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Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?

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LaComtesse
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
Bodybuilding strikes me as the absolute ultimate vanity. It has nothing to do with strength--when bodybuilders look the strongest, they are actually at their weakest. Making their muscles pop like that requires starvation. You want real strength, you'll probably also be somewhat chunky.
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Ulookinatmyjunk, JOC
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
Angela Bassett has always been my beauty/body ideal. Her arms and shoulders are ridiculous. And the plus side it that it totally looks attainable, if you're willing commit to spending some time in the gym. Plus, she's like, 50...and it's totally impressive that her body is aesthetically more attractive and healthy-looking then many youngins' half her age. Creepy, veiny, swollen and strained does not look good to me - man or woman.

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pantaloons
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
Ok seriously I do not approve of people trying to make big muscles gender neutral for the sake of the feminism. Big muscles are considered masculine because they ARE. Humans are sexually dimorphic just like a lot of other animals. Males have the hormones that promote more muscle growth and more robust bone structures to hold those muscles. Female body builders look so strange to people because it's not how women evolved to look. It's just he way it issss people. Sheesh
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Cerridwen
11/26/08

@dewdropper: Actaully, male and female physiology is not as simple as men = muscled and women = soft. When you look at male and female bodies in terms of which areas tend to be stronger without significant training, men tend to naturally have more muscular upper bodies which make them look "bigger" whereas women tend to have a much stronger core, abdominal muscles and pelvic floor, which don't make them look huge. Yes, there is sexual dimorphism but it does not mean that women are naturally not as strong as men. We are just stronger in different ways. The argument of sexual dimorphism, however, has been used for centuries to argue that women are soft, delicate, weak and incapable of real feats of strength (despite the fact that women's natural strength lies in the muscles necessary for childbirth, a damned amazing feat of strength if you ask me).
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Plum-Pie
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
Happy Thanksgiving!

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perfidia
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
My pal is a personal trainer. She's pretty, boyish and muscular all at the same time:

[www.heathercassils.com]
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Plum-Pie
11/26/08

@perfidia: So so hawt.
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kimsama
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
Ok, there's a difference between women being fit (which can look feminine), and women body builders, who often go to lengths to produce very large muscles.

Why is this "unfeminine"? Because at the level the body builders' musculature approaches, women are no longer capable of menstruation. Evolutionarily speaking, if you're trying to find a female mate and you pick a woman who is too muscular (i.e. lacks the percentage body fat) to menstruate, you fail. Only men who have a preference for woman who are not too muscular to reproduce make good on the evolution deal.

I know it's a crappy reason for a gender-normative appearance bias (more muscles = more masculine), but it's not based solely on a social or cultural construct. It does make perfect sense from an evolutionary standpoint.
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msAnthrope
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
men have more testosterone which is involved in muscle building. so that's why we're more accustomed to seeing men rather than women with muscles, especially very defined muscles. sorta like estrogen is involved with breast creation. and why we normally associate breasts with women.

the kind of muscle tone that comes with physical work (or non-bodybuilder workouts) is achievable by both men and women. just not on the same bulging level, because of the hormones involved. and i'm sure back in the day say of pioneers when women had to carry water from outside (those buckets are heavy!) and carry firewood, etc., it wasn't weird to see muscle tone on a woman.
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Macloserboy
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
The roid raged she-hulk herself:

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The One
11/26/08

@Macloserboy: Wow. I think her body looks healthy, strong and gorgeous.

Maybe this woman is a "she-hulk" next to the
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The One
11/26/08

@The One: Not sure what happened to the rest of that post, but I was trying to say that the only way she could look like a "she-hulk" is in comparison to the starving waifs who lift nothing heavier than a pencil.
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bleedingmouths
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
I love strong, toned women, sigh. Hot hot hot. I love seeing muscles too, although I love not seeing them just as much. In fact, a mon avis, all women are good. sigh. I lift weights, just light ones, because I'd love to have visible muscles. I want people to see me and think I'm physically strong. I've always found, as a woman, my lack of strength frustrating. I've always felt that I could do anything a man could do, apart from the obvious... and lifting! I must be able to lift as well as my boyfriend. It drives me mad that I can't. I just can't accept it.
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The One
11/26/08

@bleedingmouths: You can (and should) lift heavier weights (with fewer reps) without fear of looking like a she-hulk. In fact, if you don't up the weight you lift every now and then, you'll stop making any progress.
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dirtybee
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
Some of them don't look very happy :-(

Erm, also - what happens to your boobs?
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missbitchy
11/26/08

@dirtybee says we bee obama jammin: Boobs are mainly fat so when they work out like that they lose fat and boobs.

