Anna ([info]troubleinchina) wrote,
@ 2007-09-14 19:35:00
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Current mood: nervous
Entry tags:friday thoughts

Friday Discussion Question: You must be this thin: >< to perform
But if you are there's something wrong with you

Ah, yes. The age-old discussion about the beauty standard. Although this FDQ was not inspired by the whole Britney Spears thing (I meant to post it last week but got distracted), that mess is certainly very relevant to what I'd like to discuss today.

We live in a world where we constantly push the concept of "you can't be too thin" on women. Advertising features slender models in come-hither poses. Major magazines take perfectly-normal looking women and photoshop the pounds off (to some frightening results: Hot but not hot enough - America Ferrera from Ugly Betty and Redbook Shatters our Faith... with the photoshop job done on Faith Hill [be sure to check out the animation at the bottom]). Dove does a series of ads with "real women" in them and men freak out and say they don't want to see 'that' on their morning commute. (And that ads showing women in Size 6 and 8 are promoting the obesity epidemic in the US. O.o?)

AND YET.

In this post I talk about a woman on my flist who won't eat in public because she's slender and people make assumptions that she has an eating disorder based on what she eats. [info]arabidmouse talks about being invited to join a 'Down with Size 0' group - except she is a Size 0. When Britney Spears was on stage six years ago there were criticisms that she was too thin. Now, after having had two children, she's apparently too fat.





It seems like the standards are setting women up to "fail". If you're thin, you've got an eating disorder. If you're not thin enough, you're too ugly to be seen in public in anything that shows some skin. If you're a mom, you should only wear "appropriate" mom clothes. Don't be sexy, unless you're a Yummy Mummy, and even then, it's not appropriate. How dare you, anyway? Women over 30 should be covered up anyway, because only the young should be showing off their legs, but please, let's wring our hands over the sexualisation of our children.

[The late Dr Violet Socks has a very valid point to make about that in Like Lambs to the Slaughter - I really recommend you read it. It's short. She makes her points faster than I do, probably because she is dead.]

I've read about female star after female star crashing herself against the Beauty Myth, and I've watched my friends and flist struggle with the same issues.

Too thin? Too fat? Not healthy? Should I do weight lifting or will I get ugly muscles? I need to lose 20 pounds before I can get married! My friends think I'm too thin and now I feel ugly. People tell me to stop losing weight, that I'm 'thin enough' - what should I do?

I've talked before about how I think advertising is a big factor in all of this, as is Hollywood and airbrushing and the general idea that women are "supposed" to be attractive - and thus anyone outside of that attractive is to be punished, but those who reach that attractive must have something wrong with them because the ideal is set so high.

What are your thoughts?

Important Note:
I usually am pretty okay with whatever people want to write in response to these posts, because they're supposed to be general discussions and not 'please toe party line' things. However, I want to nip two things in the bud right now:
1. NO. It does not make me feel better that a small, but significant and growing, number of men also suffer from eating disorders. Don't imply or state otherwise.
2. As fascinating as a discussion about what different people find attractive in women, varying from body size, hair colour, and personality, can be, this post isn't really about that. It's about society and pressure on women to appear in public looking a certain way and then punishing them when they don't. It's not about what you, I, or any other particular individual finds attractive or appealing. I don't want to get bogged down in that.


Slightly less important note:

Things I've Heard Said About Britney:

"Did she have the body for that outfit? I don't think so."

The interview they link to has OK magazine editor arguing that sure, it's bad to have stick figure girls as our role models, but she didn't have the body for that outfit.

"I don't look at that outfit and think 'mom'. Just me."

"Where's the apron, that's what I want to know."

"And she's being criticised for her clothes, or lack thereof."

"She actually chose this outfit, she actually didn't think the outfit MTV supplied her was sexy enough or skimpy enough, and she decided to go onstage in this ensemble which amounts to little more than just some bedazzled undergarments. And, was she fat? Listen, I'm not going to call Britney Spears fat, but did she have the body for that outfit? I don't think so."


(83 comments) - (Post a new comment)


[info]rasilon_x
2007-09-14 12:09 pm UTC (link)
I think, lacking a TV, I get a rather different sort of media representation. I'd heard about Britney's comeback thing, and I'd heard the analysis that it flopped because the lip-sync was disastrously off. But this was the first time I'd seen or heard reference to any debate over what she was wearing. I had seen that photo before, saw nothing out of the ordinary, and paid no further attention.

