( Gulfnews )- Dubai: Parents in the UAE say there is nothing wrong with young girls being used as models, despite a row in Australia over a 12-year-old being used as "the face" of a fashion show.
Australian Prime Minister John Howard has described as "quite outrageous" the decision to make a young girl the star attraction of the Fashion Week parades on the Gold Coast in Queensland.
Organisers say they never thought that making Maddison Gabriel "the face" of the festival would spark complaints.
"Catapulting girls as young as 12-years-old into something like that is quite outrageous and I am totally opposed to it and think most Australians would feel the same way," Howard said.
Australian opposition leader Kevin Rudd said he had "real concerns" about "littlies" being used in fashion shows.
But Indian UAE resident Anvi Shah, whose six-year-old daughter Preetal took part in a Barbie fashion parade in Dubai, took a different view.
She said there was no harm in young girls modelling fashions, just as long as their catwalk commitments did not interfere with their studies.
"If they are doing well at school and enjoying their life as a child, then go ahead and do it," she said.
Menon said modelling could help young girls as they were growing up by improving their self confidence.
Ben Moore, 39 a Dubai-based advertising copywriter from the United Kingdom who has a nine-year-old daughter, took the same view as Shah. He said that just because children were modelling , it did not mean they were being sexualised .
He said: "I don't see there's anything particularly wrong with it. People are getting the issues confused.
"There is an issue of young models being shipped out to Milan without proper supervision, but I don't see the harm in a 12-year-old parading up a catwalk. It is not a striptease."
Rema Menon , director of UAE-based organisation Counselling Point, said there were dangers in letting very young children model.
She said a decision on whether it was right for a youngster to model would depend on "the maturity level of the child".
"I would think it's more appropriate if it's not a child, but an adult. I think emotionally some young adolescents cannot handle that type of thing," she said.
"It could put a lot of pressure on the child, particularly if they're forced into it by well-meaning parents."
The debate over the selection of Maddison , who has now turned 13, comes after the British Fashion Council released recommendations that would see models under 16 banned from catwalks and photoshoots .