KissingSunlight said:
It's obvious that you are passionate about this subject. So much so, that you have actually managed to find a few men who are sincerely upset about male sexual objectification. However, you can not convince me that images of muscular men are not sexually appealing to women. Also, that women would kill to look that sexy in those outfits that they wear in comic books and fantasy art work. In short, what is a power fantasy and sexual objectification is a matter of perspective.
I am passionate in general honestly or rather I can get passionate in my speech. It makes me seem more passionate about a subject than I am. Unfortunately, I'm not very good at turning that aspect of my writing down either. Sexual objectification of men actually isn't that big of a concern to me. It's not like I went looking for men sincerely upset about it. I've come across them during my time on the Internet. Frankly, they have a pretty big presence on the Internet to the extent that it's hard not to notice them...that is, if you go where I go...[small]I advise you don't go where I go.[/small]
I don't deny that women often find muscular men sexually appealing, but I don't know a single women (I know, anecdotal. Sorry.) who finds a
dedicated bodybuilder attractive. You know, those people with bodies built like tanks. Women I know tend to find them disgusting actually and worry they should get medical help for possible steroid addiction. And that is usually what people reference when they talk about male sexual objectification. From my experience, women tend to prefer men with athletic bodies but not too bulkly hence the love for "pretty boy" characters like Edward from
Twilight or Dante from
Devil May Cry though "manly men" are fine too as long as they don't look like tanks. Not to detract from the subject, but, actually, do women find Dante attractive? I always got the impression he has an impressive female fanbase, but, honestly, I only got into
Devil May Cry a couple months ago, so I'm still pretty new to it, its fandom, and the subgroups of that fandom.
As for women wanting to look sexy like that, I don't deny that either. However, again, I don't know a single women who is eager to look like the
over-extensive stuff like that Spider-Woman cover, not that it bothered me much or it was sexist or anything (The outrage on that was a little extreme. There are much more serious examples of sexism. Makes sense though considering most of the criticism wasn't even from comic fans). It's so extreme it's almost not sexy anymore based on the women I've talked to. Instead of enjoying the pandering, it just feels insulting at that point, like the artist is insulting their intelligence, because it's just too much to be justifiable and they're not even the audience who should be insulted, being women rather than men!
TL;DR: You're absolutely right that it is a matter of perspective, but it stops being a matter of perspective when it becomes a trope. When something becomes a trope it lends itself a degree of objectivity due to noticeable patterns, cultural symbolism, author intent, things like that.