Comment 1

Hello,

Thank you for writing about muscularity and masculinity! I find this topic very interesting ever since I watched the documentary "Tough Guise 2" by Katz. I highly recommend the documentary as it has an immense amount of information for this exact topic. I have a few comments on the matter that I hope might be useful to you. What I find most interesting about muscularity and media is that muscles were not as important, say, 10 years ago as it is today. In present time, actors are EXPECTED to have chiseled abs, which, from my own experience, is incredibly difficult to achieve. One must cut out sugar, simple carbs, high fat foods, etc. in order to achieve such a physique. In addition, the time one must spend in the gym is completely incompatible for non-actors who have full time jobs and outside work chores and errands. I think that we forget that actors are paid to look the way they look and thus, men in society have a lot of pressure to look a certain way, even if it is unattainable for the average human without supplements, steroids, and crazy dedication to the gym. Again, I highly recommend Tough Guise and Tough Guise 2 for your research! Lastly, If I were to offer any advice (other than the two documentaries) I would like to know how certain racial groups are more effected than others or how those with low socio-economic status are at a disadvantage and essentially cannot attain such a goal. Another thought is, how does this effect those with physical disabilities, does it create more discrimination than already exists?