Inkwell: Authors and Artists

    

I would like to note that there are two television shows I have seen this
year that feature very appealing overweight female characters.  The lead
females on "Ed" and "The Gilmore Girls" are beautiful thin women (of course),
but the female sidekick on "Ed" is overweight, and there are THREE beloved
female cast members on "The Gilmore Girls" -- including Liz Torres and Sally
Struthers, who both made their names as sexy (more or less) ingenues 20-30
years ago.
  

    
David and Jon are right - men are not exempt.  But I'll tell you, I
was in L.A. last weekend (I live in Northern California now, and I
always feel like Margaret Mead when I'm in L.A., observing the mores of
the natives), and I saw many men who were not conventionally
attractive with gorgeous women.  I mention this because although men do
feel the pressure to look a certain way (just go into a bar and see
how the women immediately flock to the "hot" guys), normal-looking or
even not-very-attractive men will still find women who will love them
for more than how they look, or be more open-minded about what defines
"attractive."  

Now, reverse the situation.  Do you ever see a very attractive man
with a homely looking woman?  If so, don't people comment on it as
unusual?  I saw this once and someone asked, "Is he really WITH her, or
are they just friends?" to which someone else replied, "I'm sure
they're just friends."  

This is where, to my mind, the situation is different for men and
women.  The pressure is on a much higher level for women. It's like, no
one could possibly be romantically intereted in a
less-than-conventionally-attractive woman.  (And for more on this and
when we first learn this message:  see the chapter in my book called
"Thunder Thighs" - we internalize these attitudes VERY early on!)

That said, David's insights apply to both men and women: our culture
DOES prejudge ALL people based on appearance.  And although 47+ years
seems like a long time, kudos to David for taking a cold, hard look at
our ignorance and prejudice.  Maybe I should start hanging out with the
47+ crowd - if you're all that grounded, I'm dumping all my twenty-
and thirtysomething friends TODAY.
  

    
David, I used to work as a network executive (temporary psychosis),
and while I think it's great that we're seeing different body types on
TV (and I don't just mean the fact that we start out seeing one body
type - like Jennifer Aniston on "Friends" first season - and end up
with another - like Jennifer Aniston on "Friends" 30 pounds lighter a
few seasons later!), I'm not so sure how I feel about the larger women
we're seeing on TV.  

The overweight James Gandolfini on "The Sopranos" has sex with lots of
attractive women, and is clearly not hindered by his not-so-perfect
body in that department, but the Molly character on "Ed" is the asexual
sidekick.  In fact, several episodes have had storylines in which she
doesn't get the guy because of the way she looks, or the guy really
liked the more attractive, thin Carol first, and the guy had to be
CONVINCED by Carol to ask Molly out. Or the guy only saw Molly as a
friend, whereas Molly thought it was a date.  All the insulting
stereotypes of overweight women.  
  

    
Linda - you just described not just my childhood growing up in L.A.,
but my entire last weekend in L.A.  And my last trip to NYC. Same sick
environment.

Here's an interesting tangent on L.A.  While doing publicity for my
book, the "L.A. ethos" came up at a book signing.  Soon the entire room
was ragging on L.A.  So I asked, "Okay, but if you could choose
between looking like you, or looking like those women in L.A., which
would you choose?"  And almost everyone laughed because deep down, they
still want to look like those L.A. women.  It's still a cultural
fantasy, no matter where you live in the U.S.  We may be happier not
living in that environment, but there's still an element of... I don't
know... glamorizing what it might be like to be "beautiful" - at least
in the way society defines beauty.  It's not logical, which makes these
issues so complex.
  

    

>the Molly character on "Ed" is the asexual sidekick.  In fact, several
>episodes have had storylines in which she doesn't get the guy because of the
>way she looks, or the guy really liked the more attractive, thin Carol
>first, and the guy had to be CONVINCED by Carol to ask Molly out. Or the guy
>only saw Molly as a friend, whereas Molly thought it was a date.  All the
>insulting stereotypes of overweight women.

Yeah, I hear ya.  But the guy who went out with her toward the end of the
season seemed to be interested in her on her own merits.

Still, I take your point.

