It seems that the whole idea of what it means to be male is
molting. Cultural upheavals from the women's movement to the national
emphasis on health and fitness have altered our sense of how a man should
act and look. The new male is no longer the unquestioned head of the
household, in control of the nuclear family if nothing else. Gender
parity in the workplace has made inroads: today a man may easily have a
female boss. Men's health has been given new emphasis ever since several
post-World War II studies found that men were at greater risk of heart
disease than women.
According to cultural critic Hillel Schwartz, Ph.D., author of
Never Satisfied, that awareness of men's physical vulnerability led to a
new concern with their bodies. Then, in the 1960s, the Kennedy excitement
with amateur sports helped kick off a resurgence in exercise and jogging.
Of late, the phenomenal rise of self-help groups and popular movements
such as Robert Bly's "wild men" has led to a new male awareness of
feelings, and growing intolerance of the once typical "tough guy"
upbringing. Marks and scars are no longer badges of honor.
The old ideal of American maleness is under attack, according to
the New York Times. "Today, the world is no longer safe for boys," wrote
Natalie Angier. "A boy being a shade too boyish risks finding himself
under scrutiny...for a bona fide behavioral disorder." American boys are
being diagnosed in record numbers with hyperactivity and learning
problems.
As ideals of manhood shift, so has the ideal male body. While it is
clearly more masculine--well muscled and sexually potent--it is
paradoxically feminine as well. Our ideal man is no longer rough and
ready, bruised and calloused, but, as Schwartz puts it, "as clean skinned
and clear complected as a woman." His body is "no longer stiff and
upright, but sinuous and beautiful when it moves. Sinuousness didn't used
to be associated with manliness." As a sexual object, a source of pure
visual pleasure, men are increasingly being looked at in ways women
always have.
This fascination with male beauty is not entirely new--consider the
ancient Greeks, the beautiful boy of the Renaissance, or Elizabethan
noblemen parading the court in revealing tights, silks, satins, and
jeweled codpieces. Charles Darwin himself popularized the idea of women
as selectors of plumed and spectacular male mates. "He was speaking of
finches and partridges," explains historian Thomas Laqueur, Ph.D., author
of Making Sex: Body and Gender from the Greeks to Freud (Harvard
University Press, 1990), "but we generalized to humans. It was known as
the peacock phenomenon--the notion of the male as the one with plumage."
It wasn't until the rise of capitalism and the bourgeoisie that men
renounced flagrant beauty and adopted the plain suit as a uniform. During
the so-called "great masculine renunciation" men began to associate
masculinity with usefulness. Then, notes Laqueur, "gradually women became
the bearers of the science of splendor."
The consequences of today's shift in male body image are already
apparent. The number of men exercising has soared--8.5 million men now
have health club memberships, according to American Sports Data, a
research firm. And men spend an average of 90.8 days a year in the club
(that's over 2,000 hours). That's nine days a year more than
women.
Men may be nicer to look at, but males with body image disorders
are showing up with increasing frequency in psychiatrists' offices. More
and more men are abusing steroids in an attempt to build muscle. An
article in the American Journal of Addictions noted that "anabolic
steroids are increasingly used for the nonmedical purposes of enhancing
athletic performance and physical appearance. As illicit abuse patterns
increase, so do reports of physical dependence, major mood disorders, and
psychoses." In the 1980s, body-image studies by psychologists Elaine
Hatfield and Susan Sprecher found that men were catching up to women: 55
percent of women were dissatisfied with their appearance; men weren't far
behind, at 45 percent.
Mirror Mirror: Women Look at Men
For both men and women, male personality is regarded as the most
significant quality in attracting a mate. In a sense, this flies in the
face of our concern with appearance: it lets us know that no matter how
enormous our body obsession, both men and women still rate inner beauty
as paramount. In the accompanying survey, intelligence and sense of humor
were rated most important, and sexual performance and physical strength
least important.
However, there are intriguing differences, even misconceptions,
between the sexes about the importance of certain physical
characteristics. For instance, men believe an attractive face is more
important to women than empathy and the ability to talk about feelings.
They also put more emphasis on body build than women do. In general, men
judge their physique to be more important than women do.
Yet appearance is still only a piece of the pie. Women's sexual
response to men is more complex than men's to women. "How odd and
unsettling an experience it is," comments Brubach, "to look at all these
ads of sexy men sprawling on beds and beaches. I think, 'What a nice
chest or legs,' but I don't ever feel that this would be enough material
for me to have a sexual fantasy. For most of the women I know sex appeal
isn't purely about physical appearance."
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