(Reply to this)


[info]ruuger
2007-09-14 12:10 pm UTC (link)
I'm just getting off my break at work so I don't have the time or brainfunctions for a proper thoughtful comment, but this

who won't eat in public because she's slender and people make assumptions that she has an eating disorder based on what she eats.

confused me for a second because I actually thought about making a post about the exact same thing just the other day. I'm ribs-visible-even-when-not-breathing-in thin (but still normal weight in any criteria you can throw at me), always have been, and for years I couldn't eat in company because people were always commenting on what I ate (at one point I was actually terrified that I would get a real eating disorder becaúse I was starting to hate eating in general because of it).

After a year of having lunch with my (non-commenting) co-workers, I thought I'd finally gotten over it, until last month when we got a new trainee who always makes a comment about my food (but never anyone elses) as soon as I sit in the table. And now I'm back to skipping meals just to avoid feeling bad about what I eat.

So while I think that the society in general is more anti-fat than anti-thin, I know from a personal experience that blaming women for being thin sure as hell isn't helping.

(sorry about the rant, this is just something that I've been living with and thinking about twenty years - I will try to come back with actual thinky thoughts later )

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-14 01:09 pm UTC (link)
For some reason I thought that post was yours.... But it may have been someone else's. I can't imagine what it's like to have that much pressure put on you.

Feel free to rant - I'd like your thoughts and input on this!

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]bubosquared
2007-09-14 02:33 pm UTC (link)
You know, I always wonder who has the time to even notice, let alone worry about what other people are eating.

For what it's worth, though, I've had a small taste (... no pun intended) of that crap as well, and I wouldn't consider myself "thin" by any stretch of the imagination. But I've been the same eight, and roughly the same size, since I was 16, and I'm a vegetarian with a wobbly blood sugar who loves raw veggies, so I usually take those with me to work to snack on, and I avoid too much refined sugar because a chocolate muffin on an empty stomach will lead to me having to be pried off the ceiling and then crashing hard, but I'm often acutely aware of the fact that people will assume, when I turn down the muffin in favour of the veggies, that I'm dieting, and that's ... ugh.

The whole idea that anyone has the right to keep track of what (other) women are eating, to judge it silently, let alone to their faces, whether it's because they're thin (and thus obviously anorexic) or fat or "fat" (and thus obviously gluttonous pigs) is revolting.

Also, out of curiousity, did/do you often get the "Just wait until you're 25/30, you won't be able to eat all you want awithout gaining weight anymore!" thing? I used to get that all the time when I was younger, and I still sometimes do, and it still irritates the hell out of me. I'm wondering how common this is.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-14 02:36 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-14 02:40 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-14 02:47 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-14 03:19 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]finaira, 2007-09-14 04:21 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 01:30 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 06:36 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 03:51 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 03:53 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 04:01 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]finaira, 2007-09-15 10:33 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 10:59 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]finaira, 2007-09-15 10:35 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 11:26 pm UTC

[info]looniewolf
2007-09-14 12:23 pm UTC (link)
You do know that that is Harassment. Report that individual to your boss. They do not accept discrimination on the basis of overweight, underweight, eating habits, or anything else like that, due to the fact the company itself is liable.

Of course, the other thing you could always do before reporting such harassment is just talk to the individual privately and let them know that you don't appreciate their comments and want them to stop, and also state that if you did have an eating disorder, your doctor would have noticed during your last physical (and you can lie through your teeth if you've not had one).

*looks at his own gut* *sigh* I need to lose weight. Just 40 lbs. or so... heh, it's not just women who worry about weight. =^-^=

Rob H.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-14 01:06 pm UTC (link)
[info]ruuger isn't American, she lives someplace in Europe.

I know it's not just women who worry about weight, but we're not talking about worrying about weight - we're talking about the greater societal thing. Do you think you need to lose weight because of health issues? Because the latest cover model has washboard abs? Because you can't find clothes that fit? Talk about it - that's what it's here for. :)

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]im_an_aaangel
2007-09-14 12:58 pm UTC (link)
I remember someone posted a photo of a young celebrity (can't remember who) and said "oh look, she's anorexic as well". This girl was perfectly fine. -_- Just for being skinny, she was anorexic? O_o

As for Britney, she's not FAT, but you'd think she could spruce up a tiny bit for a comeback. You can tell she had abs airbrushed onto her tummy. Why bother? She's wearing a weave but it just looks like dirty hair. And when she was singing she really looked drugged during the whole performance... I could be wrong, but something about her presence wasn't normal.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-14 01:08 pm UTC (link)
Oh, don't get me wrong - the act itself was terrible, from the clips I've seen here and there. But that Jay Leno went on at length about how fat she was left me a bit... um... less than impressed.

