Miss Great Britain stripped of her title after having sex on a reality show.

Miss Great Britain, Zara Holland, has been stripped of her title after having sex on UK’s reality television show Love Island. 

On Wednesday’s episode of the show the 20-year-old beauty queen was featured in bed with 24-year-old scaffolder Alex Bowen in a move that has seen her lose her reigning title.

Despite acknowledging they had “no problem with sex”, pageant organisers said they could not “condone” Holland’s actions and for that she will no longer represent them.

“As an organisation we have not taken this decision lightly, we are close to all our winners and wherever possible stand by them during their reign,” they said in a statement.

“We pride ourselves on promoting the positivity of pageants in modern society and this includes the promotion of a strong, positive female role model in our winners.”

However, organisers said they “cannot promote Zara as a positive role model moving forward.”

“We wholly understand that everyone makes mistakes, but Zara, as an ambassador for Miss Great Britain, simply did not uphold the responsibility expected of the title.”

It’s a significant backflip from the organisation who, upon hearing of Holland’s antics, initially released a statement saying that Zara is “a 20-year-old, single woman and her behaviour is not controlled or dictated by our organisation”.

<div

However, it appears that’s exactly what has happened. A 20-year-old woman has been shamed and controlled by an organisation that believes they promote “strong” and independent women. Just not when these strong, independent women decide to exercise a right to have sex with whomever and wherever they please.

Holland responded to her sacking in the latest episode of the show, telling the camera she was disappointed in herself and that she was wholly to blame.

“You know when you’re in the moment and it just happens. That’s really not like me at all. Why couldn’t we have just gone to sleep?

“I can’t blame anyone else for my own actions, what’s done is done,” the 20-year old told the show, explaining that it was “so out of character” for her to do anything like this.

Of course, we could talk about the archaic nature of pageants here. We could rant and ramble about the sexist vortex they exist in, and how this is just another example of an industry seeking to hold up an ideal of women that simply doesn’t exist: Pure enough to be untouched by men, but hot enough to strut around stage in a bikini. We want them to take their clothes off on our command, but as soon as they do it on their own? Hold up, honey.

However, the most intriguing point here is a different one. It’s the hypocrisy of an organisation that consistently promoted the face of Miss Great Britain while on the show. One that retweeted all positive comments on Twitter about their representative, knowing full well what kind of show she was on. A show that markets itself as a “race against time” for contestants to couple up, with anyone who stays single in danger of being eliminated from the show and missing out on the £50,000 cash prize.

Sceptics will argue that having Zara Holland on Love Island was initially great PR for their organisation. Some will argue they even put her there. They supported and promoted her through a show that reportedly has 1,000 condoms placed strategically around the villa where the contestants live.

But apparently, Zara Holland was simply meant to look at those condoms. Not use them.

We may not be surprised at the organisation’s move, but that doesn’t mean we can’t make noise about it. A 20-year-old just lost her job for doing exactly what a reality show asked of her: have sex.