Girls who lift aren't sexy!

I lift weights. I don't aspire to be as lean as ripped as Christmas Abbot. And I won't be, no matter how much I lift, because that doesn't happen accidentally or overnight.

I just don't get why anyone has to say "yuck" or that it's "manly" or "not what men want." That's not just a matter of opinion, it's rude. It's as rude and pointless as people who see me walking my Pekingese and say, "Get a REAL dog." He's just as much a dog as a German Shepherd. And a lean, muscular woman is just as much a woman with softer curves.

Why does EVERYTHING have to come down to whether a woman is "sexy" or not? -_- Oh right, patriarchy.

^^^^ THIS!!!

exactly!! Maybe her goals are not related to whether men find her sexy or not, but whether she can lift enough to do the work that she wants to do. (FTR I think she looks great). There is way more to life and people than sexual attraction.

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(aimed generally, not at the person who posted the above)

re body shaming - a preference is one thing, coming to a thread like this (as some have done) and stating that xyz is not what you prefer is another, and being able to state it without putting others down is a third thing. I have a preference for men to have body hair. Would I go into a thread someone made about a man whose physique they admire and say "I don't think he's sexy because he doesn't have any body hair" or worse, "he looks like a woman because he doesn't have any body hair"? (which isn't my opinion BTW, but I have seen that opinion expressed on this forum and consider it body shaming. A man without body hair is still a man and no more or less manly than any other.).............. having an opinion for one particular body type or characteristic does not give you the right to insult those who have a different type of body (don't even get me started on "real women have curves" and the like.... you can celebrate curvy women without putting down non-curvy women....)

re masculine and feminine - it wasn't until I studied anthropology at university that I realised that so much of what I'd grown up thinking were universal truths, were nothing but cultural norms with no biological reality. A lot of people in the west may consider long hair, make-up, dresses, lack of visible muscles, not displaying physical strength, being softly spoken and so on, to be synonymous with "feminine" - yet this is just culture, not biology. You see the woman in my avatar? Most modern western people would probably say she's not very feminine. However, she would have had her own set of cultural norms which may have included a definition of "feminine" or "female-like" (she's a reconstruction of an actual individual who lived tens of thousands of years ago) and it's highly unlikely that her definition of feminine would have matched the modern western cultural definition. It's more likely that "feminine" by her standards included being strong enough to defend her kids from attack. Some palaeoanthropologists believe that neanderthal women hunted alongside the men, if that's the case then "feminine" may have included the ability to take down a large animal, close range, with a spear. Whatever her cultural definition of feminine was, it was no more or less valid than anyone else's, and there are a myriad different cultures in the world today, never mind the number of cultures that have ever existed, each with their own norms.

Cultural norms are problematic when they constrain people to be a particular way that isn't right for them, or when they lead to some people berating others because they don't fit those norms. Unfortunately most cultures are guilty of this to a lesser or greater extent, and people really need to learn just how much their opinions are the product of their culture, and not universal truths. When you understand that, it's easy to break from from cultural norms that constrain you, and stop constraining others by them, and stop berating people who don't fit them. Going back to muscular women - there is nothing unfeminine about muscular women. If muscle wasn't feminine, women wouldn't have muscles.

Why does EVERYTHING have to come down to whether a woman is "sexy" or not? -_- Oh right, patriarchy.

^^^^ THIS!!!

exactly!! Maybe her goals are not related to whether men find her sexy or not, but whether she can lift enough to do the work that she wants to do. (FTR I think she looks great). There is way more to life and people than sexual attraction.

---

(aimed generally, not at the person who posted the above)

re body shaming - a preference is one thing, coming to a thread like this (as some have done) and stating that xyz is not what you prefer is another, and being able to state it without putting others down is a third thing. I have a preference for men to have body hair. Would I go into a thread someone made about a man whose physique they admire and say "I don't think he's sexy because he doesn't have any body hair" or worse, "he looks like a woman because he doesn't have any body hair"? (which isn't my opinion BTW, but I have seen that opinion expressed on this forum and consider it body shaming. A man without body hair is still a man and no more or less manly than any other.).............. having an opinion for one particular body type or characteristic does not give you the right to insult those who have a different type of body (don't even get me started on "real women have curves" and the like.... you can celebrate curvy women without putting down non-curvy women....)

re masculine and feminine - it wasn't until I studied anthropology at university that I realised that so much of what I'd grown up thinking were universal truths, were nothing but cultural norms with no biological reality. A lot of people in the west may consider long hair, make-up, dresses, lack of visible muscles, not displaying physical strength, being softly spoken and so on, to be synonymous with "feminine" - yet this is just culture, not biology. You see the woman in my avatar? Most modern western people would probably say she's not very feminine. However, she would have had her own set of cultural norms which may have included a definition of "feminine" or "female-like" (she's a reconstruction of an actual individual who lived tens of thousands of years ago) and it's highly unlikely that her definition of feminine would have matched the modern western cultural definition. It's more likely that "feminine" by her standards included being strong enough to defend her kids from attack. Some palaeoanthropologists believe that neanderthal women hunted alongside the men, if that's the case then "feminine" may have included the ability to take down a large animal, close range, with a spear. Whatever her cultural definition of feminine was, it was no more or less valid than anyone else's, and there are a myriad different cultures in the world today, never mind the number of cultures that have ever existed, each with their own norms.

Cultural norms are problematic when they constrain people to be a particular way that isn't right for them, or when they lead to some people berating others because they don't fit those norms. Unfortunately most cultures are guilty of this to a lesser or greater extent, and people really need to learn just how much their opinions are the product of their culture, and not universal truths. When you understand that, it's easy to break from from cultural norms that constrain you, and stop constraining others by them, and stop berating people who don't fit them. Going back to muscular women - there is nothing unfeminine about muscular women. If muscle wasn't feminine, women wouldn't have muscles.