Actually taking another look at her post, I’m not sure it makes all that much sense:
On the one hand, Rhubarbarin seems to concede that in order for this woman to look the way she does, she has to eat strictly and exercise plenty. On the other hand she’s lumping herself into this person’s body type only to say that she doesn’t have to do this. Which essentially refutes Rhubarbarin’s point I think, since it seems to admit that this woman does not actually have Rhubarbarin’s genetics (ie, genetics that would allow her to look as she does without working out). That this woman has to put some serious effort into achieving the look she has.
In general I would agree with Rhubarbarin’s larger point; that the genetic component is real and while you can make significant progress towards your fitness goals, you may not attain ‘perfection’ if that perfection is due to genetics.
The way that she expressed it is rather confused though. On the second viewing of what she wrote, this sentence does look out of place (as pulykamell pointed out).
It’s out of place because you’ve essentially admitted that this fitness lady does not have your body type (i.e, the type that requires no effort), instead this lady has had to work at it, which makes your initial irritation puzzling:
It was hidden, slyly or subconsciously, but you said it here.
Of course you have many more posts referencing your physical esteem of yourself without actually using that particular word, like where you jumped right on the topic here.
Whichever words you choose, you’ve established the notion as your signature characteristic on the board.
I have to wonder why you started this thread; everyone knows that this is your thing and you know this is your thing. Pretending not to know what everyone is talking about is (or should be) embarrassing. I could seriously post links just like the above two all day long until the hamsters cry, “Okay, we get it, she thinks she’s hot!”
Erdosain, both of those links are to threads where the topic is physical attractiveness or the personal assessment of one’s own attractiveness. Rhubardin’s comments in that context seem completely on topic.
I dunno, I’m just not seeing the annoyance here. I described the weight loss debacle to my husband and his immediate interpretation was that the overall message was: "Don’t attach your self-worth to an unrealistic body image.’’ That’s pretty much exactly how I read it, without context.
I find it helpful to hire a poet to go before me singing my praises, so I can come in afterwards looking embarrassed and protesting the superlatives heaped upon me. Problem solved!
It seems to be clear - I just don’t understand why mentioning positive self-perceptions is so annoying to people. I can’t think of a single poster on here who I’ve noticed this about, or been irritated with. Interesting.
You’ve kind of been floating a veiled implication that jealousy or bitterness is what causes these mentions to be an irritant for some. Now, you said you are a direct and blunt person…so am I, so let’s keep it real…the implication has been put out there in this thread…
But I gotta tell ya, this isn’t always the case. Sometimes, it is just off putting to people because it is forced and unnatural to the conversation and it throws off the discussion vibe.
For instance, I haven’t noticed your posts much, and I don’t really roll my eyes at women who go on about their looks, because hey, I don’t know what it’s like to be considered pretty, maybe that shit fucks you in the head to the point where you gotta brag about it. But! I do roll my eyes when folks on this board go on about how smart they are, how high their IQ is, how perfect their SATs were, how they learned to read when they were a tiny fetus, curled up with a tiny book in their lil’ flippers. That shit is cringe inducing. I have no idea why it should make me cringe for them, but I do know it has nothing to do with me being jealous or bitter.
So, I am going to extend the same assumption to those who are annoyed with your pretty-posts. They may not be haters, they may just honestly be annoyed at the way your posts seem forced into the vibe of whatever conversation they are having. Or even, kind of embarrassed for you.
Nevertheless, I am convinced that you are just trying to post honestly, without any thought to how others feel you are coming off. I trust your posts at face value. You should also take the posts that are criticizing you at face value, instead of hinting that it’s born of jealousy.
I’ve thought about why we as a species might have evolved to dislike bragging.
Upon hearing self-flattery, my immediate impulse is to search for reasons why all this horn tooting is justified. Once in that critical mode, it is easy to find someone lacking. Braggarts attract detractors because they trigger within us our inner skeptic. For the same reason we distrust car salesmen and timeshare hawkers, we distrust anyone who is trying too hard to sell us something. Because experience has told us that when people do this, it usually means we’re about to get a crappy deal. Those without this visceral reaction are probably more gullible in other areas of their lives too, and possibly more likely to get killed. Thus, anti-braggarts are more fit evolutionarily speaking, which brings us here today.
Humility and self-deprecation are socially desirable for the same reason we’re more likely to consider a long black dress elegant than one that is a mass of ostentatious colors, covered in designer labels. We trust what our own senses perceive as true more than the stuff we’re told is true. “Better to remain silent and be thought a fool than to speak out and remove all doubt” applies to everyone, but those who have the tendency to talk themselves up don’t seem to realize this.
The way I see it, you’ve either earned the right to brag or you haven’t. If you have, it’s pretty annoying to rub in everyone’s face how rich, good looking, brilliant, or otherwise perfect you are. If you’re truly that great, other people have noticed. Trust me. Lacking humility about your accomplishments just makes you seem like a giant child who is both a jerk and desperately in need of approval. And if you haven’t earned the right to brag --which is startlingly near 100% of braggarts-- you just look like a totally clueless douchebag. Like the Turnip says, when someone with an inflated sense of worth lacks humility, it’s just cringe-worthy and painful to witness.
So in general, humility makes you seem like less of a jerk, more grounded, and like you have a little bit of perspective about the universe (which, if you’re an adult, you should). You don’t wanna be the guy who passes a drowning man in a speedboat bragging about how dry he is. Most braggarts, even worse, are the guy who passes a yacht in his speedboat bragging about how awesome his boat is.
I thought about this all a lot today, and my ultimate conclusion is that the reason these remarks are a pattern for me is that that my inner troll is showing. I know certain things I say piss certain people here off (because they call me on it at the time or make snarky mentions of it other times), repeatedly, but I continue posting in the same vein when the spirit takes me because I can justify it with ‘heh heh [ roll voice], they’re annoyed again, how dumb to be annoyed by something like this’.
But it isn’t dumb. It (by which I mean comments which are, or can easily be interpreted as, bragging) may not be something I notice so much personaly, but that doesn’t mean being annoyed by it isn’t justified.
And on another level, it can be an outright thread shit, or provoke negative emotions beyond irritation, neither of which is something I want to be doing.
I’m certainly going to be much more aware of it from now on, as if nothing else, it makes me a less interesting contributor to this board.
Fair enough Jamie, as my main associations with you are a]obsessed with handicapped parking spots, b]like to post pics of yourself oiled up at body building competitions, and c]on at least one occasion you posted a thread with pictures of your face in it and asked to SDMB to rate you as Hot or Not. Every time you respond with irritation to one of my shallow posts, I think of that thread and LOL.
I think we are at least equal in cringeworthy status on here.
