Looking Good, Baby.

CNN Style Photo – From CNN.com

Slip into this, Beauty.

There’s the weight of the world, I’ll tell you. The weight of the world.

In the midst of it, we certainly don’t need any discrimination. Standing side-by-side, all-together, would be a much better approach. But. For those of you who think discrimination is overblown, all I can say is that you are probably a White Christian Heterosexual Male. Probably.

In some cases, we have become SO incredibly jaded about discrimination, that we barely even notice it when it stares us in the face.

This morning, in the headlines at CNN, I saw this:
CNN Style: The Unseen Side of New York
The photo which accompanied the headline pictured a lower leg shot of two females’ feet wearing some very female high-heels. (I’ll post it again here.) The heels were about six inches high. These shoes were clearly not constructed for the human anatomy as it was intended. (Neither was the corset, or the chastity belt.) Yet a LOT of women adore these shoes. These are articles which were designed to make their legs look longer, sexier, and much more screw-able, according to the “societal” mores.

We have been told, again and again, that this is glamorous, and incredible, and that we should aspire to this gorgeous look. We have been told by the industries which are governed by men. For years, we have been instructed on the ways we are supposed to look good for them.

Of course, some of you may have noticed that I was out sick that week, and missed the training. Hence the hooded sweatshirts and running shoes. But back to it.

Men don’t wear uncomfortable clothes. Their wardrobes are full of function. Unless, of course, you are a Drag Queen, and then it’s your own damn fault. But here women are, walking around in stilts, tight dresses, and makeup. For the Almighty and Powerful Male.

And if that is what any woman enjoys, I think she should go for it. Or, if that is her dream, her goal, her ambition in life, she should proceed on that path. But for my little brain, it is an age-old, reckless, form of discrimination which I am not cut out for.

At the U.S. Open this week, of course, is how this all filters through. How it all trickles down. The U.S. Open is one of four Grand Slam Events in Tennis, for those of you who are not familiar with it. The tournament is prestigious for these professional players.

So yes, this week, French tennis player Alize Cornet, walked on to the court, and noticed that her shirt was on backward. (Sidebar. This happens to me all the time. I will walk around half the day with my shirt on backward and inside out. When I finally glance in a mirror is when I notice my debacle. I was most likely thinking about something very important while I was getting dressed. Like, why ants can carry between 10 and 50 times their own body weight, and run at a rate of nearly 800 times its body length a minute.). Something like that would certainly distract anyone.

Anyway. Alize Cornet. U.S. Open. Flushing Meadows, NY: So there she is with her shirt on backward. She turns her body away from the crowd, and fixes her shirt, mainly exposing the back of her sports bra.

The Tennis Association handed her a code violation for unsportsmanlike behavior. Fine. If that is how they handle those things. But the male players take their shirts on and off ALL the time during the course of their matches. Without notice, and without being handed a violation.

What’s good for the doggone Gander had better be good for the Goose too.

I say, for one week, make that one month, men should have to wear high heels and dresses. Hose too. Let’s just see how that little experiment goes. On second thought, it is a bad idea. The White House is already crazy enough without this iron in the fire.

Women, if this is how you like to look beautiful, I think you should continue embracing this part of yourselves. But at the same time, also embrace the millions of other ways it is to be beautiful. We each have our own. Women, and men alike.

Alike.

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“It is amazing how complete is the delusion that beauty is goodness.”
― Leo Tolstoy, The Kreutzer Sonata

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“What you do, the way you think, makes you beautiful.”
― Scott Westerfeld, Uglies

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“Jimmy Carter was President the last time I wore a dress.” — Polly C Kronenberger

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