I’ve been putting off blogging about this, but John Hawkins has done it now, so that makes it ok.
I just want to say that I was once a Size 2, and Jennifer Love Hewitt is NOT a size 2. She looks to be about a Size 10 or 12 in that picture. I realize it IS a photo and they add 10 (or is it 20?) pounds. Her big boobs alone would never squeeze into a Size 2 top.
Imagine that you were alive a couple of hundred years ago. There was no TV back then, no internet, no glossy women’s mags, no Sports Illustrated swimsuit issue, nothing. There were also no cars or airplanes, which meant that it was much more difficult to travel.
Long story short, the average man or women got to see, meet, and talk to, at least compared to today, a very small number of people. Because of that, it was much easier, again comparatively, for someone to be considered a knockout, an incredible conversationalist, or a potentially suitable mate, because the pool of talent was so much smaller.
But today, people aren’t just competing with the people in their town, they’re competing in looks and personality with movie stars, super models, and winners from all across the country.
When a man thinks to himself, “Is she attractive,” he’s not just comparing the woman in question to people that live in his town, he’s comparing her to Mariah Carey, Natalie Portman, the hot model he saw in a toothpaste commercial, and every other woman he finds attractive.
When a women thinks to herself, “Does he have a great personality,” she’s not just comparing him to people that live in her town, she’s comparing him to her favorite TV star and the guy she has been talking to from across the country on instant messenger.
All this leads to is unrealistic expectations, declining birthrates, and people calling Jennifer Love Hewitt fat — at least that’s my theory.
His theory actually goes back to the 1980s anti-porn feminism “This Is Not a Love Story” days. I guess it has been trickling down from activist academia into the mainstream. We heard anecdotally, for instance, of Inuit men being turned off their wives once they started getting Playboy up North, for instance.
With porn now free and ubiquitous on the net, this problem isn’t restricted to the Eskimos anymore. Otherwise 16-year-old girls wouldn’t be asking their parents for breast implants instead of cars for their birthdays.
Women have always been concerned about their appearances. What’s changed is that men have picked up the vocabulary of beauty and use it to size us up. In one of his 1970s films, Woody Allen rhaphsodizes about some woman with a hint of “mascara on the lips…” Today, men know the difference between mascara and lipstick, can spot the difference between a C and a D cup, know about Brazilian waxing, butt lifts, Botox and French manicures. They increasingly demand matching bra and panty sets, and pedicured feet, because they know they exist.
You know our secrets. And we know you know.