There's so much pressure on women, especially in entertainment, to look like cookie cutters in terms of size and weight, and then they get pounced on by the tabloids, by the MSM, and by their fans, no matter what they do. The pressure seems different on male celebs. Why do you think that is?

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]im_an_aaangel, 2007-09-14 01:16 pm UTC

[info]firynze
2007-09-14 01:27 pm UTC (link)
I have body image issues to this day thanks to high school.

I didn't know it at the time, but I was thin when I was younger. Very, very thin. 5'10" and around 125lb. for most of high school, maybe up to 135 at times (and most of that was muscle). And yet I actually wore a girdle for two years because I was ashamed of my tummy. Mostly because nearly every girl I went to school with was shorter than me, and curvier than me (I'm naturally built with a body Michelangelo would've LOVED to have as a model for the David, minus the abs...only I'm a chick, sigh), and weighed less than me. How do I know this?

Because we had public weigh-ins in gym class as part of a fitness initiative.

Yeah.

I weighed at least 15lb more than every other non-obese girl in my gym classes. And it never registered with me that this was because I was tall and muscular, not because I was fat.

Didn't even register when I started getting grilled during the annual sports physical about being anorexic.

I didn't figure out just how thin - underweight, really - I was in high school until I went on a migraine medication in college that made me gain 75lb in a month and a half. After that, my body changed so rapidly that I lost all mental image of myself/my body. I still don't know what I REALLY look like because of all that.

I do know that I'm not happy with my body right now. It's not just that I feel as though I'm not curvy enough or busty enough or have a waspish enough waist to be attractive to society at large - although I don't - and it's not just that I feel my face is too heavy or my tummy too poochy or my boobs too large - although I think all of that, too, contrarily enough - no, it's that I don't feel fit. I feel sluggish and dumpy and as though I no longer have the slim, athletic, muscular, and yes, boyish body that I used to get so much enjoyment out of using. I want to fix that, even if it does mean embracing that David physique instead of a "proper" female body.

I don't know where I'm going with this. I'm freethinking at you right now, just everything that came into my head with your post. But ... yeah.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-15 01:34 pm UTC (link)
I don't know where I'm going with this. I'm freethinking at you right now, just everything that came into my head with your post. But ... yeah.

That's really important, though, and you're certainly not the only one.

I think it would be great if we would all just find a comfortable space in our skins. It feels, totally unfairly I'll admit, that men have a greater opportunity to do that. I don't have any men on my flist fretting about such things. But the sort of stars we see on t.v. and in the movies, the ones that get the "hot babes", are usually far more normal looking than the babes they actually get.

Which is where I think men don't understand the amount of pressure put on women just by walking down the street some days. I never see myself in advertising, unless it's a "before" picture.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]firynze, 2007-09-15 01:42 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 01:52 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]firynze, 2007-09-15 01:58 pm UTC

[info]padredon
2007-09-14 01:55 pm UTC (link)
There's a lot o things that spring to mind reading this post and the related links. There's the number of women like who I've known who struggle with body image because they don't conform to current beauty standards. There's the whole issue of eating disorders and the number of girls and women I've cared about or known with them. There's the impossible beauty standards as a tool of oppression, keep women busy trying to attain beauty and they're not as likely to demand their share of power. There's also the sexual ideal of looking young and victim like.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]bubosquared
2007-09-14 02:58 pm UTC (link)
There's the impossible beauty standards as a tool of oppression, keep women busy trying to attain beauty and they're not as likely to demand their share of power. There's also the sexual ideal of looking young and victim like.

Yes! Yes, yes, exactly! This is part of what I was getting at, except you said it shorter and clearer! :)

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-14 03:01 pm UTC

[info]bubosquared
2007-09-14 02:02 pm UTC (link)
It's not about what you, I, or any other particular individual finds attractive or appealing.

I think this is actually the crux of the issue, in a way. The problem with discussions about the Beauty Ideal is that they still usually hinge on the assumption that the Beauty Ideal is about what is attractive -- specifically, what is attractive to men. And it's not. Men find a range of women attractive, IME, and more importantly, contrary to what the media and the patriarchy tell us, they're not actually so shallow that they'll refuse to even look at women who might not quite meet their ideal, or even be the opposite of said ideal.

