Men of the Escapist: Keeping up appearances in order to reach "perfection"

[Parasondox]

Okay, shall we begin. Those I mentioned just popped into my head about the leading Hollywood men and those involved in comic book movies portraying Gods of some sort (Superman and Thor). You can put any leading guy in that list. I know some women who still do talk about those men and even on TV their are still talks about those guys and their appearances.

But the key is, they're movies aimed at men. Not women. Women may well be in the audience and a certain segment of those women may find the men involved to be attractive, but the primary purpose of those characters is to appeal to men.

As I have pointed out because and even in the other thread aimed at women, there is nothing wrong with making yourself look good and feel good. Nothing wrong with working out and feeling fit as long as you are doing it for yourself and not an obsession in order to reach some kind of "perfection".

I agree. Though I'm not sure that perfection is a bad thing to strive for, in and of itself. The thing about perfection though, is that when one strives for perfection, just beating other guys isn't an adequate goal to reach the standard. Which is where the creepy gym rats go wrong, I think.

Yes, what I brought up was jealousy because that is another factor to this discussion. This whole thread is about exploring if men feel pressured to look a certain way and if yes, maybe give their point of view about how they feel which can include what some of the factors are.

Then the answer I'd give is, "Yes, many men feel pressured to look a certain way, however that pressure almost universally comes from other men."

There is a small and I mean small percentage of men who would just date women as a kind of a trophy to compete with other men.

Oh, I wouldn't say it's so small. The entire reason that things like giving women scores out of 10 and the PUA community exist is because of small men who want to feel big compared to other men.

Sorry if I sounded a bit mean or rude there.

No worries. Just in case it's clear, the "you" in all of my posts here is not directed at you personally, it's the rhetorical "you".

I had to Google search "PUA community" cause I had no idea what it was and when I found it, I had no clue this community actually exist over the internet. I can't access the rest of the site cause they want my email and that's a straight nooooooo. Am I surprised a community exist over the internet? No, it's the internet but I still had no clue about it before today.

"Pick Up Artist community", I mean... is this for an ego trip they are doing it for, or just something else? I don't like the "scoring out of 10" thing because that will give people either a massive ego boost and make their confidence and self-esteem pretty low. It also just shows in order to be a 10, you have to reach a standard and it's silly guidelines.

Thank you Danger - Must Silence, for the post and responses and I apologise about misunderstanding your answers before and I understand them now.

 

[Malty Milk Whistle]

I'm actually really happy with my appearance, mainly because I don't really think about it and just rely on my sparkling personality to get by. My body's not unfit, and my friend said I looked like 'that captain guy from firelfly' after I had a haircut.
So that was wonderful.

but eh, I think there's pressure on guys to look good, but no where near as much as it is on gals.

 

[OysterEleven]

Yeah I used to feel a lot of pressure to bulk up and get bigger. For reference, I'm 5'5 with a small frame, which makes me smaller than at least half the women I know. This used to bother me quite a bit but I've learned to accept what my body is capable of. I still work out a bit, plus I have a very physically demanding job, so I'm in good shape and pretty muscular for my size. So now I just appreciate that and am no longer chasing a fantasy. I'm never gonna have muscles like The Rock and that's okay.

As for waxing your chest and styling your hair and stuff... no. None of that. I trim my beard once a week and cut my own hair every month or so. That's about the extent of my grooming habits lol.

 

[Weaver]

I do feel pressure to look as good as I can, workout, dress well, etc.

The problem is I'll never be an Adonis for various reasons, and it is pretty disheartening to know that.

I do realize models look good because it's their job to look good. We could all be in great shape if it we were paid to work out all day. Alas, my job is to sit and type on the computer so my meager exercise routine is only going to pay so many dividends.