One Hundred Years Of Men Taking Off Their Shirts
November 28, 2016 6:57 AM   Subscribe

 
I was curious about chest hair, but the article didn't really talk much about that.
When I was a lad, chest hair was a big signifier of masculinity. Nowadays, not so much.
Contrast the Burt Reynolds photo with the Calvin Klein ad.

As a result, I'm always amused by those ads on TV where the guy is exercising with the product, and as his muscles grow, his chest hair disappears.
In the old days, the hair would probably grown.
You'd think they could market the Bowflex as a depilatory.
posted by MtDewd at 9:09 AM on November 28, 2016 [6 favorites]


God, I love her writing.
posted by I_Love_Bananas at 9:24 AM on November 28, 2016


*takes off shirt*
*sniffs air, applies right guard*
posted by jonmc at 9:35 AM on November 28, 2016 [3 favorites]


Fascinating. I'm reminded of the bits in Evolution's Rainbow in which Roughgarden talks about female desire vs. male hierarchies; the male insistence (in some species, and some cultures) that it's their (our) inter-masculine competition that matters, and any female desire that doesn't align with the outcome of male competition is to be punished, wiped out.
"It is time for matriarchy if the male of the species allows such things to persist," the author exclaimed
after Valentino put on makeup. David Bowie and Prince weren't looked at much differently by the action-star '80s; males who were sexualized by any path other than their apparent ability to beat up other males should not be "allowed to persist". They were undermining male power - the power to force the focus of female desire.
posted by clawsoon at 10:21 AM on November 28, 2016 [5 favorites]


My favorite thing about this article is the angry, whining men in the comments who seem to be personally offended by the idea that images of masculinity can be examined in this way. Taking off their shirts is just something men do! How dare you think about it, and share your thoughts with other people?

I wonder how much of this is resistance to the idea that masculinity is constructed and changeable, rather than some inherently valuable property of themselves.

Actually, no, I take it back. My favorite thing about this article was the article itself, which was very interesting. I don't follow Buzzfeed, so I'm glad it got posted here.
posted by Kutsuwamushi at 11:05 AM on November 28, 2016 [6 favorites]


I remember how Mark Harmon, at that time famous for St. Elsewhere, was named sexiest man alive by People Magazine in 1986 and in the photos of that time you can clearly see that he has not only a hairy chest but also hairy shoulders.

It gave me hope.

Which was taken away by Marky Mark.
posted by srboisvert at 11:28 AM on November 28, 2016 [5 favorites]


I remember when I was a kid there was an ad called Body By Soloflex then there was this. (I fall into the latter category these days, although as a teenager I was a tall skinny beanpole)
posted by jonmc at 11:46 AM on November 28, 2016


I wonder how much of this is resistance to the idea that masculinity is constructed and changeable

Or maybe they don't like being objectified, in exactly the way they do to women?
posted by Greg_Ace at 12:00 PM on November 28, 2016 [1 favorite]


I wonder how much of this is resistance to the idea that masculinity is constructed and changeable, rather than some inherently valuable property of themselves.

I think women have a better understanding of all the ways in which femininity is constructed and performative. We know what our choices say about our femininity, and whether we'd think of it that way or not, our grooming and fashion choices can be carefully chosen and curated to present the exact version of femininity we want them to. We also know that presenting and constructing this femininity takes work. A lot of men aren't as used to that. Even as they undertake arduous workout routines, they think masculinity just is. They don't think of it as a set of choices they make and norms they adhere to. It's only the deviations they notice: men who wear makeup, men who fall at either end of the masculinity/femininity extremes, etc.

It's just another example of the "default" human (straight cis white dude aged 18-45) getting upset when it's pointed out that the default is no such thing. It's not an unmarked, "natural" state. It's as constructed and performative and changeable as everything else.
posted by yasaman at 12:02 PM on November 28, 2016 [24 favorites]


This piece, which is very well-written and fascinating, only briefly touches on the role of the increasing popularity and proliferation of homoerotic imagery (especially gay porn) in the changes in perception of male body image during the 1980s. That Soloflex ad linked above could have come straight from a gay porn mag and was definitely a nod and wink to the almost unanimous fetishization of hairless chests among gay men that the almost overnight abundance of hairlessness in gay porn represented. Mark Wahlberg, whether he knew it or not (I'm betting he knew it full well given how many larger-than-life billboards with him in nothing but white underwear popped up in gay neighborhoods at the time), capitalized on that same trend and helped push it mainstream.
posted by blucevalo at 12:13 PM on November 28, 2016 [6 favorites]


The male hairless chest / body trend thing has always been interesting to me, as I saw it evolve in media, and wondered how that corresponded also to the expectations that younger men now have for women to be always sans body hair ~everywhere~, very emphatically so ... while older men still tend to love and cherish the au natural they first encountered. Do many / most young women likewise now feel that pubic, chest, leg, back hair on men is "ew"? Or is it a much looser preference, with some liking less, some liking more, and not so much judging? (Sorry to bring down the tenor of the conversation so crashingly / crassly, but it's been a bit of a niggling curiosity to me for a while.)
posted by taz at 12:46 PM on November 28, 2016


Of the pictures in the article my tastes have always veered towards the Russell Brand type. Tall and lanky, not super hairy but also not waxed. I've said it before on this site but goddamn, I love a man in eyeliner. Not sure if it's cause I hit puberty in '82 or what but it's been an ongoing component of my life that I really enjoy.
posted by fluffy battle kitten at 12:52 PM on November 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


*Vigorous nodding to Yasaman*

Something I think about consistently is how MRA-types point to feminist writing about women and say "what about the men", and then when feminists apply their lenses to masculinity, they get angry about it being done. They make it to be team women vs. team men, but they truly belong to team "shut up and stop doing things".

