looks count everywhere, txschick, not just dallas.

we recently watched a film in sociology. i think it may have been 60 minutes or something, but it was an undercover investigation re: looks and the hiring process. they basically got 2 men and 2 women, one of each was attractive the other not so much, and sent them on several job interviews. not so attractive one had way better qualifications and souped up resume, attractive one just had the looks. 10 times out of 10 the job went to the looker. f'ed up, huh?

That's so elfed up.

Sometimes I'd like for the people who hired the "lookers" to actually see the documentary they're in. Maybe it might change their minds about who they choose for a job in the future.

My apologies, I was wrong on the "remember" equal pay comment. I know that issue isn't dead unfortunately. I guess I was thinking of my job for example in which teachers are paid on a grid according to experience and qualifications and it is the same male or female. I know better about the "real world" outside unions.

I was tired last night and maybe should have thought more carefully about my post. I have come to the sad and angered realization that fat jokes are the last bastion allowed in discriminationatory jokes. In movies it seems to happen far too often that the funny or humourous character/sidekick always seems to be "the fat one". The bridesmaid in "My Big Fat Greek Wedding" for example. All other jokes that target a segment of the population are labelled racist or politically incorrect, but you can make fat jokes all you like!

I once worked for a principal who as you watched the teachers he would hire, it was like he was trying to create his own little harem of blond, attractive, and thin "princesses", who would tell him everything and anything that was said or went on in the school. Needless to say I didn't fit in and helet me know it in all kinds of subtle ways that had nothing to do with my teaching ability!. I even made up a little song about them for my own amusement:

"I don't wear velvet for Christmas,
I don't diet and complain about my thighs
I don't kiss ***,
I'm an independent lass...
And that's why I'll never be a "princess".

What saddens me most, and maybe this is the nature of the machine, is that much of what "keeps us down" as women is enforced by women. Afterall, not all the judging is done by men. There are plenty of women out there who will judge based on looks & apparent fitness level. Plenty who may still buy into the idea that it's just a fact of life that women are treated differently. This sort of thinking breeds mistrust among us. It breeds a mistrust that keeps us separate. I don't want to get all conspiracy theorist about this, but it's a brilliant idea... keep the people you want oppressed mistrusting eachother... they'll never let down their guard to work together.

It hurts everyone. Not just people with ovaries. But men as well. If we could all sit & look at how much more we might get done... how many more accomplishments humankind may have if we can "get over" treating people differently based on sex. A job needs done? The best qualified does it, regardless of sex.

But I'm just talking a bunch of idealist babblings unless we find a way to actually change it.

Even so, I don't believe in a surefire way to get things to where they should be... What would the women here recommend as steps to take?

This is a separate thing, so I kept it out of the last post:

Women are all different shapes & sizes. Why is it that we allow anyone to tell us which is ideal? Why is it that people in a building get to decide what looks best and is therefore something I should try to attain? Why is there even an ideal at all? There may be some genetics at play telling us that certain shapes or features may be more suitable to child-bearing. (Symmetry, for example.) But, we're still influenced by what we see and are told is attractive.

This may lead into chicken or egg territory, but...

A long time ago, when gods and goddesses were worshipped regularly, many of them had ideal forms. Ideal for the times they were created. Were these ideals created by the person who shaped the statue? Were they an average of what women and men really looked like? Were statues of gods & goddesses the same to women & men back then that magazines & billboards are to us today? And to compare those ideals to the ones I'm seeing these days... IMHO at least the goddesses looked like women in all their glory, enjoying being a woman and not trying to be "sexy".

And what's with trying to make women feel "sexy" all the time? Why do I have to feel sexy to feel like a woman? Or why do I have to think a woman is sexy to find her a beautiful woman? I'm starting to hate the word "sexy".

I'm dealing with a lot of self-esteem issues, and one of the exercises I'm learning is to talk back to negative self-talk. The first step is to identify what negative messages I've been giving myself. This morning I identified this one:

I'm too old to wear that shimmery fairy dress. (meaning that old people can't be pretty or wear pretty things.)

I came up with a response to it: Age has exactly squat to do with beauty!

So much work, training me to think better.

that's cool! no apology needed. just wanted to make sure anyone reading it didn't think that it is a thing of the past. a lot of people do!


faerie - damn woman. you addressed all kinds of things. i wanted to respond to you and now that i am here i am like - um. der.

it bothers me too that women do this to other women. if we got over each other, came together, stopped being so petty we really could accomplish a lot. i by no means am a man hater, but (could ya tell there was a but coming?) look at the state of the world and what it has become under their power. war, guns, nuclear arms race, etc. etc. i am almost sure if the majority of world leaders were women that some sort of maternal instinct would kick in and there would be a little more peace. but men have set the standards. meanwhile back at the ranch, we're still trying to figure out what it even means to be a woman and worrying about the latest trends. and this is what we teach our young girls. it's a cycle.

re: gods and goddesses. have you ever read The Chalice and the Blade? uber good book. a long long time ago when the majority of people worshiped gods and goddesses, not only were women worshiped alongside males in all there glory, but religion in general was more life affirming as opposed to what it has become now - centered around death. ugh, i could get off on a tangent that's not appropriate for this forum, but yeah, what you said, i've seen ancient statues of rotund women with large breasts. these were idols

ditto the word "sexy"

ditto idealist

and not only treating people differently based on sex, but treating people differently based on anything be it religion, race, sexual orientation etc. i can't believe that we are still as a country arguing over whether or not an orphan can go into a loving home which happens to have two dads.

as to a surefire way to get things where they should be?

some days i think the system is too broke to fix and some days i don't. on the days i don't i think about Education.

