Be Excellent To Each Other

Stunning competition or an anachronism?


So, discuss.

As the ugly birds on BBC Breakfast are getting ratty with the hot law chick

for entering a competition.

We're back to my pet peeve of people getting offended on behalf of other people. The ugly people union (or whatever they were called) were protesting a similar event at a university somewhere. A few overzealous arts students destined to become till operators and shelf stackers complaining that some other, more attractive students (as a contestant put it) "wanted to feel glamorous for a night".

I fail to see how judging on beauty is any different from judging people on any other talent. I could train my entire life, I'm not going to be as good a left winger as Joe Cole. Therefore surely anything he gets for being good at football should come to me as well? Of course not. He's making the most of one of his "god given" traits and so are these women.

Nutty PC chick made me angry, then sad, just like most stuff these days. State of the nation, etc.

FLAWLESS VICTORY!

There were a couple of things on the BBC News last night that made me want to kill as well. There are probably more appropriate threads.

I don't watch it personally or like wathing it and I don't know many people who do. It's not entertaining or anything imo-

BUT: By gods let them do it-I would! People who moan about it are just jealous normally about it all. Each to their own, you don't like it-don't have anything to do with it

Mars not so lucky.



Malc

I agree, people don't complain about other random stuff like pie-eating contests or welly-wanging. There's soooooo much jealousy and self-loathing in those women. I wish to give them all a hug... well, not ALL of them, some of them probably smell

It's not about everyone being equal or "getting offended on behalf of someone else", Duds. It's about it being a bad idea to promote the mindset that women are ornaments whose primary function is to look pretty for the benefit of somebody else.

The flaw in the "footballer" analogy is that Joe Cole is actively applying his skills, imposing his will on the opposition if you like. A beauty pageant contestant is utterly passive, just putting themselves forward to be judged. To me, that's a significant difference.

As always, I feel I've got to add the caveat that I'm not asking for beauty contests to be banned, and if someone wants to take part in one that's entirely their own business. I'm just saying that on the whole the world would probably be a better place if we grew up a bit and didn't bother with them.

Post of the week, definitely.

But in a way, that's what sexual attraction is!

And it's certainly not just people that do it.

compared to

for example.

Malc

It took me a minute to get it, but certainly!

COR!

And it's the male of that species aswell!

Well, women have a choice don't they? Live life as an ornament or don't-they don't HAVE to do Miss World or doll themselves up do they? I know 2 ladies who are happily married who basically are WAGS because they never work and just sort of...are 'there' they like things like that

So if it's not sexist and it's natural to hold contests to judge sexual attractiveness (which is what you seem to be implying), how come there's no Mr. World?

Don't tell me that bodybuilding contests are the same thing, because there are direct female equivalents to that.

Erm.

There IS a Mr.World though!

EDIT: Damn you Myp!

Some women dream about living like that. I imagine some men too. I couldn't think of anything worse than being judged on your appearance. That's why I like this place. Meets aside, we all interact without ever knowing each other on a visual level. Even the avatars are stylised versions of the truth. There's always facebook if anyone is desperate to know what I (and the missus) look like. For the record, she's hot, I'm not

And as I said, I'm not saying for a moment people should be banned from participating in these contests, I just think it'd be a Good Thing if nobody felt the need to.

And what does it tell you that this is the first that I (and, I'm guessing, most people on the forum) have heard of it?

Yeah-my friend being one of them

Are you on HotorNot.com? They can DECIDE whether you are then!! Like a Mini Miss World

Roda-Oh god yes I agree it'd be good if people didn't feel the need to. Those women could be doctors or something other than bikini clad [something clever beginning with c] but sadly people will watch that kind of thing, we'll always have it

Yes, but that's an ideal. We don't live in an ideal world; we are human, after all.

Inside most people is an innate desire to be judged on something they excel at.

What do you mean? I've been undefeated since 2003.

what if they excel at butt-crunches and hair straightening? Shouldn't they be allowed to show that?

People like beautiful things, (some) Men like beautiful women, (some, but probably fewer*) women like beautiful men. Because of this people can make money (or marry money) by showing of their beauty. I don't see a problem with it if that's what you want to do.

Malc

*actually probably not true, but up until relativly recently they have perhaps been unable/unwilling to express this publicly

Shall I just reiterate what I asked before?

If society just likes pretty things, if it's perfectly natural to hold contests to judge sexual attractiveness, if this isn't something specifically directed at promoting an image of passive female beauty, if it's not sexist how come Miss World is a widely-known, widely-televised media event but about five people on the planet know that Mr. World exists?

Unless you're genuinely putting forward the idea that "until recently women have not been able to publically express that they find men attractive", which I'd be really interested to hear you expand on because on the face of it that sounds utterly bonkers.

And, AGAIN, I'm not saying that people shouldn't be allowed to do it. Just that we'd all be better off as a society if they didn't.

This win strengthens the soul of Myoptika.#



That it happens to be not as popular. Like women's football on the other side.



Several of them ARE.

It's interesting the only people making degrading, insulting assumptions about women daring to enter a competition are the people who are anti it.

It's a talent, it's not different to any other talent, nor does it preclude them having other talents.

The world would NOT be a better place without it, it would be a considerably worse, considerably less free world.

You'll find I'm agreeing with you, but I'll just reiterate what I said about an innate desire to be judged on what we're good at.

Their boobs aren't big enough.

I require sizable boobs in order to form an opinion.