At the risk of being blindingly obvious, these people aren't pulling for men, they're pulling for the status-quo.

I've seen several smart, kind men in my life become enamoured with red-pill types before they realised that all the rhetoric about 'what about male rape in prison' is utterly empty. There are amazing people working on prison reform - they're called feminists. And they'd get more done minus the death-threats on twitter.
posted by AAALASTAIR at 2:03 PM on November 28, 2016 [1 favorite]


echoing multiple sentiments already expressed, including the very solid writing* and the only passing reference to homoeroticism in the contexts laid out. still, I quite enjoyed it.

*I really appreciated how the research elements were folded into the text here. it felt seamless and yet evoked a fairly broad spectrum of research. the voice was scholarly without being opaque. I really wanted a bibliography at the end, though.
posted by oog at 2:42 PM on November 28, 2016


As someone who read queer theory for a long time, esp gay male sexual writing, it's really useful to read this thru a lens of heterosexual female desire. Not all writnig has to have all lenses.
posted by PinkMoose at 3:48 PM on November 28, 2016 [6 favorites]


But these shirtless bodies aren’t doing anything new. Justin Bieber’s Calvin Klein ads are a simple reproduction of Marky Mark’s; Shia LaBeouf channels Steve McQueen in Interview; Mario Lopez copies Burt Reynolds

I noticed this a year or two ago, and wondered whether just aren't any great celebrity photographers now, or whether photos or shirtless/nude celeb men were new enough for a while to seem interesting but done frequently enough now that there's no new visual ground to cover.

I've noticed some not-totally waxed chests on TV the past few years. It's okay by me personally, variety is nice. It does make for very distracting viewing on that new CW show, No Tomorrow, where Galavant barely ever buttons his shirt (manic bearded dream guy!) but his chest hair groom-level varies dramatically within episodes. Ah, we're back from commercial and this guy seems to have waxed while we were away!
posted by Squeak Attack at 5:52 PM on November 28, 2016 [2 favorites]


This is a set of very thoughtful essays about the use of shirtlessness on a television show that aired originally in the late 1960s and early 1970s (and on and off and syndication, VHS, and DVD ever since) and its effects on the many closeted and stressed gay boys who found a refuge in this outlandish television world.

My name is not Victoria Winters. Here is the “shirtless” tag archive of one of my favorite blogs, Dark Shadows Every Day.

They really are interesting articles, even if you're not familiar with the show. There's one I remember but it doesn't seem to be there, about the contrived reason for the shirt cutting and the way the actor angled his body toward the camera. Even though the descriptions of the action are funny, you don't need to understand what's going on in the greater plot, because it's just as bugdust insane as the writer is describing.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 6:46 PM on November 28, 2016


P.S. Oldest is at the bottom.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 6:47 PM on November 28, 2016


I love a man in eyeliner. Not sure if it's cause I hit puberty in '82 or what but it's been an ongoing component of my life that I really enjoy.

David Bowie in Labyrinth came along at the exact right moment in my life.
posted by The Underpants Monster at 6:53 PM on November 28, 2016 [6 favorites]


This is pretty tangential to what the article was investigating but I've recently become fascinated by how men's nipples are an ok thing to photograph and show in the most public of settings. I mean, on a base level, I think it's hot -- I love men's nipples. But I feel like there's something weird about the profound difference between how we view public displays of male and female nipples. Nipples are inherently at-least-somewhat-erogenous zones and therefore possible zones of intense vulnerability and sense of subjectivity. Why is it a thing of valor (or least not worthy of outrage) when a man shows his nipples to the world, but an an obscenity -- either titillating or gross, depending on whether she's breast feeding -- when a woman does the same?
posted by treepour at 12:06 AM on November 29, 2016 [2 favorites]


I love a man in eyeliner. Not sure if it's cause I hit puberty in '82 or what but it's been an ongoing component of my life that I really enjoy.

Adam Ant flipped my switch.
posted by clew at 3:10 PM on November 29, 2016 [2 favorites]


I think women have a better understanding of all the ways in which femininity is constructed and performative.

With femininity that seems logical. But have no illusions about masculinity, men know in exquisite detail the language of appearance and behavior among one another. It doesn't bind us nearly as tightly as it does women, but it is very much a constant force in our lives.
posted by Tell Me No Lies at 3:47 PM on November 29, 2016


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