The Beauty Ideal isn't about Beauty, it's about size. It's about the fact that women shouldn't take up space. Not physical space, so any woman who isn't starving herself to achieve that mythical status of "thin enough" (and there's a reason why the threshold for "fat" is so unrealistically low!) is obviously a whale -- and to a lesser extent, there's the weirdness around tall women, as well, here. Not mental space, so any woman who is naturally "thin enough" get shamed about it, because it doesn't "count" if you don't have to starve yourself for it, that's just bragging, you cheater. And whatever you do, don't ever get an attitude, don't walk around like you deserve to take up the space you do, because then you're a horrible bitch.

And it's not just the pure size thing, either. Lose weight through starvation diets, or diet and exercise, but that exercise should be things like running, or spinning, or whatever, because god forbid you gain ugly muscles -- god forbid you get strong instead of just thin. Strength means bulking up, taking up space, and that makes you double scary.

It's ... *flail* I don't know if I'm making much sense here, or if I'm chasing a rabbit down a hole, because it's hard to cohere a number of seemingly unrelated incidents and epiphanies into something that will make sense to others who haven't had those experiences.

Like: the first time I crossdressed, my friend said something that's stuck with me ever since: that 90% of "passing" as a man is attitude. "Walk like you own the place," he said. "Like it's your right to be walking on the sidewalk. Take up space." And suddenly, I realised why, exactly, people always tell me I "walk like a man": because I walk in the world as if I have a right to exist in it, and that's not expected of a woman.

Like: The furious looks I've been shot by men I've sat next to on the bus, simply because I claimed my rightful half of the leg space and didn't just let them do the "the boys need room" thing.

Like: The frustration of wanting to share with people how annoyed I was at my body's random betrayal a few winters ago, and being told I was lucky for losing a stone (a full tenth of what had been my stable weight for the previous eight years), and who cared if it was through the Winter Depression And Malnutrition Diet?

Like: Having very few people to talk to about body imagery, because my fears run the other way, and no one understands my fear of weight loss. (I don't want to disappear!)

I could come up with a bunch of other examples, all of which contributed to how I look at body politics, and it's hard to explain sometimes without giving those examples, without the context of my life, so maybe including them will help people understand?

Because as long as conversations about the Beauty Ideal keep centering around the idea that it is, in fact, about Beauty, we'll keep pitting allies against each other. Anyone not conforming to the Beauty Ideal will sneer at those that do, whether by starvation of genetics, the "average-sized" women will get insulted about what passes for fat these days, and large women will talk about how hard it is to lose the yoyo-diet weight, and/or about how they're healthy despite their BMI, and so on and so forth. Not that any of the above aren't true, obviously, and I've contributed to most of those rants myself, but in the end, what we're actually fighting there is straw men of each other.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]padredon
2007-09-14 03:44 pm UTC (link)
Men find a range of women attractive, IME, and more importantly, contrary to what the media and the patriarchy tell us, they're not actually so shallow that they'll refuse to even look at women who might not quite meet their ideal, or even be the opposite of said ideal.

I think this is a really important notion. Men are bombarded with the same messages about what they *should* find attractive. The truth is quite different and very much individual and fluid. A man may lean towards a certain body type but they are likely to find a lot of other things attractive and may well be drawn to women who don't conform to their personal norm. I really want to stress that it is personal.

Society tells us that men find a certain body shape attractive. Magazines and the like that say men like curvy women have oversimplified things to the point of uselessness. I don't think societal messages of beauty are really even about what men find attractive. They're entirely about power and control. Treating the message as being about attractiveness, sexual appeal or looking good is just a pretense to hook people. People of all genders want to appeal visually to others; making a visual standard for women, especially an impossible one becomes about power.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 04:19 pm UTC

[info]the-willow.insanejournal.com
2007-09-14 08:37 pm UTC (link)
There are a couple of comments I want to make in response to the original post, but I really want to respond to you specifically for this:

. "Walk like you own the place," he said. "Like it's your right to be walking on the sidewalk. Take up space."

Completely independently (as in they were in different countries at the time) both my mother and my father got on my case when I was younger about walking mannishly.

I realize now it's because my hands were always cold, but I tended to walk with my hands in the pockets of my jeans. It had the side affect, again I realize now, of making my spine straight, my chest thrust out and keeping my head level. Plus with my hands in my pockets, my elbows were out to the side.