"The Gilmore Girls" is a much better show in every way, and the romance be-
tween the chef and the produce guy seems pretty wholesome to me.
  

    
Figured I'd jump on board here, too - work? Who needs it...

Lori - I read your book a few months ago, and just wanted to do the
typical gush-thing and say I loved it. I didn't go thru most of it, but
I certainly empathized none-the-less. It also encouraged me to start
my own journal again, for which I'm incredibly grateful.

A few posts ago, you asked if anyone is ever relieved that they are
the thinnest in the room. This made me smile with guilt; I had a
conversation over the weekend that went down this path. I had been
commenting that in the goth "subculture," most of the women are
overweight, and most of the men are toothpicks. The guilty smile comes
from the fact that I tend to be one of the thinner goths around, even
tho according to "conventional" wisdom, I'm quite large. I know it
certainly gives me an ego boost to walk into a room and think "I am NOT
the heaviest one here!" - and it saddens me that I still have that
reaction.

Along this same line, I will admit that I enjoy shopping at stores
like Lane Bryant and Avenue; yes, partly because the clothes fit, but
also because the smallest sizes are often too large. (It is such a nice
feeling to have something fall off of you, and it's the smallest size
available. Again, it saddens me that I feel that way.) 

Along that line of thought, I wanted to toss out a general question:
do you [all of you] suppose that the reason 'cute clothes' only come in
'cute' sizes is some sense of wanting to shame larger women into guilt
and dieting? It baffles me - there is obviously a market for cute
clothes outside the Size 6 chart range, yet they don't exist. Why?


Okay, I should pay attention to work now.
-Kelly
  

    
(Just want to mention, parenthetically, that those homely men with
attractive women usually have either money or power, or so it's seemed to
me. And I have seen attractive men with less attractive women, and yes, it
does surprise me. I often figure there's a catch... like money or
power. So am I shallow, or is it true that money and power are
aphrodisiacs?)
  

    
Pretty reliable ones.  But not the only ones.
  

    
They're aphrodisiacs, but with a very short half-life.
  

    
David, I'm gonna check out "The Gilmore Girls."  

Jon: The sad thing is, power is attractive in men only, for the most
part.  Women with power are often seen as threatening or masculine, no
matter what they look like. I know men who consciously avoid women with
power, who call them "chicks with dicks," and other oh-so-flattering
monikers.  And in the office, men can pull "power trips" - yelling at
co-workers, etc. (heck, they're even PROMOTED for these tantrums --
"strong management skills"), while women who do this are called
four-letter words that start with "c."  Or if a woman uses this yelling
tactic, inevitably a man in the office will roll his eyes and whisper
to a co-worker, "Boy, SHE sure needs to get laid."

So if we see a very attractive woman with a not-so-attractive guy,
maybe we chalk it up to "power."  But if we see a not-so-hot woman with
a very attractive guy, most of us are baffled.  I mean, if it's not
her power and it's not her looks, what does he see in her?  Wit,
personality, intelligence, creativity -- these qualities alone couldn't
POSSIBLY be enough to attract a man, could they?  
  

    
Kelly, thanks for being so honest! This is what happens at my book
signings - one brave woman unleashes a few female dirty little secrets
and admits to the un-P.C. way of thinking, and BAM! The second floor at
Borders has turned into the set of "Jerry Springer"!  Suddenly
EVERYONE'S going around the room yelling out how they REALLY feel -
it's such a catharsis, in an oddly absurd way.  I actually cancel my
therapy sessions on weeks I do book signings.

About clothes sizes: I was doing Table Talk last month (am I allowed
to say that here - or is it like the Crips and the Bloods with online
communities?) and one woman said that she saw a cute outfit in a
catalogue, called the store in L.A. to order a size 10 (this woman is
apparently tall and proportionate - not heavy), and was told that the
boutique only carried up to a size 8.  Not that they were OUT of the
size 10; that they didn't CARRY any sizes about size 8.  So no, "cute"
clothes don't come in normal sizes.

