Hi,
As a big coincidence, a local newspaper referred to this book last Thursday: "The Adonis Complex: The Secret Crisis of Male Body Obsession", by Harrison G. Pope, Katharine Phillips and Roberto Olivardia ( Free Press, 288 pages, US $ 25.00 ).
According to them, and translating what Contardo Calligaris says about the book, in the last decades the body is becoming in charge of determining the differences between male and female. You can't tell men from women for their respective social functions anymore. Therefore, virility is expressed in a strong and powerful ideal body.
Unfortunately, Calligaris continues, that ideal is harder to fulfill than any complex examples of moral strength. Get a GI Joe doll's measures and calculate what an adult would have to look like to be proportional to it. The doll he used had the waist of Britney Spears and the biceps fourfold that of Schwarzenegger's!!
Being a 'man' used to be an enigmatic and intricate spiritual ideal. Now, it's an impossible body, and that's also valid for women ( he suggests that women do the same thing with a Barbie doll ).
Most of those who declare not to be satisfied with their bodies say they try to achieve the ideal in order to seduce women. Sistematically, although, tests show that the male body that would drive women crazy is 10 kg ( about 20 pounds ) OF MUSCLES heavier than the one women actually apreciate.
He concludes saying that seduction is only an excuse. Men want to be impossibly muscular not to conquer women, but to impress other men.Both for men and women, the hope of being appealing to your the opposite sex is less determining than being object of our fellows' envy.
Bye,
Caio Rossi
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