It was comfortable to me. It made me feel comfortable enough in who I was to just walk and not think about who was watching me or why etc.

Both my parents harped and harped at me about it. Both made sly references to homosexuality. Both encouraged me to wear heels and make-up as a counter to me walking this way.

The moment you said 'Take up space' it hit me viscerally to the point of tears that both my parents were objecting to my solidity.

I currently don't see myself when I look in the mirror for a variety of reasons that include my mother controlling my weight and telling me I was fat back when I was 130-150 pounds.

No one ever told me I was curvy until I went to live with my father for a year and he pointed out I had my grandmother's build - wherein when she walked into a room, her chest came first and then you saw the rest of her.

So for years I thought I was obese and waddling and taking up space and felt guilty for everything I put in my mouth and was vegetarian even though it made me dizzy and sick and tired all the time. Because I was trying so hard to be who I was expected to be.

And the reason I was trying so hard, was because I'd come out and it was like I was apologising for being a lesbian - for confirming their suspicions - by trying to be a good daughter in other ways.

It never hit me until just now and your mention of 'taking up space'. See both my parents have actually said that to me. That the way I used to walk 'took up too much of the sidewalk'.

My father objected to it, because he believed that a gentleman walks on the outside of the street with the lady on the inside of the street, but it was difficult to walk that way with me because I took up too much space.

My mother repeatedly called it rude and inconsiderate of others.

Recently I watched an anime where the lead character was repeatedly told by her father that: "A girl should be gentle and quiet and respectful and a girl has no right to be winning over a boy."

I looked at that anime and I thought that it was culturally significant but kind of a little bit over the top for it to be said out loud.

And now I know why.

Just... omg it's pinging so hard. I'm finding myself thinking of my current agoraphobia and how aware I am whenever I'm outside that people might be looking at me and how I try to be invisible and I think back to my younger self who, despite whatever else I was going through, could walk down the street as if she was supposed to be there and ignore heckles and catcalls and not fear them and not think about them and I want to scream.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 02:05 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 04:54 pm UTC

[info]odacamilla
2007-09-14 02:19 pm UTC (link)
I have issues, as my flocked posts should have revealed by now, regarding my weight, height, skin, age, the general Non-conformity of my body.

Society (media, my mum, other children, teachers) have, intentionally or not, taught me that I have no value as a woman unless I am young, skinny, virginial, horny, stupid, skinny, smoothskinned, attainable, skinny...

The ideal of skinny can be seen as an extension of the ideal of Young&Innocent. Young girls have very little shapes, women who have had children (and thus also sex) are considered less attractive.

When I was a size 6 17yearold schoolgirl, conforming to these ideals became the source of my self-confidence. Now that I am larger, older, and no longer naughtily young, fresh meat, I have had a bit of a crash.

Afterall, who would want a plain woman, used up and soiled, who will argue back (noone on TV)? And what worth have I as a woman if noone wants me?

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-14 02:54 pm UTC (link)
The ideal of skinny can be seen as an extension of the ideal of Young&Innocent. Young girls have very little shapes, women who have had children (and thus also sex) are considered less attractive....

Afterall, who would want a plain woman, used up and soiled, who will argue back (noone on TV)? And what worth have I as a woman if noone wants me?

That's really interesting, the idea of innocence being appealing and "being soiled" as being icky. The idea that we want what no one else has had.

As for the second part, there's that image that a man who does "have" a woman who argues back is somehow less of a man, pussy whipped or weak. (I've been told I'm not pretty enough to have as many opinions as I do and still be attractive.)

Thoughts?

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]odacamilla, 2007-09-14 03:53 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-14 03:55 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 11:58 pm UTC

[info]furikku
2007-09-14 02:22 pm UTC (link)
I can only comment on this as an outsider; I was raised with little pop-culture influence, never cared much for fashion, and my main experiences with "dieting" were through my mother's attempts to make sure we were all eating healthy meals in healthy portions. Weight never mattered as much as health and fitness. (I'm trying to lose weight now, but it's because otherwise my clothing won't fit.)

