I was watching Karen Corr, an attractive lady and world champion billiards player work the billiards table on ESPN2 last night and I was mesmerized by her cute face, shapely body and gently swaying cantilevered bosom hiding under the most hideous clothing choices you could imagine. I could send a blind woman into the Salvation Army store with a $ 20 bill and she would come out dressed more fashionably than this hapless, championship athlete. She’s got a body most women would kill for and men admire, and she’s got the fashion sense of a bag lady. She looks like she was run over by Paula Poundstone’s tailor.
Click on her pics section. Not one pic highlights her attractive shape to its best advantage, it’s almost like she trying to hide it.
I’d email her but I’m sure it would be taken the wrong way. Oh well… she’s an athlete I shouldn’t judge her fashion choices as long as she performs on the table. It’s pity though.
perhaps I can shed some light. Every male I’ve ever dated has abhored my taste in clothing. I’m not going out of my way to irritate, but I’m wearing what feels comfortable that covers me enough to be socially acceptable. I would imagine that if I were in a competitive sport that didn’t require the wearing of a uniform, I’d really want to be happy in my clothes to have less distraction. And, she may be trying to hide her shape, I certainly do. I’d imagine billiards is a male dominated sport & she probably wants to blend in. I don’t know the woman, just my thoughts.
I did.
I agree she hasn’t dressed in a sexy manner at all. No dispute there, but I really don’t see where you get “bag lady”.
I think that’s a bit exagerated.
Aren’t you supposed to wear a shirt and waistcoat when playing snooker and billiards? Most of the pics show her conforming to the accepted dress code of the sport. The blazer thingy looks like a club uniform. The other pics are casual clothes, such as one might wear while practising.
What did you expect - eveningwear and swimsuit sections?
Apart from the comments above regarding the accepted dress code for the sport, perhaps Ms Corr doesn’t feel comfortable dressing in the kind of clothes you think she would wear in order to enhance your viewing pleasure.
I know quite a few women who will quite happily wear “fashionable” clothes in their home but who quite consciously “dress down” in public in order to minimise the unwanted attention which accentuating their attractiveness inevitably brings.
Tansu, compared to what Jeanette Lee and Eva Lawrence (Mataya?) wear when playing, Karen Corr looks like a PTA mom and they’re the single career women who live around the corner who Karen would hate because her husband always stops to look at them when they’re jogging in the neighborhood.
To each their own, though, when it comes to taste. If that’s the look in which Karen Corr is comfortable, then, well, more power to her. I just can’t imagine engaging in such a physical endeavor as competitive world class billiards in polyester. Eww, sweat.
OK, Astro, I’m going to explain this as best I can.
She is an attractive woman in a very much male dominated arena. Yes, she is almost certainly “trying to hide it”. It has nothing to do with her “fashion sense”. It has to do with being taken seriously and not being a distraction to the men around her.
Men sometimes have these peculiar notions that women should always dress to acentuate their bodily attributes, apparently so they are more pleasing to the eye, even if those clothes are not practical for the situation. That’s stupid. You dress appropriately to what you are doing. If you’re going to a night club slinky, skimpy sexy clothes are appropriate. If you’re playing competitive billards they are not. Some men (which is not to say you are one of them, Astro, but they do exist) also have this notion that an attractive women looks attractive in order to turn them on, and get these weird ideas that just because a woman looks good she’s somehow “teasing him” or leading him on or offering him something even if she’s standing across the room or street and is totally unaware of his existance. Thus, women who look good DO sometimes “try to hide it” to make it clear that they are not in “seduction mode” or looking for that sort of male attention.
Mind you, I’m not sex goddess, but I am involved in an activity where women are outnumbered 20:1, and in a couple of sub-areas as much as 200:1. When I’m doing this activity I most certainly do not wear heels, hose, and a skirt, and not just because a splash of airplane fuel can dissolve nylons. There’s not a lot women around to begin with, so I already attract some attention, the last thing I need is men getting distracted around dangerous machinery because I’ve worn something racey. It’s rude, in my opinion. So yes, I delibrately dress down in jeans and t-shirts or sweatshirts. The boys have seen me stop by the airport after my dayjob in my nice clothes that, as you put it, Astro, “accentuate” my better features. Yes, they do treat me differently when I do that. They are polite, gentlemanly, and discreet, but there’s a difference. It’s reality, deal with it.
For that matter, the wife of the airport owner is much the same - outside of flying she’s impeccable - hair done, makeup perfect, manicured nails, very nice clothes, a truly elegant lady and much more stylish than I’ll ever be. When she’s around the airplanes it’s jeans and t-shirts and sneakers and grease up to her elbows and hair tied back. It’s called dressing appropriately. It’s essential for women are more than just eyecandy.
You have a point to a point. It’s not my prerogative as a spectator to dictate her fashion choices (which I thought I made clear in the last paragraph of my OP) but, yes to be honest it does rankle (me) when an attractive woman dresses poorly and presents herself in the frumpiest manner possible. And I’m not just talking “dressing down”, I’m talking about making the absolute fugliest choices you can imagine about how to present herself in public. It’s her prerogative to dress as she pleases as long as it meets the specifications of her sport and if that includes a burlap bag so be it.
But it’s not necessary for her to dress poorly in major championships. There are other female billiards/snooker champs who dress in a professional, non-provocative manner and have a modicum of color sense and style like the lady who defeated her in the match on ESPN2 I mentioned. If a handsome, athletic male championship racecar driver or basketball player dressed like a colorblind, Kmart refugee (and I’m sure some do) I would be similarly disappointed at their inability to make the most of what God gave them.
Other female billiards champs don’t have to dress poorly and they don’t. I don’t see that she’s making some brave. principled stand against patriarchal oppression and objectification, she’s just a unimaginative dresser with no fashion sense. It’s not a crime it’s just a pity.
astro, I agree 100%. I watched one of these matches a few weeks ago and both women (I think Lee may have been one of them) were dressed casually but certainly not skankily. One was in a nice blue blouse with matching pants and the other (the maybe-Lee) in just a black shirt and jeans. They looked perfectly comfortable and didn’t offend the eye.
This Corr, however, her clothes are an eyesore. I find that more distracting than her showing off her body. She looks like a middle-aged elementary school teacher with no home life and an ever-present cup of coffee in her hand.
"What shall I wear today? Well, lets see. I am a proffesional billiards player, meaning the only people who will likely be watching me are people who hang around in bars. There are no standards or uniforms for how I should dress, so I can pretty much get away with anything I want.
“Right. A long-sleeved silk shirt and a paisley vest with conservative blue slacks it is. I’m hip!”
I don’t know about you guys, but when I look at that woman’s face, I simply can’t imagine her wearing something other than her Paula Poundstone ensemble. She really looks like a librarian or a schoolteacher. In some pictures, she looks like a man.
She looks and dresses like (sorry for all the appearance-based stereotyping :)) someone for whom fashion is a very low priority, not unlike myself. Or if it’s a high priority, she just has eccentric tastes.
Hell, it’s a sport, not a swimsuit competition. Let her be. Regardless of claims to the contrary, a thread like this probably never would have been started if it was a man in question. I can’t remember anyone on the SDMB ever critisizing the fashion sense of Fuzzy Zoeller or any beer-gutted member of the Pro Bowlers Association.