger crowd, and even his classic song ‘There She Is’ has been thrown aside for a new one.

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Caitlin Upton trips over her tongue - Miss South Carolina was competing for Miss Teen USA in 2007 when the most viral moment of her life unfolded. She was asked why she thought a fifth of Americans couldn’t locate the US on a map and, in a jumble of references to countries like South Africa, Iraq, and “the Asian countries,” she also coined the phrase “like such as.”

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Caitlin Upton trips over her tongue -

She said, “I personally believe that U.S. Americans are unable to do so because, uh, some, uh, people out there in our nation don't have maps and, uh, I believe that our education like such as in South Africa and, uh, the Iraq, everywhere like such as, and, I believe that they should, our education over here in the U.S. should help the U.S., uh, or, uh, should help South Africa and should help the Iraq and the Asian countries, so we will be able to build up our future.”

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Sheena Monnin was trumped by Trump -

Miss Pennsylvania resigned from the Miss USA 2012 pageant and accused Trump and the other organizers of fixing the contest. She also took to social media to air her thoughts about how fraudulent the competition is. Unfortunately, Monnin had signed a settlement with the pageant agreeing not to defame it, and she was ordered to pay US$5 million to Trump. She also tried to sue her own lawyer, but she lost that case too.

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Miss Colorless America -

For a while following the inception of Miss America, the pageant held racist clauses like “Rule 7” which stated contestants had to be “of good health and of the white race.” Though the clause was repealed, the effects are still felt. 2007’s Miss California, Christina Silva, blamed this codified racism when her title was stripped due to an alleged vote miscount. She sued the pageant, but eventually dropped the case for lack of evidence.

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Carrie Prejean angers the gay community - The openly gay MC Perez Hilton asked Miss California her thoughts on same-sex marriage at the Miss USA 2009 pageant, and Prejean responded that she believed in “opposite marriage” between a man and a woman. She came in second and blamed her loss on prejudice against her religious beliefs, which might’ve held up a little better if topless photos of her didn’t surface soon after, ultimately stripping her of her title.

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Tara Conner gets a second chance - Miss USA 2006 struggled publicly with drugs and alcohol, but instead of getting the boot, Trump called a televised press conference where he gave her a second chance. Conner went to rehab and became a consultant for treatment centers.

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Katie Rees falls prey to early social media - Compromising photos of Miss Nevada USA 2007 kissing women surfaced online soon after her victory, forcing her to resign.

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Danielle Lloyd sued for a bad reputation - Miss Great Britain 2006 was stripped of her title when it was revealed that she had posed for Playboy and that she had dated a pageant judge. Lloyd was sued by pageant organizers for thousands of dollars for damaging their reputation.

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Vanessa Williams got naked too - The first African-American winner of Miss America had to give up her crown when a magazine released photos Williams had taken naked years prior. She went on to become a successful singer and actress though, so she still won in the end.

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Lindsey Evans’ smoky start - Miss Teen Louisiana rushed out of a restaurant in 2008, leaving the bill and her purse, which allegedly contained a bag of weed. She was stripped of her title, though Playboy welcomed her the following year.

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Emily Kachote strips down and gets stripped of her title - Miss Zimbabwe 2015 was dethroned less than two months after she won, when photos of Kachote naked surfaced on the internet. The pageant requires contestants to sign an agreement promising that they haven’t posed naked and would not in the future if they won.

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Leona Gage’s pants are on fire -

Miss World 1957 wore the crown for just one sweet day until her mother-in-law revealed that Gage was married, had two children, and wasn’t the age she said she was—all surefire ways to become a pageant outlaw.

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Miss Utah blanks on gender inequality - During the interview portion of the 2013 Miss USA pageant, Marissa Powell was asked about the pay gap in America and what that says about society. She answered with many blank pauses and nervous smiles, "I think we can relate this back to education and how we are...continuing to try to strive...to...figure out how to create jobs right now.”

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Miss Utah blanks on gender inequality - She also famously said, “We need to try to figure out how to...create education better...so we can solve this problem. Thank you."

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The unending tragedy of JonBenét Ramsey - The brutal murder of the six-year-old beauty pageant contestant, in her home on December 24, 1996, brought the strange nature of beauty pageants to America’s attention. After suspecting her entire family, a botched investigation, a bizarre ransom note, and a false confession, the investigation remains unsolved.

