单选题   Para. 1 For the first time in nearly a century, Miss America contestants will not strut onstage in swimsuits this year, the organizers announced on Tuesday, as the pageant tries to redefine its role in an era of female empowerment and gender equality.
    Para. 2 ①Miss America and swimsuits have been synonymous since its first contest in 1921 on the Atlantic City boardwalk. ②But what started as contestants wearing one-piece bathing suits, conservative by today's standards, became women in revealing bikinis and high heels parading around for a leering television audience.
    Para. 3 Now under mostly female leadership, the Miss America Organization said Tuesday that it was scrapping the swimsuit competition, starting at the national contest in September, in a sweeping change that will also reshape local and state contests.
    Para. 4 ①'I've talked to tons of young people who've said to me, 'I'd love to be a part of that program, but I don't want to parade around in a swimsuit,'' Gretchen Carlson, a former Fox News anchor who is now the organization's chairwoman, said in an interview. ②'I get it.'
    Para. 5 ①The organization, confronting its own harassment scandal and searching for its place in the #MeToo era, had worked on the new format for several months. ②The nine members of the board of directors—seven are now women—unanimously approved the change in March.
    Para. 6 Carlson, who assumed a prominent voice for women's rights in the workplace after filing a harassment lawsuit against the former Fox chairman Roger Ailes, said the competition would focus more on the contestants' talents, intelligence and ideas.
    Para. 7 ①'We are not going to judge you on your outward appearance,' Carlson, who was Miss America in 1989, said on ABC's 'Good Morning America' on Tuesday. ②'We are moving it forward and evolving it in this cultural revolution.'
    Para. 8 ①The changes will be immediate for Miss America, but will take longer to arrive at local and state events, Carlson confirmed. ②Since state contests are underway, they will not adopt the new format until after the national competition in September.
    Para. 9 ①Not everyone in the pageant world, however, agreed that the swimsuit portion was entirely about judging fitness. ②'I don't know if that's completely honest or accurate,' said Leah Summers, the executive director of the Miss West Virginia Scholarship Organization, who won that state's title in 1991.
    Para. 10 ①And, she noted, the news would no doubt bring contestants a measure of relief. ②'There's something to be said about not having to think about walking across a stage in a bikini,' she said.
    Para. 11 Beth Knox, executive director of the Miss North Carolina Scholarship Pageant, said that she was thrilled at the development: A woman's goals and aspirations were far more important than how she looked in a swimsuit.
    Para. 12 'If people really listen with an open mind to the reason this change is being implemented, I just do not see how anyone could not support this improvement,' Knox wrote in an email.