That's a different competition. Miss Globes

Now, now Dudley!

They can do whatever the hell they like, I'm not against it so much as to ban the damn thing-I just don't watch it as it's not entertaining to see people flounce around, same reason I wouldn't watch Dancing on Ice or any other thing like that. It's just sad that some brainless people think, 'hey! All women are like that' but they hopefully are the minority. If some woman in the paper wants to get her tits out and make money-thats also up to her *shrugs* I obviously don't want to see that kind of thing as I'm not a man so I'm biased in a way

Miss World isn't exactly 'talent' so it's in a different class imo

EDIT: It's a talent, it's not different to any other talent, nor does it preclude them having other talents.

You'll have to forgive me if I'm wrong about this as I don't watch it, but if they have other talents as you say then why not something like this:

'And here is Miss America, she is 28 and has studied physics and has an NVQ level of 3 in [something,lol] and she is going to discuss the terms for nuclear physics'

Yeah?

Well, I mean, there are more porn videos for men, there are more beauty pagents for women, there are more female prostitutes, and so on, it's only recently that there has been an acceptance for women to like things like that. Where were the Chip n dales 100 years ago? Where was the Victorian equivalent of playgirl? etc etc.

Malc

Dream? They actively go out and seek it.

I know women who have worked as hard as you could imagine to pay for their education and career. When it comes to determination to get what they want, they have nothing on a wannabe WAG.

Standing in the corner, supporting tea sets and the like

I wouldn't say "good" genes are a talent exactly. Then again, being able to smile fixedly for hours at a time surely is, and I wish I could remember stuff word-for-word.

Why is it not Talent? It's a trait you're born with that makes you naturally better than average at something...
Is the world therefore better off without everything you happen to not like?
Do more brainless people think that as think all football fans are thugs?

I didn't bring up page 3, virtually any average woman off the street could do that.



What is a talent then? You can't work to get talent it's something you're born with. Getting lucky on the looks front is no different than getting lucky on the brain front, the legs front or the fast metabolism front.

Just only one of those you're apparently not allowed to exploit.

I think the whole thing about women finding men attractive and saying it now is:

Men take better care of themselves now-they have nivea and shit like that and doll themselves up as much as women do! Some even more! So that's why now women can say 'He is gorgeous!' and watch thing with men that are dolled up like that

So tastes don't necessarily change, they just are brought forwards a bit because now it's okay for women to watch men because they now look 'pretty' I suppose.

In short, now men look like women.

Not all men do this... not all of us are girly footballers!!

I've got the hair. But not the tits.

Thank fuck Dr A isn't about. There would be that picture.

I knew an Ugby would say that.

Not that it makes a lot of difference to your argument but it's an odd choice of word. A talent is generally something you are just good at doing isn't it? I'd never thought of the world's tallest man as being "talented", he's just tall.

Why is it not Talent? It's a trait you're born with that makes you naturally better than average at something...
Is the world therefore better off without everything you happen to not like?
Do more brainless people think that as think all football fans are thugs?

I didn't bring up page 3, virtually any average woman off the street could do that.

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We'll just agree to disagree on this I think as you are putting words into my mouth and I dislike that, intensely.

I didn't say the world is better off with things I didn't like-if you scroll up I said I disliked watching it but they can do what they like-just because I don't like something doesn't mean they shouldn't do it. I just think it's weird calling it a talent because IMO it's not-'Oooh look, I got a face! Lets make a 'I got a face' programme' or something, just a bit daft-but let them do it, I don't watch it so I don't care.
So you carefully insinuating I'm brainless isn't exactly nice
Your going off on a tangent now.

Kovacs- I know, I likes my men rugged and manly ......what am I doing with Gaz again?


EXACTLY what Markg has said!

Women's football isn't as popular because women aren't physiologically capable of playing the game with the speed and strength of the top levels of the male game. It's inherently an inferior product to the other, easily-available alternative.

It seems reasonable to assume that the most attractive 1% of men are inherently as beautiful as the the most attractive 1% of women. So Miss World and Mr. World are presumably competing on a level playing-field. So why is one vastly more popular than the other?

If there's a better explaination than "people are more interested in passive female beauty than passive male beauty", then I'm open to hearing it.


Except that there's a decent argument that it IS different, as I pointed out in my first post.

Also, nobody I can see in this thread is making "degrading, insulting assumptions".

I'm not talking about impinging on anybody's rights. Or freedoms. All I'm (repeatedly) saying is that we'd be a little bit better off as a society if everybody realised that this sort of thing is just a teensy bit unhealthy and CHOSE not to get involved in it or watch it.

I wouldn't use "talent" there. To me, being talented is something you need to work at. OK, you could argue that these girls work to be good looking, through the repeated and strategic application of beauty products, but even that raises the argument that they're "false beautiful" and not "naturally beautiful".

Why isn't Miss World a beauty contest for people with no make up on?

What? I've never even met markg, and frankly I resent the implication that we're in a homosexual relationship. That's virtually slander that is, you'll be hearing from my lawyer Mr Christmas.


Tits.

Isn't it mainly down to the fact that Miss World has been running longer as is steeped in quite a lot of tradition? It's why the FA Cup is more popular than the Carling Cup, despite having - by and large - the same teams.

I'm sure there are plenty of tits in the Mr World competition.

Ah now c'mon.... which picture?

ALL OF

Why do you always have to say it better than I could possibly hope to?

*Grumbles*

Talent is something you work at yes, that's what defines it for me