Differing Sensibilities
A lot of women find this kind of thing sexy. I do not; I think it's sweet and cute, but not sexy. I guess I just don't get it. I prefer stuff like this and this. Oh, and this. :)
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About
I'm Clancy Ratliff, an associate professor in the Department of English at the University of Louisiana at Lafayette, where I am also the Assistant Director of First-Year Writing. I'm married with three children.
See my vita to find out more about where I've been and what I've done.
Email me: clancy.ratliff, gmail
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Clancy Ratliff.
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Comments
what's sexy
Let's see: one upside down, one with guns, and one with claws. Clancy says: "Two out of three hot boys carry implements of destruction!"
Fellas, don't show up with flowers, whatever you do.
and entrances are everything...
so, walk in on the ceiling carrying dangerous things?
Got it!
Want to be my therapist?
Ugh. The more I look at these images, the more disturbed I get. The one image of a real man in a real-life situation is the one I don't like. It's an image that doesn't appeal to any consumer-culture values, really, and as a feminist I should be attracted to this one; in this moment, anyway, this man is demonstrating egalitarian behavior with regard to childrearing. And he is a handsome man, to be sure. So why do I like the others so much better? Torill says it's because I'm not ready for a protector/nurturer (presumably the thing about the image that many women like), but would rather have a warrior. :-) But seriously: I feel no more enlightened than men who consume a lot of pr0n, as far as the real v. fantasy thing is concerned.
Edited to add more depravity:
They're shameless capitalists, yet still I swoon.
Rana
My take on it is that yeah, the guy with the baby is cute and all, but he's not _my_ guy, with _my_ baby. As such, he doesn't trigger the "ooh, sexy" vibe at all.
On the other hand, the things I _do_ find sexy about my guy tend to mystify both of us, so what do I know?
OK, Now I'm Grossed Out
Torill's got some good points re warrior/nurturer, but I'll hasten to point out that the two roles ain't necessarily exclusive. I'll also say, Clancy, that fantasy's fine and good, and hell, there are reasons we go to the movies, and much of those reasons have to do with hot boys and hot girls. I'd suggest, in response to Torill, that most folks know the difference between dreaming about hot, hot Hugh Jackman as Wolverine and dreaming about My Significant Other Holding the Baby -- and they're entirely different categories. Case in point: went to see "Hellboy" with a good friend recently. Her verdict, on leaving the movie: "Oh my God, it was the tail." Now, would you be as "disturbed" if you'd admitted to finding tails hot?
What's interesting, perhaps, is the way in which consumer culture makes it a little bit creepy for us to declare a "civilian" hot, but perfectly acceptable to speak our naughty fantasies about celebrities. Note the care with which the original commenter declared the baby-holding husband hot. God forbid I should ever admit that Jill Walker's new smiling picture makes my heart skip a beat or two, but it'd be just fine (albeit sadly predictable) for me to say the same thing about Michelle Pfeiffer.
But then, as far as I know, Michelle Pfeiffer doesn't keep a brilliant and deeply insightful weblog, which is maybe where it gets a little weird. Because attraction works on a bunch of different levels, which is part of the reason that most of us think it's perfectly acceptable for Clancy to find Hugh Jackman hot: she doesn't know him. If you do a "who's hot" post of your blogroll, things are gonna get weird, quick-like, for the very same reasons that lots of blog boys have crushes on you, Clancy (c'mon: checked your Orkut profile lately?), and on Jill: attraction acts in the way that physics describes a gas, expanding to fill the available space, and going quickly beyond the looks.
But really, Clancy, I gotta say: two money-hungry boys who take cartoon characters as their role models? Yish.
Cartoon characters
Hey, to be fair, everyone on "The Apprentice" had to answer that question about the cartoon characters. :)
Oh yes, give me those archetypes, baby!
I have to say that I understand Clancy perfectly well, and don't get worried about her choices at all. OK, so my fantasy images are probably way more disturbing than just guys carrying guns and walking upside down. After all I spent a year in a relationship to a fanatically mad neuter serpent metamorphosed into a human male by divine intervention while I was in the body of a psychotic, kinslaying elf.
The way I see it, this is not about reality but about archetypes. The man with the child isn't "my man with a child", it is a man with a child. The super-heroes are the ultimate alpha males, caught within reach of human ambition. Spider man is shown in the tender moment when he is vulnerable, and even Wolverine isn't caught slashing his way through bloodsplatter and metal sheets, but in between, a moment of rest, the truth of him exposed but still human enough to be vulnerable. As for the money-guys: that one is simple. They are actual fleshworld people who have ultimate survival skills, and that's what alpha females want!
And oh yeah, both Jill and Clancy are hot, brainy chicks, flaunting their intelligence and their looks online, their net presence extensions of their offline presence, but having a crush on their online presence is having a crush on the ultimate brainy chick, the one who has it all: body, brain and survival skills - displayed through their carefully and skillfully edited presentations. We even admire that skill of editing which lets us see them as clear archetypes rather than dull, everyday people.
So what is the problem? It would be pretty desperate if we had this clear image of one real life human being we wanted to meet: one sexy accountant that we had to find in the billions inhabiting earth. Fantasy is there for us to look for in the real life human beings we encounter. Me, I have always looked for the touch of madness combined with the more-than-human gentleness my character loved in the mad priest of Dragon Realms, and I have found it, loved and lived with it.
Torill