I definitely do not think beauty pageants help women´s rights.  After having stayed at a hotel in which a child pageant was held I particularly think the messages being sent to the girls were the wrong ones.  I was pretty appalled at the behavior I saw: a bunch of highly made up toddlers and preschoolers being carried around, whining, and being manipulated by parents claiming it was because ¨the girls enjoy it so much¨ where it appeared obvious to me that the parents egos were totally involved in the idea of having a beautiful girl.  

There are beauty pageants for men as well. Why do they want to become Mister World or Mister Universe and just being judged by their appearance?

I don't know who's more interested in beauty contests because I don't know anyone (neither male nor female) who follows them and I'm also not interested in them, but I'd guess that men would be more interested in purchasing a calendar with bikini pics of a Miss World contest.

That someone takes part in a pageant doesn't mean that they don't have ambitions.

Take Irene Sáez, former Miss Venezuela and Miss Universe. She later on studied political science, became a mayor, a governor and even presidential candidate: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irene_Sáez.

In the US, I think most beauty pageants like Miss America and more are not just about beauty but about how the models give back to the community. It's about their talent as well. Now only do the judges see if they are pretty but how well they care about the environment and people. Why a girl participates in a beauty pageant is her own business. Maybe it's a girls dream to be in a beauty pageant. Who are we to judge? Same could be said about men and women body builders. Is there really a reason for body building competitions? Or competition where fitness is tested. Skills and beauty get tested in the world. We always want to see who is best. Hence why there's a Guinness book of world records. In the world a lot of people want to feel like they are better than others either by personal ego issues or maybe they actually want to better themselves or feel good about themselves as a health thing. The world revolves around competition. There's dog competitions and even competitions between kids. I don't think we really need to single out 'women's beauty pageants'. 

I fail to see how the Miss Universe contest can have any real impact on society. The name itself is stupid. Since only women from planet Earth are allowed to compete, this can hardly be called a fair competition for all beautiful creatures of the universe. There's a Miss World, Miss International, Miss Earth and Miss Universe. Who's the most beautiful and most influential miss? None. . They're just contests like any others and they hardly ever make the news. The recent Miss Universe contest only made headlines because people are divided over figuring out if Miss US's remark about the English skills of Miss Vietnam and Miss Cambodia was racist, mocking, ignorant, innocent or empathetic. In this context nobody is interested in the looks of the contestants.