beauty myth

Honestly, I was dissappointed with the claims that people made in class today. I was dissappointed at the females who don't give other females enough credit. I was disappointed that so many females agree with the beauty myth, but only perpetate the beauty myth my being compeletly insecure with their bodies. A liberated empowered feminist would not succumb to social media constructions of how women are portrayed. You should feel sexy when you wear lingerie, instead of ignorantly thinking that you should look like Heidi Klum. You should be discerned with the beauty myth because the media does portray extremes ideals of beauty for both males and females. However, you don't have to pay attention and I personally don't think that most smart secure women do. I don't like how you stereotype females as being obsessed with weight when some, like me, are not. Not all women are insecure, there are actually liberated women who don't give a shit about starving themsleves. As for the women that are, it is sad that someone is completely ignorant and will buy into what the media spits out at you. That is not being feminist, so don't call yourself feminist if you are insecure with yourself for not looking like women in magazines. I don't have sympathy or the time for people that are so easily swayed.
I also think that the porn myth is rubbish. Although we haven't talked about this, I don't think men are less likely to go after women because masturbation to porn is more exciting. So what that porn may have made sex more excititng, but personally I don't feel threatened by porn. That article completely negated the fact that emotions are also involved in sex; therefore, if you actually really like someone you won't care that they do not hav sex like a porn star. Also, I think the article does not give guys enough credit because not all guys are obsessed with porn.

Fight Club Truth

The truth is that Fight Club is a novel and a movie about men, masculinity, and the ideal male. Whowver wants to disagree with can, but know that you are wrong.

Fight Club is meant for guys. Here's a story from my own boarding school experience. So,before we even knew the movie existed (I say movie because books were only read that were required by our teachers) my friends and I would havea type of fight club. Usually it would be just a few people, but sometimes there would be 15 of us. We would play really loud music, get in a circle, pick two guys to go in, watch them battle until there was a victor, and repeat. We did this because we were boys and like beating eachother up.
This movie appealed to us, because we had our own fight club, and it appeals to every other guy because it's guys geeting trashed. While the names might of been different, we used to call it battle royal, but that's not the point, I'm sure there were other variations of fight club out there.


Fight club represents the internal struggle one man has with himself.
Edward Norton plays the average guy. There is nothing special about him, he is simple, plain, boring, and above all the embodiment of the typical average American male.
Brad Pitt play the role of the American ideal. He is gorgeous, desired, well-spoken, confident, flawless, stylish, and a flat out rock-star. Pitt is wahat a masculine male should be. This applys to every guy.


Norton is so obsessed with wanting to be this ideal, that he develops a persona, Pitt, that takes on a life of his own. He is so blinded by this ideal that he does not see that it is not possible for him to reach.

He has to give up wanting to be Pitt before he can take control of his own life.

We ive in a society where we strive for perfection. Those who work hard enough or is given the oppurtunity to, reaches that will succeed at that goal.

No one wants to settle for being average. The average American public is a sad, gross sight.

Animals in Fight Club

So far, reading and watching Fight Club has been my favorite of the class. I enjoyed how most of the class was involved with the discussion at some point yesterday and I think it was because most of the class enjoyed this book the most as well.

One of the parts of the book that we sort of touched on that I found interesting was all the references that were made to animals. My favorite reference to animals was when Marla was talking about things people love for a few days and then throw away, and she mentioned the dog pound. She said, "…where even if someone loves you enough to save your life, they still castrate you" (68). I've never really thought of it that way and it was interesting to hear it put that way. I always had the mind set that they fixed the animals so that there wouldn't be the chance of more animals coming back to them.

The other animal reference that I enjoyed was when Tyler burnt Jack’s hand and after Tyler put vinegar on his hand to stop the burning, Jack made a comment, “Think about the animals used in product testing” (78). I thought it was interesting that animal testing was the first thing that came to mind after he endured the chemical burn. But it makes sense; animals are the ones who suffer the pain in our consumer culture when new products are being made. I think that mentioning animals in these to cases was to show how animals suffer as well as humans, but I am not sure.