I like to think of myself as an equal-opportunity hater.

But seriously, I can understand how some people don't see fat as a feminist issue. For me, it is. Having social pressures be a factor doesn't eliminate personal responsibility, but it does throw light on the matter and make it easier to address. Some people don't overeat simply because they like food, and getting to an unhealthy weight can have underlying reasons. Say those cravings to eat a whole pie are actually prompted by some guy saying something to me and me being taught when I was younger that "good girls" don't talk back or they risk not being liked by men and one MUST be liked by men to have a good social standing. When I'm aware of that, I can connect with the true source of the desire and challenge it and choose how to respond to the situation in some way other than filling my mouth with food instead of opening it to object. I don't really want pie; I want respect and empowerment.

I guess I have to go with a bit of cheese & say "The children are our future." Proper education will have a lot to do with how the future handles things. Not to mention when we get all old and wrinkly we'll be the ones with nothing better to do but vote, so at least then we can make a difference!

I think the issue isn't so much cultural ideals -- as we've said, every culture, every society (at least as far as I know) had certain ideals for physical beauty, for women AND men. In fact, one might argue that, at least in ancient Greece, male physical perfection was more important than female perfection (and it was a lofty goal -- perfect, hairless athleticism lol).

These different ideals shifted, changed over the centuries and over different eras, but there was ALWAYS some kind of an ideal -- be it Titian's reclining Venus, Ingres' Odaliques, the Pre-Raphaelite "Stunners", whatever (and non-Western societies had their own ideas ab this). even at the beginning of the 20th century, there was definitely a "type" -- the Gibson girl -- which eventually gave way to the flapper look, and so forth. Personally, I think its human nature, people living in society, to come up with a standard of beauty and in a way, it's hard for anyone to REALLY fight against their age's ideals (I mean, to totally unconcern yourself with it, to be 100% blind to it, etc).

The difference nowadays is how we are constantly bombarded with images, words, information, stimuli. Every advertisement, commercial, TV show, movie, whatever SCREAMS out the message: "THIS IS PERFECTION! THIS IS HOW YOU SHOULD LOOK, UGLY!!!" you can't hide from it; it slaps you across the face countless times a day. Centuries ago, there were ideas about beauty, etc. and they were depicted in statues, paintings, etc. but how many people, really, had access to these images? VERY few. Most common people had no access (or at most, limited access) to these kinds of images and even when/if the DID have access, I have a feeling (based on nothing but my own opinion lol) that they didn't necessarily look on with body-envy (maybe jealous of the figure's riches, location, power, influence, whatever).

I also think the idea of being sexy all the time, or having to "feel sexy" is an extremely new concept. Not to say that women centuries, or even a century ago, were more modest or less sexual than today, but I think there is a difference between all this pressure to look/be/feel sexy and.. actually having sex lol. Honestly, I think this idea is the product of a very developed civilization where most of us have no reason to worry about anything really important (i.e. obtaining food), so we're told to sit around and instead of feeling SO BLESSED and happy to have most of our needs met, to live in nations and cities with a relatively well-organized and stable government and developed infastructure, we should be anxious about our relative sexiness - -are we sexy, do we FEEL sexy, how sexy, too sexy, not sexy enough? I agree with you 100% Faerie -- I'm getting sick of hearing "be/feel sexy!" too. And what does sexy even mean in this context? Sexually attractive men? To ourselves? To other women? Please, someone, tell me what I need to be!! THAT is definitely a feminist issue for sure!

I think keeping kids away from the TV for as long as possible would also help, really.

Hmm... totally my opinion here, but: I think women are harder on other women than men are. I also think women are much more competative with other women than they are with men and looks and beauty are all part of the Great Competition.

Do women participate in competing with each other because society forces them to do so to get and stay ahead or do they do it out of a more basic social impulse? I'm not sure what I think about that, but it DOES keep women separate and weak and victims to the media machine that touches and hurts most (if not all) of us.

And it certainly works. Those sorts of images keep enough people disatisfied with how they look so that they'll buy whatever the image is selling. We aren't really bombarded with images of pleasant looking people with the thought "Hey, let's appreciate some beauty and the human form." No, it's definitely, "Hey this person looks pretty hot... why don't you?"

I certainly think women can be harder on eachother than men. Heck, the guys barely have to do any of the "work" of judging women if women are doing it themselves. If it really boils down to just getting attention from men it makes it all the sillier & sadder.

I think part of the competition between women comes from viewing men as a sort of commodity. There's still the idea that a woman can "win" the man, and with him his income and some social standing. So, women learn to compare themselves against other women by the men they're able to "win."

I think part of it may come from the whole pack animal/pecking order social structure, but not all.

A lot of the posts here saying weight loss is a health initiative sound really healthy.

Here's another thing: Wanting to be attractive to a mate does not necessarily make you a bad feminist. It makes you human.

I think sometimes we set the standard for women's empowerment so high that we all feel guilty for being unable to reach it. It turns some women away from feminism, and rest of us can turn in on ourselves, second-guessing everything we do.

It's complicated, and we all want to hold the right values. But you have to give yourself a break. Sometimes I want to be pretty and a feminist too.