Body Perspectives

"Ever wondered why a man can look at an advert featuring a six-pack and laugh, while a woman might look at a photograph of female perfection and fall to pieces?" A mildly interesting opening line to an intriguing article about the different perspective men and women have on body images.

The basic premise is that women are constantly bombarded with pictures and magazine articles telling them how they can have the perfect body. This makes them vulnerable and insecure because they know they will probably never attain that body. It's not enough that their partner may love them them just way they are. In fact, being told "I love you just the way you are" whilst intended as a compliment from the man could easily be taken as an insult by the woman.

A man is in a more fortunate position knowing that although he may never look like Brad Pitt, his body is merely a machine. If he gets fat and out of shape then that can be fixed by exercise and that's as good as it'll get. He'll still not look like Brad Pitt but he's looking as good as he'll ever look. There's no pressure to achieve the unattainable.

It's a sad state of affairs and although I was aware of the above contradiction I'd never really thought about. Perhaps we haven't really moved on that much in the last thirty years. Society still places unreasonable expectations on women - probably even more now than ever, and men still get the easy ride.

It's rather more depressing to read some of the misogynistic views in the Comments section suggesting that women who are susceptible to this are shallow or stupid or lazy.

Read the whole article here but I don't suggest you bother with the 200+ comments - the ones I read didn't really add much value.