A man once tweeted how a female colleague of his kept calling him short at a height of 5’10. She equated his height to that of a woman saying he should have been a woman because of how short he was. One day, after listening to her body shame him, he lashed back and called her fat.
Everyone in the office reprimanded him and said he shouldn’t have done so. Are women the only people allowed to ‘body shame’ others? Do men also have the right to ‘body shame’ people?
According to the Cambridge Dictionary, body shaming is criticism of someone based on the shape, size or appearance of their body.
When body shaming is brought up, men are not the first people you think of. Body shaming has become very rampant in recent times especially with social media usurping the role of an arbiter. Granted women are the first victims of body shaming as over time society has found a way to make women feel in certain ways about their bodies. Women have, therefore, more or less taken ‘ownership’ of the word.
The problem is that women have more or less been cast in the victim category of this ‘crime,’ but when body shaming happens to a man, it is presumed as normal.
Rapper Kanye West in 2018 when he released his album ‘Ye’ said he got Liposuction because he didn’t want to be called fat. Wentworth Miller, made famous for the series ‘Prison Break’ also spoke up in 2016 when pictures of him while he was shooting the series and years later became an internet meme. He talked about struggling with his mental health and being semi retired from acting when the pictures were taken.
Are men not allowed to ‘let themselves go’ when they are going through life changes? Imagine if it were a woman who was used as a meme right after giving birth.
The media had constantly criticized actors like Vin Disel, Ben Affleck and others when they put on weight. They questioned why these men would let go of themselves and sometimes go as far as putting pictures of when they were in their ‘prime’ physique. These pictures are almost always from when they were training extra hard for a movie role. A major media outlet carrying the same speculations about a female star will receive backlash for body shaming. How is it acceptable or okay for the man?
Recently Davido had an altercation with a young woman on Instagram and he retaliated by body shaming her and he got a lot of back lash from it till he apologized. If the script was flipped and it was a woman who retaliated and insulted the size and length of his private parts or height or any other physical appearance, it would not have received as much attention because it has been assumed to be normal. What is good for the gander is good for the goose, so they say. If passing judgment on a woman’s body is inappropriate, it should be the same for a man. After all, we are all human beings.
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Women constantly debate and cite the size and length of a man’s genitals as a reason they wouldn’t date a man. Some go as far as using that as an insult to a former partner. The men don’t scream “I’m being body shamed.” This is because for them this has somehow become an acceptable form of insult.
Height also is used as an ‘insult’ to men. Sometimes, it may be used jokingly but what if a man then replies and jokingly calls you fat or even too thin? You would then scream blue murder. Don’t men have feelings? Or is a woman’s feeling just more important than a man’s own?
John D. Moore writing for the ‘Good Men Project’ says, “Shame not only hurts, but it’s destructive. Chronic shame has been linked to depression and addiction. In young men, shame can lead to destructive behaviors and violence.”
Body Shaming most often has nothing to do with fitness or better health care. It has a lot to do with the acceptable mode of appearance and what the society dictates for both sexes. When Prince William started losing his hair at a young age he was in the media a lot for his thinning hair line, a condition with which he had no control over. This is because society just believed at his age he shouldn’t be going bald and hence the situation made headlines.
Men can be and are victims of body shaming, while everything is geared towards protecting women from certain things, the men should not be excluded. The same way body shaming impacts women, is the same way for men.