Now, I'm a size, like, negative something (I'm 5'2" and
mistaken-for-a-teenager tiny), and I recently tried on a pair of pants
at a funky store in Venice Beach, only to learn I wear a size LARGE. 
Which begs the question: who in the *&&^%$* is wearing a size SMALL? 
Calista Flockhart's baby?
  

    
btw, Kelly, glad my book inspired you to keep journals again. A lot of
people have written to say the same thing.  One person even sent me
her journals, which, it turned out, were about me and what she thought
of my book. I wanted to write back and say that journals are supposed
to be private, but I'd just PUBLISHED mine, so I knew that wouldn't
fly.  I think the rule is: private or published is okay, but not sent
to strangers who star in the entries.

A few weeks later, I wrote a piece for Salon on memoir and stalkers. 
Her journals were not mentioned in the piece, but guess what I got in
the mail the next week?

btw, the Goth scene fascinates me.  Did you ever read Sarah Vowell's
essay, "American Goth"?
  

    

If I see a very attractive man with a not-so-attractive woman, my first
thought (when not in LA) is, they must have grown up together, so he is
still able to see her as she was back when she was cute.  Catty, no?  When
in LA, I assume money and/or power.

There was a time when I prided myself on being the thinnest in the room,
back in the olden days when I was under thirty.  Thinnest and cutest - at
least if the men were older.  I remember with some chagrin one bitchy
thought I had at a party I attended with a very attractive older man when
an attractive blonde was giving him the eye:  Oh, she must be over thirty,
I can see that her arms are starting to flab.  I haven't got a thing to
worry about.  And I tossed my hair and grinned in a vastly superior
fashion.

O, I am paying for that now, in a karmic sort of way.  Now I attend
parties in my baby-whale-shaped way, wearing clothes in sizes that are
shocking, and watch the cute young girls and the muscled young men, all
smooth and without a dimple or a sag and I get to find out what it was
like when the tables were turned.
  

    
What a great discussion -- tons of insight here! 

Castle, there's something you said a few posts up about your mother:
"...it seems like the pressure coming from my mother to lose weight
started around puberty, as if she were attempting to refute my
development, nip those curves right in the bud." 

I'm not surprised about this in some ways -- Lori, in your journals,
it seems like you began hearing some of the messages about losing
weight around the time you hit puberty. 

I'm wondering something here: is there a kind of desire of female role
models or mothers to keep their girls girls, rather than see them
become women? I'm looking for the right word here -- I'd say that it's
as though they want to emasculate their daughters, but the word I'm
looking for would be to e-feminate the girls. 

Does this somehow tie into the power dynamic as well?

Taking this a step further, in the whole LA dynamic you've been
describing, where thin women are perceived as more powerful (or are
more revered) -- I wonder if this power struggle gets internalized or
turned against the female body. The fewer curves you have (and
possibly, the less zaftig, feminine, curvy female you are), the higher
your position in the society. 
  

    
I think thin women are often perceived as more powerful--being thin
carries the notion that women have power over their own desires, their
surroundings, the people they are with, etc.

I have noticed in many cultures (I've never been to LA) the sort of
"gospel of thinness" where if a woman is thin/seems to control her
intake of food carefully, people attribute all sorts of other kinds of
strength and discipline to her; they'll ask her how she has such a
great family life, or how her house stays so beautiful, how her
finances stay so in control, etc., even if they don't really know
anything about her. 

I am attracted to the idea of e-feminization (which I think of as
de-feminization), too, since it seems so conflicted: do the mothers
restrict their daughters diets (if they do) because they want to
control the daughters' bodies, or because they are interested in
controlling the daughter's desires? 

I have known some women who were eating cookies over the sink not
because they were concerned about eventual weight gain (anyone with a
brain knows that cookies are equally caloric no matter where you
consume them) but because it's somehow unladylike to do it at the table
like a real person. When I eat cookies over the sink, am I agreeing
that I don't really deserve to eat as much as everyone else, as nicely
as everyone else, as openly as everyone else, or in as much comfort as
everyone else? 

More risky, am I also saying my actions are just as real, just as
valid, or just as important as the actions of everyone else at the
table? 
  

    

I see the mothers' motivations as more primitive than wanting to control
their daughters' bodies or their desires:  I think they want to keep them
from being competition for their father's desires or from the desires of
other men, rendering the mother powerless in the face of the new,
desirable female.
  

