Not sure what to make of this...

[Pootles2010]

This was in our local paper today. It doesn't sit right with me at all, but not sure if i'm being daft?!

Mmm. I know what you mean.

On the one hand, I see where they're coming from - I think girls do stop cycling because they don't associate it with being very attractive ('helmet hair' etc.).

But OTOH it is shite that the message isn't 'you can look how you like', but 'ohhhh, you'd look so pretty if you bought this shite and cycled! Oh and by the way, please help Lush profit!'

Also if your approach to girls stopping any activity because of appearance related factors is to use the "you can still look good" argument - well ,to a certain extent it isn't true in that grooming and strenous exercise don't really go together.
As far as cycling goes if you are going to ride gently to school/work,which is great,it'll work,but if you are going to cycle more you may well get helmet hair/hot/sweaty/muddy/wet (delete where not applicable!) and you need to be happy about that,and not feel that as a problem,or that the effect on your perceived attractiveness overrules every other aspect of what you do.
Not sure what the answer is really.

Well, the answer is to somehow teach girls not to give a toss what other people think. Many girls are sensible and confident enough to get this simple fact. Some aren't. Not sure what you can do about that.

But that is just tackling a symptom grimbletart. The cause is the objectification of women. That is what should be tackled. It is incredibly difficult to give women the confidence when all around them they are being judged on their appearance. Confidence is fluid too. You can have it at one point in your life and then lose it due to circumstances.

I understand what you say Abigail and agree. But you have to start somewhere. It's a fact that some women do have the confidence etc. not to care. What is different about them from other women? Once you can establish that and, hopefully, help other women to feel the same way objectification ceases to be effective. Of course, you should work on tackling objectification as well. I took that as a given. But in the interim we need to give women the tools to tackle reality as it is. And that's what I'm not sure how to do.

What I am sure about is that it would be useful to know what makes some girls have a useful sod-off mentality and others not........

I suspect a stable upbringing without the focus on appearance/diets/body image and more encouragement on what they do/achieve/their potential. But I don't know. That's just a personal thought.