The concept of people I perceive as a healthy weight being "fat" frankly baffles me; I know obese people, and they look nothing like the average size that's being called "fat." I understand that there's a perception being influenced by more and more altering techniques on photos, but I still can't understand WHY.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]furikku
2007-09-14 02:35 pm UTC (link)
I should also add that I think some of the personal attitudes- such as, "Oh, she must be anorexic/dieting/whatever," on skinny gals- might come from a sense of... maybe helplessness; we're given a near-impossible-to-achieve body type as the ideal (at least without unhealthy measures and some body-altering surgery), and told that it's "healthy." When we find it takes herculean efforts for us (or at least for Average Jane) to reach that ideal, we tend to assume that anyone who is at that ideal has not only taken them, but possibly taken them farther than is healthy, out of a combination bitter jealousy and flawed logic.

(Basically, "It'd take me going into a starvation diet to achieve and maintain that body. Therefore, this person with that body must be in a starvation diet.")

There's probably also some anger at the system that gets misdirected toward the gal with an Ideal Body Type, since she's an easier target than an entire cultural setup, what with being humanshaped and physical.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-14 02:39 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]odacamilla, 2007-09-14 02:44 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]furikku, 2007-09-14 02:47 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-14 02:51 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]furikku, 2007-09-14 02:56 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]elanor_x, 2007-09-14 03:16 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-14 03:19 pm UTC

[info]automaticdoor
2007-09-14 04:18 pm UTC (link)
From the other end of it, this reminds me of the "Real Women Have Curves" crap. Yeah, it's great for women at the "other end" of the spectrum or "normal" to get credit, but as someone who's 5'2", a B-cup, and 110 lb, that doesn't exactly make me feel better about myself either. What, I'm not a real woman because I'm not larger or closer to the average? Sometimes I wish I could grow about six inches just so I felt less like a little girl. After all, the models you see are about my weight, yes, but they're also all six-eight inches taller or more. So, though I might be petite, even I don't fit the standard, which says something about how unrealistic it is to start with.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]the-willow.insanejournal.com
2007-09-14 08:40 pm UTC (link)
Laurell K Hamiltion has an extremely offensive quote (by one of her characters) about people of your body size.

"I hate women who complain about being fat when they're like a size five. Anything under size five isn't a woman. It's a boy with breasts." -Anita Blake


It emphasizes how even when trying to supposedly uplift women who don't fit a certain body type/ideal it's necessary somehow to put down other women.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]arabidmouse, 2007-09-14 11:51 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 01:39 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 01:38 pm UTC

[info]spacelem
2007-09-14 05:34 pm UTC (link)
What are my thoughts?

I have no thoughts on the matter. I'm not interested in Britney Spears and she can do what the hell she likes.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-14 05:49 pm UTC (link)
I was inviting people's thoughts on standards of attractiveness as applied to women across the board. Brittney Spears is only used as a recent example of being attacked for not being pretty enough, not to be the topic of conversation.

Did you have any thoughts about the beauty standards as applied to women across the board? How women are either seen as "too fat" or "too thin" by society in general, and punished for stepping outside the boundaries? I'd like to hear them if you do.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]spacelem, 2007-09-15 04:27 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]crashusmaximus, 2007-09-14 10:08 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 01:43 pm UTC

(Anonymous)
2007-09-14 07:31 pm UTC (link)
"It seems like the standards are setting women up to "fail". "

Gosh, really? (for those who don't know me, and the fact that plain text is poor at conveying tone, that is about 125% false innocence. I think that sentence works better and is more true to how things really work if you remove "It seems like" from the front.)

These days I go out of my way to avoid pop culture. But damn, it's hard to get away from.

James

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[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-15 01:59 pm UTC (link)
(Don actually called me about your comment. Cuz when I went home and we talked, I was all "Has James commented? I like it when James comments!")

The thing is, these things are also outside of what is usually referred to as "pop culture".

Let me give you an example where we're at least talking about the same thing.

You know Firefly and Buffy, obviously.

One of the things that bothered me in both shows was the way the camera treated Buffy, Faith, Inara, and River as opposed to how the camera treated Season 1 - 3 Willow, Kayley, and Tara. Buffy, Faith, Inara and River are all treated as sexy, attractive, femme-fatales in many ways. With River, you've got that added "Look at me, I'm a victim!" going on with her sexualisation and sexuality.

Meanwhile, Kayley and Tara are shown repeatedly as being "cute, but not sexy" by the camera, by the script, by the way the lighting treats them. It's very much a "male gaze" thing.

Now, don't get me wrong - I like Joss Whedon and I know he's a very vocal feminist, and that's something I really appreciate him for. But there it is - Inara is the sex kitten you can buy (for the right price), and River is the broken doll, and Kayley is "cute", but certainly not sexy.

