"I've always loved comics," Rebecca Burch enthuses. “I still have a huge box of them from my childhood. I love the Marvel and DC movies. But I really worry when I see my nephew, who has a closet full of superhero suits, with abs and biceps stitched in. What will he think of that when he's an adolescent trying to attain these in the real world? And he's a little guy, so I don't think he's going to get there."
Burch, Associate Professor of Human Development at New York State University, is joking, but her concern is real. When she conducted a study three years ago of the physical dimensions of 3,752 Marvel comic characters, she found not only that-as measured by body mass index female superheroes tended to be underweight, but the male ones tended technically to be obese. More particularly, their ratios-notably of shoulder width to waist, creating that classic inverted triangle-just weren't realistic.
"More than that, they're unattainable," she says. "They're absurd. You might imagine that they're just bodybuilder big. But these proportions are not possible in reality. On the one hand that lets people off the hook to know that. But the problem is that they shape our conception of the physical ideal now, and with it the idea that this level of muscularity is what a 'hero' should look like."
この記事は Esquire Singapore の November 2022 版に掲載されています。
7 日間の Magzter GOLD 無料トライアルを開始して、何千もの厳選されたプレミアム ストーリー、9,000 以上の雑誌や新聞にアクセスしてください。
すでに購読者です ? サインイン
この記事は Esquire Singapore の November 2022 版に掲載されています。
7 日間の Magzter GOLD 無料トライアルを開始して、何千もの厳選されたプレミアム ストーリー、9,000 以上の雑誌や新聞にアクセスしてください。
すでに購読者です? サインイン
THE MILD HANGOVER
Hangovers get a bad rap. We know. If you’ve gotten this far in the magazine, you’ve surely divined that we’re mildly hungover most of the time.
AN ELECTRIC FUTURE
Polestar, the minimalist electric Swedish car brand, turns the voltage up on its competition.
LET'S GET REAL (ESTATE): LUXURIOUS LONDON
Royalty, shopping, the best tea and scones the world has to offer, and a lifestyle worthy of what you're working for. Here's why London is ripe for your next investment
NEXT UP....ZARAN VACHHA
As Co-founder of the events and talent agency Collective Minds and Managing Director of the Mandala Masters, Zaran Vachha is definitely not new to the culture scene, but he's certainly shaping what comes next.
WHAT I'VE LEARNED...
I DON’T WEAR SOCKS except in January.
The Body Is a Language
A bad handshake is such a turnoff; we feel irked when someone rolls their eyes at us; we can't stop pacing when we're nervous-ever wondered how certain body language has the power to change how we feel instantly? We explore why.
EYE OF THE TIGER
Hailing from Singapore, Japan and Brazil respectively, Evolve Mixed Martial Arts (MMA) athletes Darren Goh, Hiroki Akimoto and Alex Silva are proof that the ring demands as much from mind as it does from matter.
THE ADONIS COMPLEX
With the rise of superhero culture making a return and bringing with it the celebration of the classically ‘masculine’ body type, can men really overcome the pressure to conform when culture keeps getting in the way?
FUNNY BUT TRUE
A comedian, an iconic Singaporean, and now a man much evolved. After overcoming two years of pandemic limbo, unlocking career milestones one after another and undergoing a life-defining physical transformation, Rishi Budhrani is ready to emerge into the world renewed-and anew.
LIKE NO OTHER
With its horological triumphs, Hermès has truly come into its own as a watchmaking maison. In this exclusive interview with Esquire Singapore, CEO of Hermès Horloger, Laurent Dordet sheds some light on his timepieces' rising stardom and the importance of being different.
