Friday, May 05, 2006
Hot Beef Injections
I see a lot now that I don't have classes. Yesterday, one of the things I saw was a commercial for Burger King. In said commercial, a man bursts into song while seated at lunch with his girl, singing, "I am man, hear me roar," which quickly turned into an entreaty towards the pure masculinity of BK's latest artery clogger. As a gathering army of men sang the praises of unbridled grease and meat and decried the eggy oppression of quiche, the symbols of masculinity gathered around them: the destruction of minivans, men pulling trucks with their bodies alone, and beautiful women in skimpy clothes holding burgers on platters. Shakes goes into this in detail.
I couldn't help but think back to those ads for Hungry Man dinners a few years back, the ones that featured men who ate "light" being blown away by a stiff breeze. These ads eventually reached their apotheosis by boasting about how the meals offered one pound of food. No health information, no talk about whether the food was tasty. Nope, just the fact that it was one pound of food.
This is why no one takes health seriously in this country. This is why, despite all the talk about nutrition and healthy eating, I could still get a burger and fries for less than a salad at my high school. It's because people believe that they will be ridiculed for being healthy. American culture has devised this idea that it is "unmanly" (and if it's unmanly to balloon up to 300 pounds and have a coronary, then by all means, cut off my tallywhacker) to diet, and advertisers are latching onto it and flogging it like a lame horse. It's enabling a gradual personal destruction and making ready use of culturally-engrained sexism at once! Hooray!
You wanna know what strength is when it comes to a diet? Not what "maleness" is, and not what "masculinity" is, but what "strength" is. Strength is keeping your body healthy-- indulging every once in a while, hell, indulging as often as you want, but while knowing that what you are doing is not healthy, and that you can take steps to correct it through eating right and exercising a bit.
It's not bolting down mass-produced beef because you're afraid you have a tiny penis.
I couldn't help but think back to those ads for Hungry Man dinners a few years back, the ones that featured men who ate "light" being blown away by a stiff breeze. These ads eventually reached their apotheosis by boasting about how the meals offered one pound of food. No health information, no talk about whether the food was tasty. Nope, just the fact that it was one pound of food.
This is why no one takes health seriously in this country. This is why, despite all the talk about nutrition and healthy eating, I could still get a burger and fries for less than a salad at my high school. It's because people believe that they will be ridiculed for being healthy. American culture has devised this idea that it is "unmanly" (and if it's unmanly to balloon up to 300 pounds and have a coronary, then by all means, cut off my tallywhacker) to diet, and advertisers are latching onto it and flogging it like a lame horse. It's enabling a gradual personal destruction and making ready use of culturally-engrained sexism at once! Hooray!
You wanna know what strength is when it comes to a diet? Not what "maleness" is, and not what "masculinity" is, but what "strength" is. Strength is keeping your body healthy-- indulging every once in a while, hell, indulging as often as you want, but while knowing that what you are doing is not healthy, and that you can take steps to correct it through eating right and exercising a bit.
It's not bolting down mass-produced beef because you're afraid you have a tiny penis.