Fight Club gender roles

Now having seen the movie in addition to having read the end of the novel “Fight Club” by Chuck Palahniuk, the themes engraved in the plot are much clear to me. I had trouble understanding how femininity plays any role in this work, but through class discussion on Tuesday, which never touched upon the ending of the novel or film, it started to make sense. I watched the movie the following day and towards the end of it I realized Marla represents how males treat females unequally, as has been the case for centuries and centuries. The main character remains nameless and is not directly shown demeaning Marla through his masculinity, but Tyler Durden, his other self, makes several sexist remarks aimed at Marla. Tyler only uses Marla to satisfy his sexual “needs”. In the film, the only time he spends with her one on one is in his bed having sexual intercourse. Afterwards, when technically he is speaking to himself, he says how she annoys him and wants her to leave whenever they are done having sex. Marla still sticks around even with his dual personality. By staying around she is giving into masculinity. She lets herself be vulnerable and be taken advantage of by both of the main character’s personalities. When he is Tyler, he makes loves to her and tells her sweet words while they are in the middle of the act, but after they are done, he turns back into himself and looks at her as Tyler’s girl. Because of his confusion he ends up always making her feel unwelcome and gives her no tenderness whatsoever. Although we only find out at the end that he does so because of his disorders, in both the film and novel, Marla takes this emotional beating until the very end when his problems finally become too much. Despite this, she still is there for him at the end even though she is clueless as to what the situation with him really is. Femininity is being oppressed in the film. The “fight club” is like an all male army where females have no place and where only one man’s opinion rules. The women in the film, mainly Chloe and Marla, are weak, dependant, emotionally unstable, vulnerable, and depicted as being clueless. Of course, the author of the novel lets us know how things end up when there are no voices of reasons from females. The last scene in the movie, which is the most memorable one to me, summarizes what happens when masculinity dominates and femininity is oppressed. The city is blown up and destroyed, and it happened due to a single man’s confusion.

I agree with the previous blog by understanding how Fight Club could possibly be feminine. Fight Club is a masculine handbook, reiterating the basic points of what constitutes being a man. The book is solely the struggle of one man striving to be like the ideal man (Tyler) and also trying to struggle with his lifestyle (commercialism and his job). You can juxtopose the role of women with masculines struggle because you can relate fiminism and masculinity. However, I don't think that the purpose of this book is to relate feminism and masculinity. The book is a narrative about the key factors of what it means to be a man, and how you can overcome the struggle of trying to be a man in society by the basic all time masculine practice of fighting. I think the novel becomes more interesting when not juxtaposed with feminism, and do not think that this book is a celebration of feminism. The book is a rare narrative solely about masculinity, when there are plenty of novels about feminism and the struggle which women have overcome. Fight Club provides insight on the masculine struggle reiterating what it means to be a man, and is not supposed to reiterate what it means to be a women.
If I wanted to read a book about feminism I would not refer to Fight CLub, because there are far more better quality examples of works that touch upon both maculine and feminine gender roles. Let Fight CLub be masculine without taking away from that struggle of masculinity (because obviously there is a struggle) by comparing its roots with femininity. I think that is why there really is no really strong feminine character. The main female character, Marla, only highlights the angst of what a man has to overcome.

Fight Club Discussion

I also enjoyed the discussion on Fight Club in Tuesday’s class and it brought up many points that I had not thought about, for instance that the novel could be considered feminist. I read Fight Club during the summer and then again for class, and I got a totally different read the second time around. When I first read the novel, the tone seemed very pessimistic and dark; almost that the meaning of the world was lost. Then, when reading the second time, the tone seemed more sarcastic and slightly humorous about exaggerating our culture’s stereotypes, such as masculinity or commercialism. I’m still struggling to see how this novel could be considered feminine because the idea of a fight club or the character of Tyler Durden is so primitively masculine. I can connect the idea of feminine to the main character’s power animal, the penguin, because this is not a typically masculine animal but not to the concept of the fight clubs. I think women were outlawed from the fight clubs to convey this intense exaggerated feeling that men are the most constricted in their gender and need an outlet. Though I don’t necessarily agree with this view, it seemed to me that the book wanted to comment on this point of view in society; not to draw attention to women oppression. Also, the two main women found in Fight Club, Marla and Chloe, both seemed to be portrayed in a very sexual light that is contradictory to the feminist perspective. I hope that this masculine/feminine subject can be further explored when discussing the second part of the novel.

