Our editor-in-chief bares it all in a direct confrontation with body shame.
My body is a testament to high testosterone. I have a body type one sees a lot: male pattern baldness, plenty of body hair, builds both muscle and fat very easily. You see guys like me all the time, with our wide shoulders and wider beer guts. Burly sonsabitches, often rocking the shaved-head-and-beard combo. It is not, it’s fair to say, a body type that is highly lauded by media culture.
I didn’t always look like this. When I was a teenager, I was so skinny I won awards for dressing as Jack Skellington, which sounds like a joke and isn’t. When I was twenty, I dressed as Nightwing for a costume contest, and the woman MCing the show called me “the reason spandex was invented.”
That was a long time ago.
Nowadays, I’m technically considered obese.
Click to continue…NSFW images ahead
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About Noah Brand
When women suggest that they have been dealing with this for longer than men or it is more egregious, I would suggest that they make sure that this is correct.
What I am 100% sure of is that women complain about body image WAY more than men do. Does complaining about something mean that the phenomenon exists more for the complaining group or that they are more just outraged and vocal about it?
You can expect men to start speaking up more. Men’s silence all of these years came from an overconfidence that was not earned. Women and other groups have really dominated such conversations for a long time now and the narratives are way off track.
BTW Noah. Kudos to you for doing this. I do not have the courage to do what you have done.
This guy is sane/brave/& provocative, and a a natural for his age.
Wish I would be as forthcoming abt myself.
For now, I hide within my clothes.
Ray.
This is absolutely beautiful. You are absolutely beautiful. Thank you so much for doing this; being the change in the world. I admire this and you.
Bravo. Beautifully conceived, written and executed piece. From my point of view both men and women are heartily shamed about our bodies by a culture that promotes profit above physical and emotional wellbeing.
If we aren’t insecure they can’t continue to sell us the pills, potions, lotions and garments that are the booby prize for buying into the cult of you’re never enough.
Thanks for speaking out naked.
Maureen AKA Moe The Pro
Beautifully stated, Maureen!! It reminds me of a quotation I read:
“If we have only trash and trivialities to sell, we must produce trashy and trivial personalities to serve as consumers”
~~ Lewis Mumford (1895 – 1990) – From “The Condition of Man” (1944)
Let’s step away from PC BS mind control and move back into re-empowering ourselves!!
George
i was feeling good until i saw the blatantly sexist american apparel ad 1/2 way down the ms. page of a girl who look underage in a skin tight body stocking with her butt and legs exposed and her back arched as if she is inviting a man to mount her from behind. i guess Ill go elsewhere so I dont have to look at underage looking girls who are almost naked or in tight clothes posing for a for a company that is supposed to be advirtisiing clothes and not skinny perfect stereotypical girls who look underage, and whose owners have been found guilty of sexual assault of their minor aged models like the one pictured..
You look at ads?
I had an artist flatmate many years ago. She had stuck some of her drawings from life class up in the hall. We had a short discussion; I remember she said, “Most people actually look better naked, because most people don’t know how to wear clothes.”
Hey, wir könnten alle viel sagen/schreiben, aber wenn du das vielleicht auf Englisch schreiben würdest…
Dude, we can all say lots about this, but if you’d do it in English….
Also, what’s this guy whining about? Anyone who is unhealthy is portrayed negatively in the media, so start exercising and stop being unhealthy and feeling sorry about it! And the ladies are right, women have it more difficult than men. Fat balding men can score hot chicks in beer commercials….not so much the other way around.
Because beer commercials are really valid representations of real life I’m sure. There are movies with large women + smaller, stereotypical hot men….