[Most of the men I know have told me they find Kayley much more attractive than Inara and Willow. Which is kinda not the point - the camera and how it treats them here is the point.]

(Also, I keep catching myself trying to make my posts less in-your-face with ways of softening them to give people a way out. I need to break that habit.)

What are your thoughts here? I'd really like to discuss Buffy and Firefly and their treamtent of women with someone other than Don.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
Firefly wimmens - (Anonymous), 2007-09-18 04:44 pm UTC
Re: Firefly wimmens - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-19 03:23 am UTC

[info]sanityimpaired
2007-09-15 12:06 am UTC (link)
I've found this post and comments very confusing. Not because I disagree, but because I don't see a lot of this myself. I've ignored the media concept of attractiveness as long as I can recall, and so do the people I associate with, so I don't often see the kind of pressure that is being exerted by peers and family..

That said, I'm rather small compared to the male ideal. My ideal weight is probably around 130, and I've been plagued with comments like "You should eat more or work out" most of my life. The people making such statements typically don't eat as well as I do and are usually in worse shape as well. So even though me and mine don't spread this kind of mentality around, it's still obviously there.

I'm delighted to have links not only to the media being idiotic, but links to provide feedback. Putting a false ideal of beauty before one's health is lunacy, and there seem to be a lot of editors out there who need to be reminded of the fact.

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[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-15 11:31 am UTC (link)
"I've ignored the media concept of attractiveness as long as I can recall, and so do the people I associate with, so I don't often see the kind of pressure that is being exerted by peers and family."

Do you remember telling me how thrilled you were that I didn't immediately freak out and scream "no, no, don't pick me up, I'm too heavy"?

Or the way you reacted when I said "I'm not a cute young thing anymore"?

That's your friends being affected by the media conception of Beauty. I told you I didn't worry about you picking me up because I figure you know your own strength better than I do, but there are reasons women built like me automatically think they're too heavy, too big, too *fat* to be picked up. And it ain't because some boy before you dropped us.

And [info]arabidmouse talked in her LJ about feeling attacked because of the "down with size 0", and there are so many other examples of slender or petite women in this thread feeling like they're being watched or obsessed over, where "real women have curves" is insulting to them, where we're told "it's okay to look like X - boys like X!" and...

Our mutual friends tend to come in all shapes and sizes, and it's great that a lot of them, myself included, aren't dieting ourselves into illness or feeling guilty or non-existent for being slender, but we're still affected by it.

I mean, I'm too *old* to have hair this long - I've been told. Repeatedly. By my parents, by my coworkers, by *friends*.

That's the media telling us what "old" looks like. What 30 looks like. And it's ain't like me.

(Note: I don't care. But it's *there*.)

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]arabidmouse, 2007-09-15 02:55 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-15 03:10 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 06:42 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-15 06:04 pm UTC

[info]parsimonia
2007-09-15 02:33 am UTC (link)
I keep waiting and hoping in vain for Britney to just turn around and say "Fuck you!" to everyone. Or perhaps "fuck y'all!" may be more appropriate.

While my sympathy for the rich and stupid is limited, a part of me really wants to see Britney Spears pull her shit together and stop trying to conform to these ridiculous standards. She's Britney Spears! She shaved her head bald for goodness sake, she could have made angsty!baldness the new pink if she played it right! She could've been sporting some funky pixie-cut at the awards and, I don't know, singing something defiant or making fun of herslef like "Yeah, I didn't know it was wrong to drive with my baby in my lap, I'm country! Screw you!" (or, you know, maybe something less controversial and more rhyme-y.) She could have just sung Lucky and it would have been far more profound.

But, no. Looking at how desperate she seems to want to be liked/popular/"hot" by adopting Paris Hilton-style antics, and continually putting herself in the "anything sexual or naked is edgy and therefore cool and therefore will make me popular/successful" frame of mind, she must feel absolutely powerless.

From a marketing/popularity aspect, eventually people will get tired/immune to a female popstar like her dancing around in skimpy outfits with sexually suggestive backup dancers and lyrics. I guess what I'm kind of expecting is what we've come to see from most pop stars. Expecting her to "reinvent" herself. She's not trying anything new, and I could so see her being able to do that if only she'd just stop giving a crap about constantly trying to appear "sexy" and "cool" in front of every single camera.

