How often do you wear your Lycra gym kit under your outfit when you’re on a third date? Most women want their sexual and romantic partners to be attracted to them, and young women aren’t any exception to that – I think it’s disingenuous to get into arguments about teaching young women not to care a single jot about their looks, because we’re never going to stop people of any age or either sex caring about their looks and wanting to look attractive - yet the only bodies women see in the media and are consistently told look attractive usually aren’t synonymous with being fit and strong and eating well, but with limiting food intake, getting cosmetic surgery, and undergoing procedures. If the only time women see strong, muscular female bodies is when they’re out on a rugby pitch in gym kit and sportswear, the association between being strong and muscular and also that being a body type to aspire to if you don’t plan to spend your life on a rugby pitch in gym kit and sportswear is never going to be made. And if women don’t aspire to muscular bodies, or associate strong and muscular with attractive, they’re going to continue to eschew and avoid engaging in sports and keeping themselves healthy in favour of the only type of body they’re told can look good in a bikini.
I take a lot of the points made here, plenty are absolutely valid, and I agree – I think it’s fairly shit underwear! Which I suppose is par for the course with many products that aren’t targeted at me. I lift weights, I box, I run distance. I’m not a waifish model, and you’d break your fist on my abs. I spend a lot of time in gym kit and I’m incredibly confident in the way I look – but it’s taken a long time to get to that, and I’m under no illusions that we’re going to get young women confident about building and having a body which doesn’t fit the airbrushed Insta norm by simply telling them they shouldn’t care and to just wear their gym kit. I also have a 13-year-old goddaughter, and because I’m not her mum and am therefore a bit cool, I get the privilege of hearing what goes on inside her head quite a bit. I could tell her until I was blue in the face that she shouldn’t care about looking attractive or what boys think, and it wouldn’t make a bit of difference: what is making a difference is being the person who models strong being attractive, and being attractive in a bikini or a backless wedding dress or a halter dress as well as in leggings whilst squatting 100kg.