VA: I’m Tired of Bulimia Being the New Black
Oct 7th, 2007
(29 votes, average: 3.07 out of 5)
Loading ...You know, I like to talk a big game, but the truth is I’m not much different than most women. I’m irrational and overemotional. I cry during sad movies. […]
Original post: I’m Tired of Bulimia Being the New Black
I think you’re fuckin’ silly.
I thought that was a given like 1+1=2.
It is… and oh yeah, full o’ shit too.
Good for you! I’m the exact same way, so I say.. we are rare. I think I’m pretty damned perfect (despite my flaws) because I like ‘me’, the one on the inside.
@4 What are you talking about…
Oh yeah V, I still love you cuz you do what you can… so I give you lotsa *smooches* (and a couple of loving smacks).
And, as far as ya’ll wanting me to shut up. FUCK YOU. I gots nothin’ to lose. So you can all go fuck yerselves.
Many women have body issues. This is true.
Women who express confidence in their bodies are subject to insults and criticism. Also true.
Ever think the two might be related?
It’s in everybody’s best interests that women hate their bodies. Corporations make immense profits from women’s hatred of themselves and competition with other women. Men get to sit back and reap the benefits, such as they are: oh, we get neurotic about it, but we also end up looking pretty good, and what straight man doesn’t enjoy being surrounded by pretty women?
And, of course, the women with the most money and/or genetic advantages get to be on top.
Given how many people have an investment in women’s insecurity, of course a woman who says she’s okay with her body is going to have people jump all over her. She’s breaking the social contract.
I am SO with V, especially on the baby animals thing. She’s also correct about the husband thing, and the finding someone else to hook up with should the marriage somehow end. I hate to say it, but men act like only Cinderella will do for them to stick their prized manmeat in, but the reality is this: most men will stick their dick anywhere there’s an opening. These are the geniuses who thought up glory holes, after all.
I’m comfortable in the skin I refuse to slather anti-aging products on. They is grey mixing in with the brown, and I don’t care. I know a woman who is stunningly gorgeous, with a head full of white hair, in her sixties, and she is a fucking MODEL. My husband had a crush on me in high school, when I was much thinner and technically “hotter”, and seven years and two body-changing daughters later, he still wants to get it on.
I refuse to be blonde. I refuse to have breast implants too big for my frame. I refuse to walk around uncomfortable heels or boots, get acrylic nails, or skip dessert because I’m worried about my ass. Not gonna tan, get contacts, or use Oil of Olay. I yam whut I yam.
I also want to add that a swell cure for bulimia might be to drop all of Ana’s and Mia’s friends off in Darfur for awhile.
I agree with V. and with Elizabeth. Luckily, I have never had “typical female” friends, and therefore have gone through my teenage and adult life thus far without kvetching about body issues. Sure, I could stand to work out more, but only because I know I’m lazy and not in good CV shape.
Oh, and for all of you baby-animal-obsessed people, cuteoverload.com is a great place to get your fix.
Not to sound all After-School Special, but….
I think that if you feel pretty and good enough on the inside, that will invariably reflect on the outside. Yes, I have body issues sometimes, but at least I’m intelligent enough to know that I’m just being silly and insecure, because I know that I’m good enough for myself on the inside. I get over it very quickly.
And if you can be enough for yourself, you’ll be enough for anyone else.
Oh I’m sorry honey… please forgive me. I thought this was a role-playing forum.
I think your intentions with this post were admirable, but I still find your logic flawed. Yeah, women need to learn to be comfortable in the bodies they have. And yeah, it wouldn’t hurt if they take a bit of pride in their appearance and exude confidence and acceptance.
But why should the primary reason be to attract a man?
“I learned a long time ago that I don’t have to be the most beautiful woman in the world. I merely have to be pretty enough to attract the type of men I’m interested in. I’m a married woman and my husband thinks I’m cute. Should my husband and I ever decide to call it quits, I’m confident that I would be able to catch the eye of someone equally appealing to me. So, as far as my looks go, I’d say they’ve served me pretty well.”
YOu make it sound like the point of your entire diatrabe is to prove that as long as we have a body good enough to get a guy to notice (and marry) us, we’re doing good. That’s just so wrong! I may not be delirious with my own body and I always seem to be on a diet, but you know what? It’s not because of my desire to be attractive to the opposite sex (and yes, I am married and not a bitter dyke). It’s because I like having a fit, acceptable body for MYSELF.
