Quality & Equality
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I was flipping through the radio yesterday on the drive home and I caught a couple of minutes of this guy's show. He was telling a girl that only fat and ugly women like the show "Ugly Betty," so she must fat. She is 5'6" and weighs 135, and he said she had "junk in the trunk" and "should" weigh 125. (I love how guys like this think they have the first clue what 5'6" and 135 looks like--or that the same height and weight looks the same on all women.)
The caller said that she didn't think she was fat, and that also he was sending a terrible message to young girls because "we have more to offer than how we look." (Which is, of course, the message of "Ugly Betty.") His response was that "men don't care" and that "high-quality men who are rich, successful, and wealthy" (yes, he said both rich and wealthy) "we" (yes, he said "we") "don't care what else you have to offer." After a few more minutes where he patted himself on the back for "telling it like it is" I switched it off in disgust.
Sure, this chick is fat like Tyra Banks is fat. Obviously this guy's schtick is to be a sexist blowhard asshole, he's not the first and he certainly won't be the last. But the interesting thing to me was that he was really emphasizing "high-quality" men as being successful men with money. I had this sudden realization that perhaps the pressure that women have to be thin might be equivalent to the pressure men have to be successful and rich. I always think men have it easy, but maybe they don't; it's just a different kind of pressure in a different area of their lives.
Of course, I know that these type of "high-quality" men exist, and they don't want women to weigh more than 125 pounds or whatever. And I am sure there are plenty of "high-quality" women who are into that sort of thing. But there are also rich and successful career women, men who don't define themselves by job title or bank account balance, and men and women of all shapes and sizes who find each other and love each other for what they are, not for their adherence to some totally imaginary ideal. Thank god we've got Match.com and America Ferrera to help us figure it all out.
I was flipping through the radio yesterday on the drive home and I caught a couple of minutes of this guy's show. He was telling a girl that only fat and ugly women like the show "Ugly Betty," so she must fat. She is 5'6" and weighs 135, and he said she had "junk in the trunk" and "should" weigh 125. (I love how guys like this think they have the first clue what 5'6" and 135 looks like--or that the same height and weight looks the same on all women.)
The caller said that she didn't think she was fat, and that also he was sending a terrible message to young girls because "we have more to offer than how we look." (Which is, of course, the message of "Ugly Betty.") His response was that "men don't care" and that "high-quality men who are rich, successful, and wealthy" (yes, he said both rich and wealthy) "we" (yes, he said "we") "don't care what else you have to offer." After a few more minutes where he patted himself on the back for "telling it like it is" I switched it off in disgust.
Sure, this chick is fat like Tyra Banks is fat. Obviously this guy's schtick is to be a sexist blowhard asshole, he's not the first and he certainly won't be the last. But the interesting thing to me was that he was really emphasizing "high-quality" men as being successful men with money. I had this sudden realization that perhaps the pressure that women have to be thin might be equivalent to the pressure men have to be successful and rich. I always think men have it easy, but maybe they don't; it's just a different kind of pressure in a different area of their lives.
Of course, I know that these type of "high-quality" men exist, and they don't want women to weigh more than 125 pounds or whatever. And I am sure there are plenty of "high-quality" women who are into that sort of thing. But there are also rich and successful career women, men who don't define themselves by job title or bank account balance, and men and women of all shapes and sizes who find each other and love each other for what they are, not for their adherence to some totally imaginary ideal. Thank god we've got Match.com and America Ferrera to help us figure it all out.
posted by mo pie at 11:44 AM
7 Comments:
FROM DOLLEY:
Absolutely, men are under the same pressure to be "successful" (i.e., "rich"), that women are under to be "thin" (whatever the culture defines as "pretty;" these last few decades, "thin" has been an overwhelming part of that definition). My best friend is a guy, and it's been a little horrifying to see the world through his perspective. I see the same disgust, and feelings of helplessness, about his needing to be "successful," as I have seen with women over the need to be "thin;" even when those goals are achieved, there's resentment and frustration over what each party winds up attracting: the woman who struggles to be thin, because otherwise she has no hope of competing in the marketplace (call it a marketplace of affection if you will, it is a marketplace nonetheless), but isn't happy with the men who then court her; the man who works hard, and is "successful," but who then deals with the frustration of women who are interested only, or primarily, in his earning power, and have very little interest in him as a person.
This is just an observation post, not an I-have-some-kind-of-solution post. It seems, most days, as if humans haven't much evolved past their earlier hunter-gatherer instincts; the women are looking for good providers in their mates, and the men are looking for the young and fertile. :(
Oh, except for the additional observation that, some people obviously have evolved past that: my ex-husband expected me to be the "good provider."
--Dolley
I'm feeling a parsec past snarky today.
"I love how guys like this think they have the first clue what 5'6" and 135 looks like--or that the same height and weight looks the same on all women."
It's pompous pronouncements like that one by boys (old or young), followed by statements like "men are logical", that make me not just want to laugh in their faces, but do so. Like this:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAA!!!!!!!!!
Plus, Leykis? A "high quality man"? More like "high quality asshole". Except not even.
Plus, Dolley, they want you to not just pay all the bills, but also ask them out and manage the rest of the relationship. Lazy to the point of comatose.
I'm really starting to wonder what the point is.
Plus, you know, I'm sorry. Walking wallet? Well, damn, who has all the money?
When the woman-earning to man-earning ratio eases past 70 or so cents to the dollar, then the men can whine a little more.
And it's not that I'm not sympathetic to men with social graces that were always nice to women, who ignored them until they had a six-figure (seven, it seems, thes days) salary and some preferred stock in the bank. It's like when I'm a single-digit rather than a double-digit size and hideous sleazy men crawl out of the woodwork at the club and attempt to paw, which I'm thinking is part of your point, Mo. (Happened just the other night down on Varick Street. BLEAH.)
IMO it's about people whose limbic systems are more developed than their cerebral cortices, basically.
However, if you are one of those he-male-baboons with a blowhard's entitlement complex, with no social graces and no empathy for what women go through in Western society that only wants whatever matches this year's trophy model and will trade that in when she falls out of line, just because you've got a couple T-bills now?
KMA, STFD and STFU.
Gah!
Amen to what littlem wrote.
And since he went there, I'll go there. Did anyone get a gander at that photo of his?
He looks like just the sort to be all, hey, here's my fat wallet (I have nothing else to offer), so where's my arm candy?
That guy is a menace and ugly by anyone's standards (physically and otherwise)+ FAT. Not that anyone has any right to make those judgements about women...but especially not him.
It was a great day when he was removed from the Seattle talk radio airwaves.
Just as a sidenote: this is only a rumor-it has been said, he has on many occasions been seen canoodling with a plus-sized woman who is obviously his significant other.
Well, first I clicked on the link to his site and laughed forever, because as earlier posters have pointed out, he's not exactly easy on the eyes. Then I noted he has guests like Adam Carolla, the most unfunniest man on the planet who still somehow gets paid as a comic.
Then I rememberd his line about how he was a High quality Man and realized that we already know about a great high quality woman for him! Who needs match.com when we have BFD?!?!?
oh, v'ron! awesome!
i actually went back and reread that woman's original blog post and, man, bitch crazy. i also did some bopping around to see what lil'miss success is all about these days and yes, she's packed on a few pounds (about 20% of what she claimed she lost in the vitriolic post), is playing poker for a living (though she wants to have her blog income to support her), until recently was living off her parents.
Such a catch!
They deserve each other!
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