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Sam Haskell tells us how he really feels - In December 2017, the Huffington Post published emails written by Miss America CEO Sam Haskell to others employed by the organization, using misogynistic language to describe the competitors including calling them “snakes” and c-words. Naturally, he resigned two days later.

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Miss Amazon had her crown snatched - During a Brazilian beauty pageant, one of the contestants, Sheislane Hayalla, literally snatched the crown off the head of the winner of Miss Amazon, Carol Toledo, before angrily storming off stage to a mix of shock, horror, and applause.

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Génesis Dávila: makeup or made up? -

Génesis Dávila lost her Miss Florida 2017 crown a week later, when the pageant director accused her of having her makeup done professionally, which is against the rules. She later sued the organization, seeking US$15 million for defamation. The lawsuit was later dismissed.

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One crown, not two -

The former Miss New Jersey 2007 was forced to turn in her crown after becoming pregnant, as the Miss USA rules don't allow contestants who are pregnant or have children. 

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The mystery of Oxana Fedorova - Fedorova was the first Russian entrant to win Miss Universe, but after just 119 days she was either dethroned or she gave up the crown. It’s still not clear as to why.

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Jenna Talackova challenges gender ideas - The model was well on her way to the top of the 2012 Miss Universe Canada pageant when organizers found out she was transgender and disqualified her, since the rules apparently require competitors to be "naturally born" women.

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Jenna Talackova challenges gender ideas - Equipped with a lawyer and a grassroots petition, Talackova challenged organizers, including Donald Trump, to reverse the decision. They did so before the case went to court, on the grounds that Talackova met "the standards of legal gender recognition requirements of Canada." The Miss Universe organization ended its ban on transgender contestants soon after.

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Miss Puerto Rico is anti-Muslim - Destiny Velez, the 2015 Miss Puerto Rico, was suspended within a year of her reign for making horrendously insensitive and uneducated anti-Muslim messages. In her apology she said, “I am first and foremost an #UpStander and as such I stand up against bullying. The last thing I wanted to do was to bully anyone.” That's certainly not what it seemed like.

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Miss America 2014 is victim to racist attacks - Nina Davuluri's win apparently fueled racist trolls on Twitter, who started referring to her as a terrorist just because of her skin color. The ignorant trolls also reportedly suggested that choosing a brown woman as Miss America was unpatriotic since the pageant was held four days after the 12th anniversary of the 9/11 attacks.

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The first Jewish Miss America - When Bess Myerson entered the Miss America pageant in 1945, the pageant director reportedly suggested she change her name because it sounded too Jewish. Myerson refused—and went on to win the pageant, becoming the first Jewish Miss America, just as World War II was ending.

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The beginning of the Miss America pledge - Jacque Mercer, Miss America 1949, was married and divorced during her reign, which proved to be a scandal back then since directors wanted their Miss Americas to be eligible bachelorettes. Because of her, the board enacted a rule requiring all contestants to sign a pledge vowing they have never been married or been pregnant. This rule wouldn’t change for another 49 years.

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The birth of Miss USA - In 1951, Yolande Betbeze Fox won Miss America, then refused to pose in a swimsuit even though the organization’s sponsor was Catalina, a swimsuit company. Catalina then went on to create and sponsor Miss USA and Miss Universe.

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If you could be Miss Universe Canada for 24 hours - Less than 24 hours after being crowned Miss Universe Canada 2013, Denise Garrido was told that there was a mistake, and Riza Santos was the real winner. She did the best thing ever and changed her Twitter bio to “Miss Universe Canada 2013 [ 24h ;) ].”

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Miss Teen Wanganui wasn’t blonde enough - In 2010, 15-year-old Olivia O'Neil from New Zealand had won the pageant but dyed her blonde hair brown three months later, posting a photo of it on Facebook. Her crown was then taken away due to her new hair color, and a pageant spokesperson told the New Zealand Herald, "The expectation in holding the crown [was] that she maintain the image she had when she won it."

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Miss Florida's unreliable numbers -

In 2014, Elizabeth Fechtel was named the winner of Miss Florida for a few days, until it became apparent that there had been a scoring error. She was forced to give the crown to her runner-up, Victoria Cowen, who could then go on to compete in Miss America.

Sources: (Ranker)

See also: Famous royals before they married into royalty

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