Muscles and signs of physical strength is often considered as unfeminine and unattractive by western culture and society for a long time now. What changes after 1900 could flip this dynamic and make muscles and female strength be considered the height of femininity and attractiveness in popular culture today?
AHC - Reverse the idea that female muscle is unfeminine and unattractive
- Thread starter Exostrike
- Start date
The two problems here is that muscular women before recently would be associated with women who had to work all day in dirty jobs like farming or factories and that showing excessive female skin whatsoever was rather vulgar. And while I might be repeating an oft-stated urban myth, it's often said the historically (Western) ideal of female beauty was full-figured (but not obese which was a sign of decadence/moral failing), and this trend reversed because obesity became a sign of poverty while thin and muscular women a sign of someone with leisure time and income to eat healthy food.
So for this AHC we'd need to take this to extremes, with an earlier obesity epidemic causing a backlash which brings about a fitness culture. Have the government sneak pro-women's fitness messages into popular movies, have women's wrestling (both pro wrestling and otherwise) and MMA become popular for more than just sex appeal/novelty, that sort of thing. I guess the psychological message is that "strong, muscular women give birth to children who grow up to be strong and muscular."
So for this AHC we'd need to take this to extremes, with an earlier obesity epidemic causing a backlash which brings about a fitness culture. Have the government sneak pro-women's fitness messages into popular movies, have women's wrestling (both pro wrestling and otherwise) and MMA become popular for more than just sex appeal/novelty, that sort of thing. I guess the psychological message is that "strong, muscular women give birth to children who grow up to be strong and muscular."
Female strength and muscles are considered pretty attractive today…just ask Caity Lotz
As to in the past…maybe more of a glorification of women in the work force? Wartime propaganda - see Rosie the Riveter - could glorify strength, maybe if that continued post-war somehow?
Maybe more countries do like the State of Israel do and recruit women into the armed forces.
Aphrodite
Banned
Women used to be muscular by our standards. You didn't just turn on the faucet, but went to the well and hauled it home.
Laundry meant beating clothes against a rock and hand wringing it.
Cooking meant stoking a fire by throwing the logs on.
That said, female attractiveness is rooted in her ability to have children. The ideal hip to waist ratio of . 72 is the ideal for delivering children. Full breasts show an ability to breastfeed.
The extra fat stores mean that a baby can be carried to term. Nothing will change that.
Laundry meant beating clothes against a rock and hand wringing it.
Cooking meant stoking a fire by throwing the logs on.
That said, female attractiveness is rooted in her ability to have children. The ideal hip to waist ratio of . 72 is the ideal for delivering children. Full breasts show an ability to breastfeed.
The extra fat stores mean that a baby can be carried to term. Nothing will change that.
Aphrodite
Banned
My mother was a Lt. Commander. Still got dad to take out the trash. Asking a man for help not only saves your back, it makes him feel useful
I love Caity Lotz. I think she looks amazing but that's as muscular as a woman should go in my opinion. She is still in the 5-10% body fat range.Female strength and muscles are considered pretty attractive today…just ask Caity Lotz
I think a woman who goes sub 5% body fat doesn't look particularly attractive to me.
That's also the point where being "too fit" can mess with the production of certain hormones and interfere with periods.
As I said to someone in my karate dojo on the topic (after she said she doesn't want to go the gym because muscles are not attractive) "I'm sorry but you are 1 to 2 years of being obsessed with the gym and your diet before you have to worry about that.
Female labour is assumed to be not physical by the capitalist basardry of the united states (which will inherently dicate all results of this challenge).
Thus female physicality is anti-worker and aristocratic / bourgeois / heroic / technical / specialist.
Thus physical females are viewed as outstanding examples of moral purity, rather than tarnished wage labourers.
Tell me more about the coal strikes in this time line.
Thus female physicality is anti-worker and aristocratic / bourgeois / heroic / technical / specialist.
Thus physical females are viewed as outstanding examples of moral purity, rather than tarnished wage labourers.
Tell me more about the coal strikes in this time line.
rndbabylon
Banned
Have Eugenic Feminism take off (eugenics can always be rejected later, just have it permanently influence this part of culture). They promoted fitness and masculinization of girls and women in the belief it would result in healthier future generations. To get this popular? I'm not sure, perhaps have a figure like Teddy Roosevelt endorse the movement? He was concerned about "race suicide" and supported suffrage irl so I don't think it's too much of a stretch for him to do that. But you'd probably need more than just his endorsement.
Alternatively:
Alternatively:
This would help too, though not as much.
marathag
Banned
Avoid the Warsaw Pact doping of the female Olympic athletes to where they were indistinguishable from men, like the East German Swim team