The other day, I was perusing a Victoria's Secret catalog that had come in the mail. The Husband innocently strolled up behind me and caught a glance of the half-nekkid beauties in their skivvies. His eyebrows naturally went up in interest, and I immediately slammed the magazine shut and chastised him for being a man.
It was all in good fun, you see, and he smiled, laughed, and pointed out the fact that I employ a double standard.
Exsqueeze me?
He's right, you see. For the last post recorded on this blog featured a half-nekkid photo of a very attractive, but underage nonetheless, 17-year-old boy. The words written by me were in praise of the boy's glorious nekkidness, and I mooned and swooned verbally for several paragraphs.
Now.
Imagine, if you will, that the tables were turned. If the Husband had a blog (bwaahhh! Sorry, the very idea of that makes me laugh) and he wrote a post discussing several hot, young, underage girls. And let's just say he even put up a picture of one of them in a skimpy bikini. What would be the consequences for him then?
Well, we all know what the consequences would be.
I'd be LIVID. He'd be in so much trouble that I'd be getting flowers and diamonds every week for the next five years. It would be completely unacceptable for a grown man to write about a 17-year-old girl in that way. Is it any less so for a grown woman?
The funny thing is - he has no problem with my mooning over the hot young thang. He encourages it! He figures (rightly) that me getting excited about physicality will ultimately benefit him in some way. And the Twilight books? The female equivalent of literary porn. Totally made me want my husband when I read them, ifyouknowwhatimean. But would I allow him to peruse literature that provides the same reaction for him?
Not in a million years.
All this prompted a very interesting discussion and I feel compelled to put this question to you, dear readers. Why the double standard? Why do men not mind when we read things, watch movies, or fawn over half-nekkid young men? Why are we unable to reciprocate the same privileges to our husbands? Are we wrong? Should they be more outraged? Should we be less insecure?
Discuss.
23 comments:
If Josh had a blog he would do at least one post a week about his favorite sister, Gabie.
No double standard here. If he says, "Salma is hot" then I say, "so is Ewan". Then we have some amazing sex and all is good. What it really comes down to is does the husband respect & honor the wife and does the wife give love & affection to the husband? BTW, I wouldn't worry about your husband seeing the Victoria's Secret catalogue, I would worry about your boys gettin' an eye full of that candy. I finally had to shut down that subscription because my 13 year old was all too eager to get the mail for me. Also, men don't usually need any help getting all hot and bothered so BRING ME SOME OF THAT JACOB!!! Woot woot!
BAHAHHAHA!!! this was so funny to me.
Interesting conundrum.
Now I can feel all self righteous for being a bit disgusted by Jacob's body. For me, it was way too much. I was relieved for the few scenes in which he wore a shirt.
But that doesn't mean I never find myself seeking out Mr. Darcy or for some literary romance either.
I will have to discuss this issue with my own husband.
I always tell Kendon, "I'm so glad I'm the wife not the husband." Usually after he just got in "trouble" for something that I wouldn't think twice about doing! Poor guys.
Curse those VS catalogues and the silly poses the models strike. CURSE THEM!
I hold my husband accountable to the same standards I take in myself. I don't want him oogling over other women, so he's the only one I drool over.
It isn't right that for women it's just fun, but for men it's pornography. In some of my husband's recent meetings they've discussed that pornography problems among women are on the rise. Sad.
Unbelievably I agree with deidra. It's a double standard and probably not appropriate. this from the girl who posted drooling over Zac Efron. Porn for women is just as wrong. Plus, it's in bad taste. Sorry.
Total double standard.
I guess the justification for it is somewhere in my blasted Anthropology textbook that I haven't picked up in ages.
But Hubby and I are both aware of, and okay with, the standard.
A few things come to mind:
1) It's not our fault Chris Weitz choose to have a close up of all 35 of Taylor Lautner's abs and the longest take-the-shirt-off scene ever. Not our fault. We were just witnesses to his choices. (If you haven't seen Jimmy Fallon talk about TLaut's abs, you should. Srsly. http://www.latenightwithjimmyfallon.com/video/clips/taylor_lautner_interview_part_1_111909/1177764 ) And, even funnier and not our fault, the wardrobe choice of "little jean shorts" for the wolfies.
