Transgender Miss Canada Loses Bid for Miss Universe

....TORONTO (AP) тАФ The first-ever transgender contestant to compete in the Miss Universe Canada pageant strutted the runway Saturday night, making it to the penultimate round before losing her bid to win the title.

Jenna Talackova, 23, competed with 61 contestants and was among the final 12 contestants before failing to make the final five in the glitzy pageant.

Sahar Biniaz, 26, claimed the crown and advances to the international Miss Universe competition in December.

Talackova, who was one of four contestants named Miss Congeniality, was born a male and underwent a sex change four years ago. The Vancouver, British Columbia, native was initially denied entry to Canada's pageant because she was not born female. Donald Trump, who runs the Miss Universe Organization, subsequently overruled that decision last month.

The 6-foot-1 (1.8-meter-1 centimeter) blond beauty, who towered over her fellow contenders while competing in the bikini and formal wear contests, garnered most of the attention Saturday night, soliciting loud cheering and howls each time she appeared on stage.

Talackova's involvement in the pageant has drawn international attention since being denied entry and hiring high-profile lawyer Gloria Allred to represent her in her battle to be readmitted.

The rules of the contest run by Trump's New York City-based organization say entrants must be "naturally born" females. But shortly after Talackova announced a news conference in Los Angeles with Allred, the Miss Universe Organization said in a statement on its Canada website that Talackova can compete "provided she meets the legal gender recognition requirements of Canada, and the standards established by other international competitions."

Miss Universe organizers have not elaborated on the statement.

Allred said during Saturday's pageant that Talackova shouldn't feel too disappointed.

"She's still a winner as far as I'm concerned," Allred said during an intermission. "She won an 'herstoric' civil rights victory and that I think is frankly more important than anything, any victory she would win, even representing Miss Canada."

Talackova is the child of a Czechoslovakian father and aboriginal Canadian mother. She has said that she knew early on she was in the wrong body. Her change of gender was hardly a secret before the event because she had competed in the 2010 Tiffany Miss International Queen Competition for transgendered and transsexual women in Pattaya, Thailand. In a video interview for that pageant, she said she had lived her life as a female since age 4, began hormone therapy at 14 and changed her sex at 19.

The controversy surrounding her participating in Miss Universe Canada erupted this spring after a blogger recognized her from the transsexual beauty contest in Thailand and posted about it.

Miss Universe publicity director Brenda Mendoza has said transgender competitors are now welcome at all of its pageants around the world.

But she says it's being left to the individual franchises to determine if the recent policy change is carried out.

..Associated Press

DaBoss appears to be having a moment of madness by posting this in the Gay Thailand forum!

Why ? Are Gay people in Thailand SO insular that they are only interested and only want to read about strictly what happens strictly within the gold fish bowl of gay Thailand and not re the wider gay / transgendered world in general etc ?? If so how sad for them. :-(

I quite agree - but this news item ought surely to have been posted in the Global Forum (where, of course, Thai people can see it!)

yeah I guess you're right about that actually - although actually that just made me wonder ( and not to go off topic but....).......so just how many of us DO actually read the other forums regularly ?? I know personally I hardly ever read them and simply tend to browse over them if I'm traveling to some other SE Asian country and want some tips or info perhaps etc - so am I the exception or do most of us just sit on the Thailand board perhaps ?

Meanwhile ( and getting back on topic before I'm told off :-) ........so, what do we all think about the whole "should transgendered people be allowed to compete in what are currently 100% natural female "Miss World" type shows etc - yes or no ???

While I DID think about putting it there, I also saw this and thought I could put it here.

Talackova is the child of a Czechoslovakian father and aboriginal Canadian mother. She has said that she knew early on she was in the wrong body. Her change of gender was hardly a secret before the event because she had competed in the 2010 Tiffany Miss International Queen Competition for transgendered and transsexual women in Pattaya, Thailand. In a video interview for that pageant, she said she had lived her life as a female since age 4, began hormone therapy at 14 and changed her sex at 19.