Miss Italy pageant maintains 'woman from birth' rule, excluding transgender participants

AP Photo/Gregorio Borgia

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The Miss Italy beauty pageant, widely known as Miss Italia, has confirmed that transgender participants are prohibited from entering, stipulating that all competitors must be "a woman from birth."

Patrizia Mirigliani, the official overseer of the competition, stated that this exclusion of transgender women is a policy that has been upheld for a significant period.

“Ever since it was born, the competition includes in its regulation the clarification that you have to be a woman from birth. Probably because, even then, it was expected that in the future beauty could undergo changes, or that women could undergo modifications, or that men could become women,” she said.

Mirigliani has expressed that some beauty competitions appear to be seeking media visibility by allowing transgender participants, terming it as "a little absurd". She further added that Miss Italy will not "jump on the glittery bandwagon of trans activism."

“It’s all part of the new way of talking about women, but we try not to facilitate everything that is excessive to accentuate the aesthetics. Excesses are not good,” she added.

Mirigliani's comments were made in the wake of the Miss Netherlands beauty contest notably crowning a transgender man as the winner – a development seen by some as a blow to traditional feminism. The 22-year-old winner, Rikkie Valerie Kollé, will represent the Netherlands in the 2023 Miss Universe pageant, which, as reported by the Epoch Times, is likely to be held in El Salvador.

“If Miss Holland thought it appropriate to include [people who identify as transgender] I am happy for them,” Ms. Mirigliani said in separate remarks, adding that rules for Miss Italy would not change for now,” the Huffington Post Italy reported.