Social-Economical or Sexual? Maybe Both

I was very intrigues by the discussion in Tuesday's class about Fight Club. It led me to think about how the social and gender issues in Fight Club relate to today's world. I discussed earlier in a post about the connection of the social and economic sphere in today’s world most notably portrayed in The Great Transformation by Karl Polanyi. Throughout human history, the economies that have emerged have always been a subcategory of the social environment in which that culture lives, and have never, until recently, become intertwined or even mask the importance of social wealth Saving the details and redundancy, Polanyi, in 1941, foresaw that consumerism in a capitalist society will eventually breed anarchy as the economy becomes interlinked in society and those unfortunate citizens who are defined socially by their economic characteristics will revolt. This is obviously portrayed vigorously in Fight Club. It is a fact of nature. There are always people who will reject the status quo, some who quietly oppose it, and some who accept the changes. The bottom line is that change takes generations, and very important life lessons are learned as one grows up. The discussion of father and mother roles in development, the Oedipus complex, and the way these theories apply to the way a person thinks and acts when they become mature is strong evidence to support these claims. People who are left behind in a changing socially gender-egalitarian liberal society will often reject the current norms. If a man grows up with a father that portrays women as sexual objects or in any way shape or form inferior to males, that man will probably develop sexist thoughts, and may even act on those thoughts. It is an unfortunate circumstance that our society deals with while we positively deal with highly necessary gender-equality issues.

The opposite of this may even be true. What if a woman grows up without a mother? or a father for that matter. How will this affect her development of thoughts on gender when she is older? These questions are highly prone to interpretation, but important to understand why the family and society in which any human is exposed to can affect their thoughts and decisions in life.

As for the notion that Palahniuk purposefully left out women in his novel, and movie adaptation, I’m not complaining. The books powerful meaning and violence was probably intended to be read more by men. The fact that women are left out for the most part in the fight clubs and projects is just a way the author strengthened his audience’s interest in the book. It is possible that portraying women as “uninvolved” or “unimportant” may have been a way of reaching out to the sexist or testosterone fueled viewers simply because it might have been a more economical way of selling the book or movie; another example about how economics takes precedence over social justification in our society. It is not wrong to choose to write a novel incorporating just one sex. I’m sure there are books out there that do just the opposite. I look at it like this, if you don’t like it, then don’t watch it because the U.S. is still based on freedom or speech and choice.

Another way to look at the role of women in the movie or novel is perhaps this…Palahniuk, in my opinion, displays a strong, yet abbreviated message about women’s role in this changing society of alternative fist therapies. When Marla attends the Testicular cancer groups, she displays the authors feelings about how women are equally in command of the decisions made in this society. It was a notion strengthening gender equality, but as you can see, the narrator was furious that Marla had interfered, or effectively “castrated” him to the one true thing that the narrator had left to identify himself as different; his male reproductive system. When he was alone in this group, he could set himself above the others in the room and feed off of their sorrow because he could officially call himself a “superior” male over the other males, but when Marla joined, she compromised his sexual identity and right to fell like he belonged to an exclusive social class of the operable male phallus. This was a huge message to convey within this novel, and it was essential to relating the narrator’s slipping grip with reality and the reasons he felt he needed to find a new solution in finding his superior male identity. Marla was integral to the movie and its message, as messed up and ethically wrong as it may be, this often how males think in our society.

I like to think of myself a s a realist, instead of denying the status quo or trying to change it, I try to understand the real meaning behind why things are the way they are. I often find myself in the middle of a conversation between men who might not look around to see who is there before speaking. It is socially acceptable, especially among young or uneducated men in our society, to discuss their sexist ideologies with each-other. This is reality, and I have yet to hear any male on the receiving end of this type of language to stop the other and tell them that they are being sexist or demeaning to women. This is just my experience, which may differ from someone else’s, but I’m sure that it is credible. The fact that movies like Fight Club and Crash expose the reality of our society is incredible. It helps people understand both sides of the issue at hand and ACTUAL methods to solve them, instead of demanding instant gratification, especially in Crash, where the movie includes many forms of discrimination along with racism and sexism. If discriminating people can’t see how extreme instances of their mindset can affect others, then they probably wouldn’t consider changing their ways.

In conclusion, I would say that I completely agree with Beckyloo’s post, Fight club is far more about the male struggle with societal changes, and shouldn’t be confused with anything to do with feminism. I also agree that the “constricting” society (which by the way is the worst word to describe it considering that most laws and norms accepted by societies throughout the world has focused on “freedom” from oppression and attempts to satisfy what we call “basic human rights.”) creates problems for both genders where aggression may need to be relieved. On the contrary, the novel did indirectly relate to themes men express in reality about losing their “power position” to women through equality. No person likes to lose their wealth or power to anyone, unless of course they are an egalitarian radical, most uncommon amongst today’s world. The problem with this mindset in males is that they didn’t lose anything! They are only jealous that women have the same rights as them! It is an ignorant and selfish point of view that exists in the modern world. My point is that the narrator and his posse were rejecting the economical norms of their society and wished to make themselves equal to others, throwing in the biased oxymoron belief that men are naturally supposed to be the “equally-superior” sex based only on their physical strength prowess. It would be interesting to see what this novel would have conveyed had it been written by a woman.