    
I have to say, I see my own weight issues as reflective of my strength of
will (and ergo strength of character).  If I am controlling my intake of
unhealthy foods, and exercising sufficiently, then I am living the
disciplined life I would like to live; if not, not.

So it makes sense to project these same things on the people I see, no?
  

    
I guess it makes sense, but is it fair or accurate? Only if you can
guarantee that others have the exact same degree of difficulty keeping
themselves slim and the exact same level of desire to reduce/stay at
your idea of a good weight for them?

It seems to me that you are projecting your own idea of the right
weight for them, not your idea of discipline; people have their own
ideas of what constitutes discipline. I find myself judging people
whose surroundings are untidy as undisciplined, or people who are often
late or unable to keep commitments. Does that mean they are not
"living the disciplined life" you refer to above?  
  

    

Hey, I'm describing the behavior, not excusing it :^)

We just need to be reminded of this phenomenon and taught not to judge
everyone by our own standards.
  

    
Lori - your book signings sound like they must be fun. Is there a list
where one can view where you'll be next? 

Re: journalwriting. Well, I started mine back up when my husband and I
split apart. I figured I needed to write to keep sane; I had just read
your book and figured, if nothing else, perhaps I might like to see
what I was thinking, someday when. (A few weeks later, another friend
read your book at my insistence, then my journal and told me "do like
her - publish it!" - but I digress.) Anyhow, you mentioned it was weird
to read something where you were central to the journal; my husband
probably empathizes well, as he just read mine over the weekend. 

As for clothes - my god, size 10 isn't considered "normal" anymore, by
clothing retailers?! Sheeesh - and I felt old for remembering when
size 14 belonged in the "normal" part of the store, not the "plus"
area.

I got into a good rant the other day on another 'board, talking about
clothing sizes and how you cannot pick up two pieces of clothing in the
same size and have them fit. (Or, if you've got my luck, an XL will be
too tight in one brand, but fall off you in another.) Another poster
pointed out that the weird sizes had to do with the way clothes were
mass cut...


Dan: I don't know if it makes sense to project that onto the people
you see; in fact, I would suspect it kind of unhealthy. If you equate
eating healthily with being thin, you could very easily feed someone
elses insecurities (anorexia comes to mind).

Then again, it does take serious willpower to diet. (Big dramatic
sigh.) I really want to lose this last 50 pounds or so, and that means
exercise and trying to "eat right" - I wish my eyes and tummy agreed on
what right is.  ;-)

-Kelly
  

    
Oh, Lori - I've not read Sarah Vowells essay, but would be interested
to. I did a quick search of Salon and determined it's not (easily
found) there - tho, did you know in a topic search, your name is right
under the "Goth" topic? 

Is the essay published in her recent book?

As far as goth culture goes, I'll admit I'm "on the outside" - I don't
go for the bats and spiders thing, personally.  ;-)

-Kelly
  

    

 re 23:  yes, I do -- the response tends to stop the neurotic kind
of talk and move to what's important. It might very well move to
something that has some content - for example, the response might
be "I know, but I'd feel so much better if I'd get back to running/
biking/whatever", and that's actually something a friend can help
in talking about, finding time, going together, etc..

But I have to add that as a mother of teenagers (boys, thanks god,
because as they'll explain matter-of-factly, "Girls don't eat."), I'm
appalled by the current obsession with thinness among young girls
(having nothing to do with LA or New York). It seems to me that I grew
up in a time when a girl's looks were all she was judged by(though there
was no such thing as a size 0), and then feminism got us away from
that for quite some time... and here it is back again, full force.

I haven't had the opportunity to read your book, but I'd be curious to
know, in terms of society, if you track trends in this, and how it relates
over the past 30-40 years to the entry of women into positions of
power and their capability to live independent of men.
  

    
>having nothing to do with LA or New York

If these girls and their peers watch TV, go to the movies, read magazines,
or see advertising, it's got something to do with LA and New York IMO.
  

    

What size *is* considered "normal" now?

Are 5-7-9 Shops still in business?
  

    
(topic title adjustment by special request)