From: kieran@world.std.com (Aaron L Dickey)
Subject: Re: Deep beliefs
Organization: The World Public Access UNIX, Brookline, MA
Date: Wed, 23 Dec 1992 20:38:51 GMT

Susan Harwood Kaczmarczik <amadeus@CCWF.CC.UTEXAS.EDU> writes:

>I don't guess you've ever been hooted at and ogled on the street by
>perfect strangers too often.  Ya know, each time it happens I keep waiting
>for that special inner glow -- that one that tells me that Cindy Crawford
>and I are this close, and I too can soon have my own workout video -- and
>it hasn't come yet.  Must be some defect in my character... or maybe I
>just need a good, well, you know.

Too often?  Try never.  I've been publicly harrassed on the street (and
plenty of other places) quite enough, but mainly because I'm deemed not
attractive *enough*.  That, combined with being almost completely ignored
at social functions, says just as much to me about societal shortcomings
as getting "approving" catcalls.  Perhaps the grass is always greener, but
I'm not so sure...

You don't want to be in a Cindy Crawford-style video anyway.   All the
experts are saying her techniques are physically dangerous. :)

>Oh, that's what it was doing for me!  I see.  Now I welcome those
>catcalls, I really do.

I didn't say you should be happy to put up with such crap, just that the
downside of attractiveness is, IMHO, a small price to pay for all the
doors it opens up in society.

>BTW, I don't consider myself amazingly attractive.  I'm pretty, I have
>(well I did before I had a baby) a nice figure, and I have slightly larger
>breasts than average for my size (except for now, when I could feed
>Somalia without much effort).  It's that latter thing, I think, that has
>contributed to most of the involuntary salutes I've gotten in my life.

You don't have to be *amazingly* attractive, just not "ugly".  As for your
breasts, well, ::ahem::, you're probably right.

>You would rather have people howling at you on the street than get turned
>down for a date?

Honestly, yes.  I would gladly trade the occasional, or even the often,
howls for the howls of unattractiveness and loneliness I have now.

>I agree with you that sexual harrassment works both ways.  But what are
>you angry about?  Which group are you trying to champion here, men or
>not-pretty people?  I think if you look at the numbers, women of all
>levels of attractiveness are still getting discriminated against --
>whether not hired for a job because she's not pretty enough or turned down
>for an opportunity because they need someone smart not pretty, and she
>might be a temptation -- more than men.

I'm trying to champion mainly non-"attractive" people; I was just making
the point that I don't think it's all a matter of men in general being
sexist jerks.  Women do it too, and I think a lot of people overlook that.
 And I don't doubt that women suffer all sorts of job discrimination for
all sorts of reasons; I also know from experience that the exact same
things happen to men, though not as often.

>It's not men so much as it is the system set up by men and, sadly,
>maintained by men.  To say that all men are assholes is just as foolhardy
>as saying all attractive people have it easy.

Well, to a point I agree about the system...I don't think it's quite as
male-dominated as it once was, however.

>(BTW, have you read _The Beauty Myth_?  Some interesting points on this
>very subject...)

That bitch?  I always wondered who she slept with to get into Oxford. :)
Seriously, I haven't read the book (though I've been meaning to), but I
have seen her being interviewed a number of times, and find her take on it
all rather interesting.  I also find it interesting that a number of her
critics attacked her for putting her picture on the back cover (like 90%
of all other book covers aren't printed the same way these days) because
she was "too attractive".   Sometimes you can't win for losing.

--Aaron

Comments: Gated by NETNEWS@AUVM.AMERICAN.EDU