I'm always entertained when feminists freak out about the way women are portrayed in comic books. "Real women don't look that way," they will howl. "These are just fantasies!" The appropriate response, of course, is to laugh and reply, "Yes. They are fantasies. That's the whole point." One then notes that both men and women are portrayed unrealistically in the media and that the ideal of heroic nudity is an old one.
I bring this up yet again because there's a remarkably amusing essay over at Jezebel by Dodai Stewart in which the author notes that men are being asked to conform to unrealistic standards of beauty but that it doesn't matter because it makes her feel all funny in the bottom of her stomach. Here's Stewart:
Here's the thing: It's really hard to be outraged about these men going to great lengths to bulk up and lean down, even while reading about the dangerous health risks and blatant exploitation and objectification, because I LOVE IT. I LOVE IT SO MUCH.
I love the way it looks. I love looking. A shapely form is actual eye candy: A sweet, delicious, fleeting morsel to devour with your pupils.
Points for honesty! It's a totally human reaction. Stewart then gets into the concept of heroic nudity—I'm glad she's been paying attention!—before casually, almost absentmindedly, stating that her objectification of men is different from the objectification of women because she finds one attractive and doesn't find the other one attractive.
But the objectification of men is a false equivalency to the objectification of women, because what's being fetishized is strength. Virility, capability, vigor, fortitude. Power. In a world where men actually do have power. You can't say the same about the standard objectification of women, which usually revolves around sexually-charged parts like breasts and buttocks, not biceps. In addition, "sexy" images of women generally involve us being relaxed, lying down, finger in the mouth like a child. Submissive, pliant, docile.
Ah, the dread "false equivalency"! Nobody expects the "false equivalency"; surprise is its greatest weapon.
But is the equivalency really all that false? Men and women find different things attractive, thus altering the ideal that each gender should strive for in their costuming. Stewart says in her essay that the epidemic of shirtlessness on her favorite TV shows is "gratuitous" and she doesn't care because it gives her the tingles. But things that turn dudes on are totes bad because they correspond with a standard of beauty with which she disagrees. As I said, the whole piece is kind of amusing in that way that it's always really amusing to watch people wrestle with their own hypocrisy while trying to convince you that they aren't hypocrites at all.
We'd really be better off as a society if we just accepted, as the ancients did, that the idealized form is just that: idealized. Mere mortals aren't expected to look like demigods and there's nothing wrong with appreciating—and portraying—demigods as beautiful creatures, objects of lust and attraction.
So, Dodai, allow me to suggest a compromise: I won't give you any grief when you ogle Ollie Queen ...
... if you accept there's nothing terribly wrong with the costuming of Zatanna Zatara ...
... and Harley Quinn ...
... and Power Girl ...
... mmkay?
UPDATE: Adam Kredo and Ashe Schow complained about the Harley Quinn image above; Kredo suggested putting this one in its place:
The nice thing, of course, is that I don't have to choose. So you are free to enjoy both options! Tweet me and let me know which one you like more.