I’m not saying that this has happened in last few weeks, but now the mass media (print, TV, and movies) wants to belief that a true man has the following appearance:
*Overall slender form
*Ideally, washboard abs without a gram of fat on them
*Even more ideally, a cut, buff bod with a big chest
Which is to say, you must be slender, but if you really want to be the kind of guy who attracts the babes and succeeds in life, you’d better be buff and cut.
The ultimate imaging of this ideals comes to us in the form of the underwear package. The abs pictured thereon ain’t just washboard, they’re each separate washing machines. Total body fat on the man (his face is never shown) is 0.0065 g.
Realistically speaking, to have a body like that you’d have to make it your day job. This type of model is not quite going for a true competition Lisle Alzedo bod, but the level of work required must be comparable. I have worked out in a lot of (regular, non-competitive) gyms with a lot of guys, and although you see some strong fellows, you rarely see the combination of buffness and low-fat that these models display.
Still, these are just “regular” guys wearing “regular” undies, right?
The male body image was not always like this. Take a look at the James Bond films. Sean C was “fit” (in the lingo of the time). He was barrel-chested but not cut. The male gut of the time was rarely cut, either. Sean’s wasn’t. And sometimes in the Bond movies, when “good physical specimens” are presented, they similarly display the fit, barrel-chested, not-cut look.
Look at Rock Hudson in his early '60s pics. He was big and hunky but he would practically be considered obsese by today’s standards.
Women have been complaining for a few decades about unrealistic media body images, and they’ve been right. Lethally skinny Twiggy in 70s ads, skeletal Callista on TV, and buff babes like Melissa Joan Hart on the big screen. Needless to say, these women have all been paid big dough to eat nothing all day long. But the images pound against the brain so much that gals eventually feel that they must be so or face the consequences. These images also affect the way men view women, too.
But I think things are nearly as bad for men now. I never used to think about my weight until the 1990s, when the buff bad look seemingly became de rigueur. Now, every day, I peer in the mirror and suffer feelings of shame and inadequacy. I’ve done rep after crunch rep with a 25-pound weight beneath my head, but I’ve neaver achieved washboard and doubt I ever will.
The US government even, bent on insanity in every possible dimension, it would seem, is pelting us with BMI nonsense. The BMI is a stupid concept to begin with: it says you should be a certain weight for a certain height and does not take muscle mass into consideration at all. I’ve read critical articles in which it was determined that Brad Pitt and George Clooney would both be “obese” under this standard. According to a statistic in a recent Salon.com article, about 80% IIRC of the USA have BMIs that go over the standard. Obviously, the standard is f*ct.
I say this: all these standards and images are bullshit. They are cultural self-torture. They have nothing to do with health and even very little to do with what is aesthetically pleasing. Although there is a level of obesity that can do one various types of harm, most people aren’t in that range.
Anyone disagree with the above? I doubt it.
