Gym Rats

[katzgar]

Please know that what I am about to say is in no way meant to be offensive. It is the opposite. I simply want to make a case for empathy and understanding.

A person caring about their appearance, having vanity, or even thinking they are "better looking" than others, does not make them a bad person. Looks are subjective, but people who pursue a specific, subjective, standard of beauty, do not by default assume those who don't are lesser than they are. I do not believe the wrestler, "The Rock," thinks he's a better person than Albert Einstein was for obviously being stronger than he was. Likewise, Albert Einstein has many quotes attributed to him saying he believed him being smarter at physics does not make him a better person than anyone else (in fact, he regretted how his work led to the creation of the atomic bomb, and wished he had been a watch maker instead).

People want something - anything - that makes them either special or worth something. "Worth" - that's the keyword, people want some attribute to them that gives them validation in being worth something as a human being. People pursue this value in multiple ways - some try to be "holier," some try to be nicer, some try to be richer, and some try to be better looking or stronger.

Pursuing looks is just for many people their way of being "worth" something. Is it wrong? Yes, but not because they are evil, bad, or mean, but because they are misled. For many women, they often times have no choice but to pursue this subjective metric, simply because they lack opportunities from an unfair, patriarchal, system. Things are changing, but for many, especially historically, there haven't been many job opportunities for them, and their best chance at survival - yes, survival - was to make themselves as "good looking" as possible, so as to attract the richest man they could, so she and her children could survive and have opportunities. This is why I'm hesitant to judge "gold diggers" - they're only doing what society tells them to do.

Men on the other hand, are often vilified for attempting to mold their appearance into a beauty standard. After all, many people say - they aren't being judged by society for their appearance, so why are they trying to be an Adonis? They are called insecure, and when I google "insecure men," I get, not definitions of an insecure man - but the definition of a psychopath.

I have seen the word "narcissism" thrown around haphazardly. In one class discussion of mine, I had heard classmates call those with eating disorders "narcissists." To me, the very idea that someone who was mentally ill to the point of literally starving themselves to death, was a "narcissist," was mind boggling. Furthermore, in a discussion on mental health, it was dangerously out of place.

I am not a health or mental health professional, but I do know that when I look up the diagnosis for Narcissistic Personality Disorder, one of the criteria is a lack of empathy. A person can be the vainest person ever, and even have a superiority complex, and still have empathy. This is why you should be careful when calling someone a "narcissist."

I think it is a remnant of the patriarchal - and homophobic - past, that men who want be "better looking" are considered lesser, and even evil, beings. It is all rooted in the idea that men being "pretty" is wrong. Going back to the metrics people often use to assign worth to themselves - holiness, niceness, wealth, and appearance - many young men in today's society (especially gay men) now feel appearance may be their only metric with which they can possibly have worth. Let's examine why:

Holiness - religion is now declining in the west. Being a virgin isn't exactly something people are bragging about nowadays.

Niceness - I think we all know the saying "nice guys finish last" is rooted in reality. Yes, thankfully there are those who value niceness in men, but if you want to make the case that popular culture celebrates it above the other metrics, good luck with that, and for many men and women, being nice doesn't exactly give them our third metric, wealth.

Wealth - how many men get rich through being nice? Yeah, keep counting. In today's economy, many are now waking up to the bitter realization that George Carlin was right when he said you have to be asleep to experience the American dream. Most of the American and European factory jobs that gave men a decent standard of living with little education and experience have now been outsourced to the global south, where jobs once touted as proof that anyone can "pull themselves up by their bootstraps" are now being done by overworked, underpaid workers. We now have a service-based economy, and in the US, a low minimum wage. There are people in the US who are working full time who literally need welfare to prevent themselves from starving to death. Education is always touted as the answer, yet it comes at the cost of unbearable student loan debt, that one can't even declare bankruptcy on.

Which brings us to appearance. For many boys and young men, this, in their minds, is the only thing that can give them some sort of "worth." Religion has declined, they get trampled and bullied if they're nice, they have no hope of building wealth, but - even if they aren't born with features that are subjectively considered good looking, they can, possibly, go to the gym and become stronger, and even have a body that people might say is beautiful.

This does not make them narcissists. This does not make them have no empathy. This is their way or attaining some sort of worth. This is, of course, wrong, but it is a fault of society, not a fault of a young impressionable mind that has been born into a world with no higher purpose, a dog-eat-dog world, and a disgusting economic system that has ROBBED the younger generation of a future and DESTROYED the planet in the process.

With that said, I would also like to say that no one owes you their body or a relationship.

I get that body builders are seeking attention but wonder if they can give attention