Also, professional weight lifting is really detrimental to your health. In order for the muscles to stand out they must have no fat, and thin skin. To do this they go on really dangerous diets, and completely dehydrate themselves before a competition. They look incredibly strong but they are really sick and weak during those things. Sometimes they collapse the second they get off stage.
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Plum-Pie
11/26/08

@missbitchy: I love trashy biographies and Jon Hotten's Muscle is a great-but-horrifying whirl through pro-bodybuilding.
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Cafezinha
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
I kind of like the Amy Winehouse 'shop.
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bluebears
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
PERHAPS steroids were involved????
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Red-headed bookworm
11/26/08

@bluebears: Definitely involved. I know some people who take steroids...it's a lot more common than people think.
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swashbuckling
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
I think about this a lot when it comes to women who don't want to lift weights too much or not at all for fear that they'll "bulk up". I've had exercise videos where the instructor assures us that we won't have to worry about building too much muscle. A physical trainer once told me that it's not possible for women to bullk up the way men do (and I didn't ask for this so-called information.) Many women simply don't think muscles are feminine.

It's detrimental for women to think physical strength has to trade off with beauty and femininity. Huge muscles on a guy doesn't do anything for me, but a little bit of muscular bulge is good for anyone if you can get it. If a guy was turned off by my muscles, I'd get suspicious because only someone who wants to overpower you sees your strength as a bad thing.
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beatrice2000
11/26/08

I really enjoy using weights at the gym. I may use handweights, but I like that I've progressed to using 10-lb weights or 15-lb bodybars, and have more strength and visible arm and leg muscles. Still, I have soft muscle tone and a voluptuous shape, so it's hard for me to look really as fit and toned as I want to be.

I went to a male bodybuilder competition years ago because my then-uncle was in it, and it was terrible. I just held myself from laughing because the men looked absolutely ridiculous.

@swashbuckling: I always cringed at that whenever I heard a woman, famous or not, saying she doesn't want to "bulk up."
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brendastarlet is on it
11/26/08

@beatrice2000: I use weights at the gym, too -- hand weights, and I bench press, and do a lot of exercise for resistance. The reason is that women lose muscle and bone mass at an alarming rate as they age, and you need to keep yourself strong for balance and longevity.

I'm toned, especially in my legs and arms, but not at all "bulky." My trainer says women generally don't get that way until they go above 20 pound weights.
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The One
11/26/08

@brendastarlet is on it: I lift more than 20 pounds and don't look bulky at all. Heck, I do squats with a 50-lb barbell, and use 35-40 lbs on it when doing deadlifts, yet I still don't have that bulky look.

Unless there is a medical reason (cardiac, orthopedic, etc.) that prevents it, your trainer is doing you a disservice by not getting you to lift heavier (over time).
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AthertonMerriweather
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
I give these ladies props for their discipline and hard work. There are many natural bodybuilders that look like that and if it makes them happy, what the hell should we care?
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The One
11/26/08

@AthertonMerriweather: Almost no female who looks like that is doing it without steroids, hormones and/or other dodgy substances.

I see a few women like that at my gym. They have HUGE upper bodies, yet they lift FAR lighter than I do, and I don't have bulging, hulk-like muscles.

Except for those with serious hormonal issues, women just don't have the testosterone to build those kind of muscles.
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Red-headed bookworm
11/26/08

@The One: Almost no men look like that naturally, either. Steroids are way too common in the body building world. Plus, looking like that does not equal strength.
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The One
11/26/08

@Red-headed bookworm: Men have more testosterone and are generally more predisposed toward bulking.
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PoisonPixie
11/26/08

In reply to Muscles: Strong Enough For A Man, But Made For A Woman?
Can't a woman be fit and muscular without looking like a roid-raged She-hulk (Jessica B, anyone)? Men body-builders scare me, and the women scare me too...but only because this look is soo extreme, and would never be found in nature from doing good old honest exercise outdoors for example. Bodies like those (belonging to M. Phelps) are what we tend to be attracted to, not this extreme show of vanity and a body pushed to it's breaking point to capture a certain look.
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rosasparks
11/26/08

@PoisonPixie: um, what? Jessica Biel does NOT look like a 'roided body builder. Gimmea break.
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Kali Mama
11/26/08

@PoisonPixie: It's not even a maintainable physique, there is severe dehydration going on a few days before a show to give that "cut" look, and in off season, the body builders take on fat, which makes them look malformed, what which stretched skin where the muscles were, now filled with fat.
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Das ASHloch (achtundsiebzig)
11/26/08

@rosasparks: @andromache is freakin' out, man.: I guess we can go with "fastidiously-measured" :D
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K-spar
11/26/08

@rosasparks: I read it that Jessica Biel is an example of someone picked on for being muscular, not as someone who actually looks like a body builder. Or at least I prefer to read it that way.
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sequined
11/26/08

@K-spar: I read it that way, too.

And I agree with the original comment here that a natural-looking muscular body--one that looks like it comes from doing an activity, rather than devoting one's life to body building--is attractive. On a man or on a woman.
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