But yeah, I just want to see Britney turn around and bite her critics' heads off, grow a spine and develop some sense. Not likely to happen, but still. It would be satisfying to see someone like her recover a sense of self-worth and success.

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-15 02:03 pm UTC (link)
"she must feel absolutely powerless."

That's my thought.

I wish she would just turn around and smack a few people. She says she wants to me a mom. Be a mom! It's a good thing!

The read over at Pandagon got into that a lot - did you read it?

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]parsimonia, 2007-09-15 07:04 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]troubleinchina, 2007-09-16 04:28 am UTC
(no subject) - [info]kyuuketsukirui, 2007-09-16 01:49 am UTC

[info]starbrow
2007-09-15 07:17 pm UTC (link)
I'm finding it hard to articulate what I want to say here.

When I went clothes shopping recently, I found that Evans did not have any size 32 trousers that would be appropriate for work. In fact, in the whole store I found very little indeed that was size 32.

When I asked about this, the salesgirls first checked the stockroom. When that turned up nothing, they tried to order things for me, but everything was oddly 'out of stock'. They said things like "our larger and smaller sizes sell out really fast when they arrive."

I said, "well, women who are size sixteen have other options, other stores they can go to. Women my size have nothing else."

It's scary because it's true. There are a few online shops (which I think are all just one shop, actually) that go up to size 36. But their clothes are cheaply made and as it is far too expensive. But the only place on the high street you can go to get clothes in my size is Evans. And they've not carried my size for months now.

To me, the message is clear: if you are above a high street accepted size, you do not exist. You do not go to work, you do not go out and party, you don't shop, you are not a market at all.

There's a woman who works near me who is even larger than I am. The only thing she wears is a long black skirt and blouse. Every single day. (I don't know if she has multiple sets of the same thing, I'm guessing so.)

Now I finally did manage to locate a few smaller things that would fit me because they're stretchy. And I've emailed Evans (with no reply as yet).

But I suppose the only answer the fashion world throws back at me when I wonder what to wear is: "Lose some weight, you fat bitch!"

And while I don't deny I should lose weight, what am I going to wear while I do it?

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]bubosquared
2007-09-15 11:46 pm UTC (link)
To me, the message is clear: if you are above a high street accepted size, you do not exist. You do not go to work, you do not go out and party, you don't shop, you are not a market at all.

And you definitely, above all things, don't want to look sexy, because my god, who wants to see that, right?

*brief pause as I retrieve my eyes, which just rolled out of my head*

But I suppose the only answer the fashion world throws back at me when I wonder what to wear is: "Lose some weight, you fat bitch!"

Three words: Mumu of Shame. I refer to it as such deliberately, because they're designed to shame the women for whom this is often the only damn thing they can wear becuse of the non-existence thing you mentioned, and if I had any pyrokinetic abilities, every single one of them would have log burst into flames by now, because HATE.

But I suppose the only answer the fashion world throws back at me when I wonder what to wear is: "Lose some weight, you fat bitch!"

This reminds me of that time you were having problems with your knee, and were told to just lose weight, which, you know, is obviously a piece of cake when your knees hurt. Right.

(I really should get my knees and hips looked at, and I'm really afraid to get my concerns dismissed as weight-related. :/ )

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]starbrow, 2007-09-16 06:02 pm UTC
(no subject) - [info]bubosquared, 2007-09-16 06:27 pm UTC

[info]tatterpunk
2007-09-16 06:57 am UTC (link)
Roeper seriously said that about the Dove ads?

He needs to be stabbed in the kidney. No joke.


I remember realizing how blatant and unashamed the double standard was when catching a VH1 special about "hot bods" in Hollywood and how they were achieved -- the show was immediately followed by yet another shlockumentary on Hollywood elite, only this time asking "how thin is too thin?" and bemoaning the lack of healthy role models, which featured the exact same actors as the previous program.


The mind, it boggles.

So, I guess the question is: why are women programmed towards dissatisfaction?

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]troubleinchina
2007-09-16 09:36 am UTC (link)
Don & Melle think that it's a distraction technique - you know, keep us running after ideals we can't really reach in order to keep us from other things. (Something that's just built into the system over time - I, at least, don't think people in the media are sitting around thinking "How can we keep them damn wimmin distracted?" Don & Melle may disagree, though.)

Bread and circuses, in a way.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)
(no subject) - [info]tatterpunk, 2007-09-23 02:01 am UTC

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