I've got two fashion posts today, so let me go with a third, which is already bulging out in the comments to the shorts post. Haven't we seen enough of the female midsection for a while? The look-at-my-abs style has lasted way longer than was ever justified. I understand a fixation on breasts or legs, by why are we going on for years and years looking at ladies' tummies? It's rather strange, isn't it?
IN THE COMMENTS: More discussion of Barbara Eden than you might have predicted. I'm thinking there are a lot of boomerish men out there who have Jeannie deeply imprinted on their brains.
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I suppose that depends on the relative attractiveness of said tummy. I'm sure most would agree that a flabby one sticking out isn't the most attractive one to look at... but then again... that can be said for most visible body parts.
Unlike hair or breasts, a lean abdomen is hard to fake.
It is a siren call of healthy nubility.
I agree with the proprietor, let's get fashion back where it belongs, focused on the chest.
See, you're bringing out the point. An abdomen, to be bared attractively, must be in great shape. So the fashion sets up a big competition and takes a hell of a lot of work (or bad judgment) to participate in. So, okay, for a while. But is that what people want? To inspect the health of every stray woman who walks by, with few meeting the standard? If the focus is on breasts or legs, many more women will have something good to offer. Leg and breast-focused fashions yield more beauty!
Blame her.
You can't fake abs.
Yoga pants are also hot right now, combined with tight yoga shirts that are cut short. If you can wear that, it doesn't matter how big your breasts are. If you can't, it doesn't matter either.
So 3 cheers for abs. Backless is also nice, and can be dressed up for formal occasions too. Big fan, as long as its classy.
Can we stop using the word "midriff" to refer to the lower abdomen?
I don't think displaying paunch was the original intention, rather displaying youthfulness and rippling fitness (a la early Britney Spears) was the original intent.
No woman who wasn't over 18, under 25 and (notice, not or) incredibly fit should have ever attempted this style, and even then that style always connoted more stripper/hooker than schoolgirl/cheerleader.
Just as the Dolce & Gabana ultra low rise jeans for men (currently a hot topic) scream prostitute and are only suitable for the very fit, young and willing to be judged/used for their sexuality, the expanses of exposed belly was/is a massive mistake.
I suspect too that there is a class component to the equation though it is hard to suss out, cause currently being extremely trim and fit is a marker of high status (shows the means and time to devote to excellent diet and exercise, while flab is now associated with fast-food, TV viewing and poverty) but the willingness to display that toned flesh will always have a connotation of trashiness (even when the flesh being bared is of an heiress, reminds me of driving on Robertson and seeing what looked like a sickly transvestite hooker, but no just Paris).
The fact that so many women were/are untroubled by displaying less than perfect physiques (look no farther than the Dove firming cream ad campaign) could be viewed as empowering or just plain misguided.
I fall on the misguided side, and when it comes to allure, the suggestion of what might be underneath, rather than the brazen display of flesh, has always garnered my attention (while expanses of flesh at inappropriate settings just garner my embarrassment).
lmeade: It's fascinating that Barbara Eden's abdomen, which must have been considered perfect at the time of "I Dream of Jeannie," do not meet today's standards! She would need to spend a lot of time with a personal trainer before she could wear today's styles.
Ann: As someone who was a boy just reaching puberty when "I Dream of Jeannie" premiered, I'd have to say, yes, Jeannie's belly was perfectly...um...considered.
This style will fade but as a personal trainer I know that regularly spending a moderate amount of time strengthening and conditioning one's abdominal muscles yields myriad health benefits for women and men. Pilates, for instance, is not a crazy fad -- every human activity is enhanced by developing and keeping a strong "core." Fundamental strength, flexibility and health tend to be attractive.
Now that the subject is Barbara Eden I seem to remember a snippet from an interview with Sidney Sheldon (probably an E! True Hollywood Story, and yes I'm a loser) where he said part of why they cast her as Jeanie was that she has an unusually low belly button (and not necessarily the most perfect body) and network standards and practices wouldn't allow an exposed belly button (too obscene afterall, and the picture previously linked was from a much later costume, not one from the original run of the series, also, hard to fathom things like that were still an issue while all those dirty hippies were already running around) so they chose a woman with whom they could show the most flesh while still meeting the requirements of the decency police.
And speaking of decency police and exposed flesh, how is it that no woman has successfully sued a public beach into allowing her to go as topless as the men (it would seem to be an equal protection issue, but maybe not, and I remember in the mid 70s parts of Venice Beach had become defacto topless optional due to lax enforcement).
But is that what people want? To inspect the health of every stray woman who walks by, with few meeting the standard?
Yes--sigh--that is the burden we men must bear. But would you really want it otherwise? If we lower our standards, we deprive women of an important incentive to stay fit and healthy. Only a misogynist would do that.
LeRoy: I can just imagine the ad in the trades for that Jeannie part: "Must have low belly button."
ROFL
Re health inspection: all this Spartan emphasis on health and athleticism — when did that become sexy? Marilyn Monroe would fail!
No one has mentioned the loathesome 'muffin top,' when you wear pants so tight and so low that a pasty roll of flesh wells over the top, as the dough from a baking muffin. I spent an amused session with two little girls in a restaurant, supressing our glee as we went on periodic muffin-top alert.
Lighter weights, higher reps - atta girl, Norma Jean! One more? Perfect form... now go for the burn! Sturdy flexible muscles with just enough subcutaneous adipose softness... what could be more physically beautifully feminine?
Way to earn that premium milk chocolate bar! Now let's do our squats and crunches before stretching. Feelin' good? Lookin' great!
Slocum: Maybe the idea is to express a kind of freedom and love of one's own body, which could translate, for some viewers, into a message of great sex. That toned abs girl, on the other hand, has to be quite austere and rigorous with herself. Who should you infer is the better lover?
I think the more masculine man is attracted to real women, not teenagers. And that man is wearing pants.
Well, Ann, speaking of brain imprints - for this boomerish man, it all started with Annette and her friends. Of course, that was when I was a young boy still in short pants but drinking my breakfast from a glass, no longer from a bottle. Annette wore her bikini slightly too high but sometimes let it slip a bit. Heaven!
Jeannie fulfilled the promise of Annette. Exposed pierced bellybuttons on any paunch simply fill the void of good taste.
Beldar: Actually, this is NOT good Darwinian analysis. A very thin woman is less fertile. Many extra thin women stop having menstrual periods. And in the natural state, someone in that condition would face death at the next famine. Primitive man did not exalt the thin woman. All the early fertility figures are fat. Often absurdly fat by our standards. Thinness as the standard of beauty only emerged in a world that conquered famine. It is not an instinctive reaction.
Ann: aren't a lot of activities that we now view as 'healthful' viewed considerably differently in the recent past? In the era just before Jack Lalane, a man who worked out with weights too much was viewed as homosexual! 'Real men' didn't want to pump iron!
Someone riding a bicycle in a '30's or 40's film (if not a European) is viewed as infantile, not health conscious.
This transition would be the good subject of a book.
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