Nose jobs. Tummy tucks. Botox. Breast implants. Fad diets. Historically, most of the pressure to look a particular way to be considered beautiful and sexy has been put on women. But according to an article by Clarissa Sebag-Montefiore at Aeon, men are starting to feel the heat, as well.
From the article:
Images of this hyper-sexualised, commodified male are everywhere, from Hollywood films to glossy magazines and billboard advertising. British journalist Mark Simpson calls them ‘spornosexuals,’ men who want to look like sportsmen or porn stars, chiselling their physiques through a cocktail of gym sessions, diets and drugs. The spornosexual has evolved from the ‘metrosexual’, a term Simpson popularised in the 1990s. While the metrosexual puffs and preens, the spornosexual sculpts. Aesthetics trump sports or performance. And for the first time in history, the buff and the beautiful can spread their bodies to the world instantaneously via Instagram, Twitter and Facebook.
Ironically, women aren’t even pushing for hyper-muscular guy physiques — in one study described in the article, men consistently overestimated how much muscle women found attractive. Bulking up seems to be a phenomenon created by guys to show off for other guys.
Tell me what you think — have you changed something about yourself for the sake of beauty?
(And you can read the whole thing at Aeon.)