Your message is true, but that one paragraph just really ruined it for me. And I’m really surprised at you, based on your previous posts, that this is the priority you put on having a “good enough” body. Shame, V!
@Lona…that sounds like something an ugly girl would say
Can anybody explain the article title? I don’t understand what it’s supposed to mean. What is the significance of the color black?
I liked the article, but here’s a quick summation that I think V would appreciate.
Women spend so much time on their appearance because they have such horrible personalities that they couldn’t sustain or get into a real relationship by any means other than physical attraction.
@Jenn ~ Rather than be insulted that actually cracked me up, thanks for the laugh.
Robin:
The black in the title references the way various fashion magazines try to push a certain color as the new “it” color of the season.
Elizabeth says: “Women who express confidence in their bodies are subject to insults and criticism.”
This is true, but only as part of something else: “Anyone who expresses confidence in anything about themselves is subject to insults and criticism.”
Some people can only feel better about themselves by making other people look worse. So when they see someone that they feel compares favorably to them, they have to belittle them. It’s human nature, not a vast patriarchal conspiracy. I’m not saying it’s good, it just is. My sister-in-law does this to my wife all the time. It annoyed me until I realized what was going on, now it makes me vaguely sad. My wife, being smarter than me, had figured this out years ago.
Robin: “Women spend so much time on their appearance because they have such horrible personalities that they couldn’t sustain or get into a real relationship by any means other than physical attraction.”
Women do not spend time on their appearance for men. Men don’t care about that very much. Really, we don’t.
They mostly do it for other women.
Actually they mostly do it for themselves. Once again V takes the extreme - she seems to only have extremists among her female acquaintance - and applies it across the board. While I love her stuff her gross generalisations sometimes drive me wild. Animals groom themselves to put forward their best appearance to attract a mate and to establish their status in the pecking order, humans are no different. It only becomes a problem when it becomes obsessive to the point of stressing over minor ‘flaws’ and going to absurd lengths to overcompensate and letting it affect your life and self-esteem at a profound level.
Most of us have days when we look in the mirror and wish we hadn’t, pull on our jeans and curse that last doughnut because we can’t fasten them…Then we shrug it off, do our best to highlight our good points and play down the bad, it doesn’t make us obsessive, vain, vapid or otherwise flawed just human. I don’t consider the wearing of contact lenses, dying your hair, using moisturiser or applying a little make up to be major crimes against reality in the scheme of things. I’m not forcing anyone else to do it and seriously some days I’m doing you a favour by NOT going out in public ‘au naturel’ and I wish more people would do me the same courtesy.
The aggressively “I don’t care about my appearance I’m so freaking happy and at peace with my looks” brigade at one end of the spectrum are almost as bad as the botoxed, plasticised Joan Rivers brigade at the other. I do not need to see your hairy armpits and the pasty jelly rolls spilling out over and under your spaghetti strap cut off shirt or the blotchy purple cellulite on your thunder thighs when you insist on wearing Daisy Dukes or your greasy grey combover of stringy unwashed and uncut locks with sweaty pink scalp show-through when, or your pus-filled zits and blackheads which a little concelaer under foundation would cover up nicely and your crooked yellow and black teeth when a little cosmetic dentistry could correct them.
Frankly whatever people do to themselves if it makes them happy and feel better about themselves and it saves me from vomiting in my mouth then where’s the harm?
Yes. I know my wife worries about the way she looks occassionally. But like Pasketti said, she frets because she wants to look good in front of her peers… other women, not menfolk. At least that’s what she tells me!
~MB
Pasketti… I’m aware of that theory and intentionally left gender pronouns out of my summary. However, I’m still not fully convinced, can anybody give me any more compelling evidence? One female friend told me that it was almost like an arms race, girls had to do things like wax their eyebrows because they’d feel left out if they were the only ones without waxed eyebrows… not exactly a case of women dressing for women.
Robin: Oh yes it is — that is exactly what your friend meant. She said failing to wax (or whatever) would make her feel “left out” — of what group? Other women, of course.
It’s a fairly standard sitcom gag for men to not notice when a woman’s had a haircut or bought a new outfit, but there is some truth to it. It’s not that men are oblivious, but unless they work in the beauty industry or are fond of makeup themselves, they probably won’t notice the finer details of a woman’s toilette. The general impression is much more important than the nitpicky stuff.