This Vox dude is turning out to be a real trip. Of course I always keep in mind that a single, incoherent, poorly written blog article does not speak to the entirety of any particular blogger’s ability–I’m sure I’ve cranked out enough of those to paper at least one wall of my basement. But two of ‘em in a row…that can’t be a good sign.
Voxalicious’s opening words in yesterday’s blog entry, following up his diatribe on the new Battlestar Galactica series:
As long as my masculinity is again being called into question, I suppose it’s as good a time as any to answer a few of the regulars who emailed to ask about what’s been going on in the workout front
What does working out have to do with masculinity..? No idea here; I’ve been working out since I was thirteen years old and I’ve been a girl the whole, entire time. As a matter of fact, that was the year I got my first period..! (TMI, no doubt. Sorry, folks. 
)
particularly about an injury I’d mentioned a while ago. I don’t know if it was age getting the better of me or if it was just my propensity to overtrain, but something deep inside my shoulder had been bothering me for a long time, so I finally listened to Spacebunny and kept my bench under 165 for about a year.
Oh, wait. It’s weightlifting! Oh, well, I’ve only been doing that since I was eighteen. Maybe my gender switched polarities or something in those intervening five years. Of course, that was also the year that I first got knocked up, which makes it difficult to believe.
The rest seems to have helped quite a bit; today was my second heavy lift in over a year and the shoulder held up fine without even a twinge of discomfort. It felt great and everything except the very last rep at 270 went up easily.
No, no, now I get it! He lifts really heavy weights. Much like our sure knowledge that no woman has ever knocked a man out with a pugilistic blow, we also are just as positive that no woman, anywhere, lifts really heavy weights. And if she DID lift heavy weights, they would never be anywhere near as heavy as TWO HUNDRED AND SEVENTY POUN–
Women’s Olympic weightlifting records.
In the 58kg (128lb body weight*) class: 522 lb
In the 69kg (152lb body weight*) class: 605 lb
In the 75+ (165lb+ body weight*) class: 671 lb
*Weightlifters are classed by body weight–not knowing Vox’s body weight, I put up a nice range above for him to fit himself into.
My recommendation: Try defining your masculinity in some other way than based upon how much weight you can lift.
(Previous musings on sexual dimorphism here.)
Given that most people I know who work out are female, I always thought it was a predominantly female activity, one purpose of which is maintaining the ideal female figure as portrayed in the media.
My recommendation: try to quit obsessing about how successfully you’re upholding the gender binary. No one cares.
Given that most people I know who work out are female, I always thought it was a predominantly female activity, one purpose of which is maintaining the ideal female figure as portrayed in the media.
Ah, but the weight room is manly man safe space. In my gym there are usually more women then men total, but the freeweight section is a narcissistic sausagefest. I understand the point of the mirrors, but it’s still creepy to be in that room full of muscular guys checking themselves out. I’ve never been made to feel unwelcome there, but there’s definitely a weird vibe. I stick to the machines.
Pfft, it’s just a little uterine lining, nothing to clutch pearls over. It’s not as though every other fortnight you release a vast cloud of shrieking vampire-bats from your ladyparts.
…one assumes.
“I understand the point of the mirrors, but it’s still creepy to be in that room full of muscular guys checking themselves out.”
Oh yes.. totally agree with you on that, even though I qualify for the “sausagefest” part! Dedicated “muscle” gyms are even worse. I ignored the warning signs once (run-down location, posters of obvious steroid-abusers in the reception lobby etc) and went for a ‘taster’ session in one. Never, ever, again.
It wasn’t that I was made to feel unwelcome at all, and there were (a few, very well defined) women there so it wasn’t all testosterone fuelled, but I just felt deeply uncomfortable even though I was pretty fit at the time.
Each to their own, but the over-developed physiques of male or female bodybuilders doesn’t look healthy to me, and the obvious narcissism is a complete turn-off.
It’s not as though every other fortnight you release a vast cloud of shrieking vampire-bats from your ladyparts.
Er… so that’s not normal?
It’s a waste product released by my body through an orifice, which as far as I’m concerned, makes it something to usually be not mentioned in casual conversation that is unrelated to discussing it directly as an issue in of itself. Same with me pooping, me peeing, etc.
I don’t consider that “pearl-clutching,” but “couth;” of course, we don’t all have to agree.
Great post! Bookmarked for my (male, of course) friend who frequently tells me: women can’t lift blah-blah number of pounds! HAH! Gotcha.
I live for the day when Vox complains online that he’s fallen down and can’t get up, but pats himself on the back because he fell down while he was lifting a really heavy weight.
That day will come. I have no doubt.
‘Couthness’ being one of the watchwords of this blog.
*glances at masthead*
Yeah, that’s the ticket.
But seriously, on this blog I’ve seen no small number of references to waste elimination, and intercourse, and so forth, which nobody deemed worthy of apology. But with anything related to or referencing menstruation there seems to be this pervasive feeling that it is somehow specially awful, as though merely reading about it might cause my testicles to shrivel up and fall off (oops, I alluded to the fact that I have male sex organs, sorry to gross everyone out). Objectively speaking, it’s no worse than sneezing, which involves all sorts of lovely fluids, as well as the possibility of spreading disease, but no one feels weird about that coming up in conversation.
“But seriously, on this blog I’ve seen no small number of references to waste elimination”
But seriously, you really need to provide us with no small number of examples before we can take YOU seriously.
Especially, examples of me talking about me peeing, pooping, etc.
“and intercourse”
Really very, very different from waste elimination…and if you don’t find it so, I’m sorry for you.
“Objectively speaking, it’s no worse than sneezing, which involves all sorts of lovely fluids,”
Sneezing comes in a wide variety of types, from the type that is entirely self-contained and involves the release of no fluids at all, to the (most common) kind that involves a small effluent of saliva (which is not a waste product) that is contained in a hand or Kleenex, to the kind that involves blowing a bucket of snot out. Again–for us to take you seriously here, or at least me, you need to provide an example of where I discuss the snot-blowing sneeze type, which is the only kind that can really be considered as some kind of “waste elimination,” and did not apologize for sharing TMI with the audience.
“Objectively speaking, it’s no worse than sneezing, which involves all sorts of lovely fluids,”
I dunno, if the worst thing I ever found in a filthy women’s room was comparable to a well-used Kleenex, I’d be a happy person. Menstruating is waste elimination, you had some uterine lining, it’s past its expiration date, it needs to go.
Things can be important and also be icky.