2) Read this article about Twilight and women who love it. The best part "Men feel perfectly comfortable slathering their chests in greasepaint and screaming like half-naked ninnies at football games, but women too often over-explain their passions, apologizing for being too girly or
liking something too trashy. The grown women of "Twilight" will no longer apologize. They will go to those midnight "New Moon" screenings.
But as for telling them how silly they're being, how Edward is not real, how their brains are rotting and their sense of reality is being distorted and this obsession is crazy, just crazy? There's really no need. They already know."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/11/18/AR2009111804145.html?referrer=facebook
3) Thanks for posting a real discussion about serious girl issues. It is appreciated. I always wondered if Baywatch had more male watchers or more female. Ya know?
4) I'm still Team Edward by the way.
I agree there is a double standard. However, I am ok with that because there are inequalities in the other direction as well. Such as, when he takes the girls out to a store and they are whiny or crying, people think to themselves, "that poor dad his hands are full with those little girls. What a great dad to take them out shopping!" While if it were me and that happened it would be, "can't she control her kids? She needs to stop having kids if that is the way she handles them!" The same with how they dress. Once my girls came home and I had not seen them before they left with their dad. They didn't match and looked awful! I asked him to double check them before leaving the house because people think "what was the mom thinking?" So I will take the young hot guy since I'm blamed for other things!
Ryan and I are allowed to look and we even discuss who you think is attractive or not. At the end of the day we still want each other over anyone, so it works :)
It does seems funny though that it is a double standard. Cuz it is.
I COMPLETELY agree! I freak out if a Victoria's Secret commercial comes on TV and he doesn't turn his head! But I'm TOTALLY allowed to look at half-nekkid 17-year old boys.
Women are just more mature...my good friend always says that men are way to immature for their male anatomy....
Reading Twilight totally made me want my husband, but I'm not sure a picture of a nekkid beauty would have the same effect on him.
Double standard or not, it's the way it has to be!
No double standard in my house. I drool over Jacob (have been and always will be TEAM JACOB!!) and my husband just rolls his eyes at me. My husband shares a house with 45 other (mostly married) guys because he is based on a totally different coast from which we live (he's an airline pilot). I'm quite certain some magazines a little more offensive than a VS catalog has made its way into that house. If I spent my time worrying about whether or not he saw any porn or looked at a Maxim magazing (or even a playboy), I'd be a miserable mess the entire time he was gone.
Just as I love to drool over Jacob, at the end of the day the only arms I want around me are my husband's. He can drool over those half (or entirely) nekkid girlies as long as I'm the one his arms are around each night as we fall asleep.
I trust my husband explicitly and I understand that I cannot ask him to turn off his instinctive primal tendencies any more than he can ask me to turn off mine.
And yes, reading the Twilight Books (and watching the movies) definately had some positive benefits for my husband. (hubba hubba!!) LOL!!
I'm glad you acknowledge your pedophilia...
I laughed at the, "He figures that me getting excited about physicality will ultimately benefit him in some way."...because as I read the Twilight books I used to joke about how we should *ahem* tear up the furniture, etc. My husband supported my reading those books.
This post was so spot on. It really is a double standard...
To be honest, though...to me it is evident that your saying that you lust Jacob, or Mr. Darcy or 007 is meant to be funny. I have never thought you really and truthfully lust after them.
It's called-THEY want to get SOME so whatever it takes.....we just don't feel the same way. Dang it for them! LOL
we totally win. because it's okay for me to drool over denzel AND halle. he can only drool over halle. in some ways, it's totally a woman's world.
There is a double standard but it is because millions of men before him blew it for your husband. There are way too many pedophiles, rapists and just your typical sleezy old men that have made it not okay for them to comment on young women.
My husband loved it when I watched Sex and the city (the movie) because it definitly put me in the mood. He doesn't need any help getting in the mood. I joke that if I climb into bed and my toe accidently touches his foot--he thinks I just came onto him. I'm not safe.
I was actually thinking about that the other day. Very interesting... I don't think there should be a double standard.
I want to read the post you post when you discover VS catalogs hidden in your boy's room. Then it becomes a triple standard.
I haven't read the comments, but I think the double standard is b/c they are visual and we, as a rule, are not. So much. That's what I tell myself, anway. ;-)
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