Agree completely. I don't get the people who always supply negativity. I for one don't have the balls/confidence to show people naked pictures. So more power to those who do. Even if I don't find them attractive or whatever I never say something negative cause they are doing them and there is no reason to be negative about that.
No matter how much people try there will always be sexism, racism, homophobia, and all sorts of hate and its unfortunate. People only like to see black and white and not get to know the person they are judging.
Well said, @kacigoff, we always need more intelligent and passionate women (and men) to speak up for equality, and a more tolerant, accepting and loving world.
I like your rant. As an advertiser (creative), I'd like to point out somethings so: The rule book of sexiness is hard wired. Culture is written with the genetic alphabet so to speak. Like language makes for millions of books, the genetics interact with ideals and culture. Advertisers use both culture and primal reflex. We do part of that, because it works. Personally I find "sex sells" boring and manage to avoid it, even in condom ads ... indeed I never used models in condom ads. Thinking about it. I never worked with classic "pretty/fashionable" models ever. I prefer "real" people in my ads.
I have to admit that I am not a big fan of magazines like Cosmo because their approach to "helping" women seems to be at best superficial and at worst actually harmful. More than once I have seen them advise women to lie or at least conceal the truth to get a man. In that same vein, their advice seems to be largely focused on ways to capture and keep a man. I think women could use better advice than being fake and sexually compromising themselves in order to get men. Don't get me wrong. I am all for pleasing your guy. But I believe that the pleasure a woman gives should be based on her own personal desire to please the guy, not acts based out of a desperation to hold onto or trap him. As for feeling secure in our own bodies, that is a tough one. Every society favors certain attributes that they associate with beauty. These attributes have varied across different cultures and historical time periods, but there have always been some sort of standards put forth for beauty. It is hard to feel confident in one's beauty when one knows that they do not measure up to those standards. I agree that it would be fantastic if we were all valued for who we were and not what we looked like, but that doesn't seem to be the case a lot of the time. In fact, psychology studies show that beautiful people have more positive personality traits attributed to them by others even though there is not logical reason to associate those traits with beauty. We just seem to favor beautiful people. Believe me; I wish we favored more what was in people's minds. I would be so much further ahead of the game. Nonetheless, I agree that treating all people as if they are beautiful is something truly worth aspiring towards. And, we should always be promoting more love and less hate. :-) Good topic, by the way.
I like what Flippyleggs had to say... I try to treat all people like they are beautiful. It's true that we are hard wired to be attracted to beauty, no matter what sexual preference we have. Magazines that gear towards women "pleasing men" or "getting men's attention" are an insult to intelligence. I think those articles ultimately damage peoples self respect and confidence.
Also, Sexuality should be part of freedom of expression. Obviously some folks will be more overtly sexual than others due to chemistry.... I ,for one, am a total flirt and love to see other people smile when they feel attractive and respected.
It could be about killing judgement towards women or indeed applying strict moralism to men too! :) Either way would work creating eaquality of morality for all of the genders :P
