food thing*

[emchy]

I was talking with pantryslut last night about the food blog
and how - it isn't a diet and it isn't a gender thing and yet
i am only seeing female identified people taking part
interesting

most of the guys i know work to not fall into gender stereotypes and such
but is there something about the food logging that seems especially gendered?

a way of being vulnerable around food, around how women are more used to watching their food, having other people watch their food and the knowledge of how it's socially accepted to judge and watch the food that women eat. is there something scary about logging what you eat and exposing it for a male person who wouldn't be used to it? i mean i know men do watch what they eat and judge it and have body image issues etc etc. but the fact that there are so many women on my flist doing it and no men - it does make me pause and wonder.

so maybe instead of theorizing i just ask - hey guys - why aren't any of you jumping on the bandwagon?


* i want to say there are women on my flist not doing it as well. i know this. i don't think people should or shouldn't do the project, this issue just struck me in conversation and i wanted to open it up for you smart people to talk / think about

Comments

[huskypapi.livejournal.com]

When I read the profile of the "project" - it was specifically geared towards women.

[cindymonkey.livejournal.com]

true - but it was also geared towards plus sized women and i am seeing a bunch of my thinner female friends informally taking part on their LJs...

i think that was what made me start thinking about the gender divide

the folks who are unofficially doing it, and noticing that none of them are guys

[imnotandrei.livejournal.com]

hey guys - why aren't any of you jumping on the bandwagon?


I suppose it's for several reasons:

First -- I don't do well with daily regular blog-type things. I've tried before, and regularly blown it. And this seemed like the sort of thing I should do all the way through.

Second -- I did not have the voice inside my head asking the very question you're now asking..."Why is it only the girls?". I can't say directly that I was avoiding being co-opting, because it wasn't that conscious -- but there is some of that, perhaps, involved. I wrote an essay a while back on the very subject of bear invisibility in fat activism, which appeared in Size Queen...

Third -- For various and sundry reasons, I am fairly private about what I eat (and yes, I know, part of the point of the project was to get away from that) -- though, ironically, it's more about waht I don't eat (like lunch, more than rarely) and the memory problems listed in reason #1 just exacerbate that...

[cindymonkey.livejournal.com]

i would love to see a copy of that essay - that is the train of thought i was on... i was / am feeling like there is a whole specter of people that have body image issues that are relevant to this conversation, relevant to size shame / acceptance that are invisible in this project

[justin42.livejournal.com]

too many other things going on to take this one on right now, for me, cuz food is a huge issue for me, and body image issues and such, and I wasn't willing to put it out there... also I hadn't read the project itself and only the posts of those participating or talking about it... and it seemed very mixed... and I wasn't sure I was invited... seeing what Dante says about it being geared towards women, I gotta say I'm extra sensitive to respecting that especially during the backlash aganst transmen being in women's spaces... I am more and more unwilling to set a toe anywhere near anything specifically geared towards women because of all the past painful stuff that came up around transmen being in women's spaces... and I remember my own feelings of being in one of SF's only dyke spaces and looking up and seeing guys ... how I felt so angry like we get one or two places in all of SF and you have to come take up space here, too... why? it made me mad. I never want to be that guy. I don't want to make someone else feel like that. but yeah, I have a ton of food issues and shame about it and my body and my diet... as much as anyone I know, regardless of gender... so I hear a lot that women have it worse and I couldn't speak to that.. my experience is obviously a little different, but 30+ years being seen as a woman and trying to be one, and now trying to live as a man, I see that men can be quieter about their feelings in general... we're not supposed to have feelings or fears... and we're not supposed to talk about stuff... and there's a ton of pressure and punishment and shame around that... it feels dire... I get extra quiet for fear of saying something wrong... could be my shit, but that's how I've seen it... men may not speak up as much about food issues/body issues/etc. but I think they're still there... or they are for me... is it on par with what women experience? dunno. guess it depends on the individual, their upbringing, etc. I continue to think we can't really generalize on gender lines or any other way... we miss too much of the complexity of the individual... there's a long answer that probably doesn't really answer your question and went off in a bunch of other directions... :)

[cindymonkey.livejournal.com]

actually it totally answers it. these all do. and it looks to me if the point of the project is to help people normalize food, take the shame away - it seems in some ways even more important to open it up in terms of gender...

interesting thoughts to chew on

[doriankatz.livejournal.com]

For me it is still hella weird to have an lj going at all. I've never been an open book kinda gal. Sometimes it seems like secrets and making art are the only things I have that are truly mine.
It is easier to blab on about the fact that I exercise regularly, have extremely volumptuous biceps and can jog easily now that I don't smoke a pack a day.

I enjoy reading and writing about the decadent foodstuff too-- like my new love of cooking with duck fat and your lists of cheeses tried.

[abostick59.livejournal.com]

For me, it seemed to be a lot of work for little apparent reward. Keeping track of the handful of Cheerios, the apple that was sitting in the bowl on the coffee table, another handful of Cheerios, the slice of dry salami, the handful of raisins, the crackers topped with slices of cheese, the slice of bread and butter, etc., etc., etc., that I snack on in the course of a typical day would require a lot of attention to detail. Too much bother.

[black-pearl-10.livejournal.com]

I 2nd that.

[rebwhy.livejournal.com]

simplistically, don't men just do and women process, rationalize, fret, worry, feel guilty and then do? while multi-tasking of course...
seriously though, it seems to me that in general men have a very different relationship to food than women do
and one that more resembles the one children have to food
i think most women's relationships to food are learned and largely negative
i long for the days when food was just food

this tracking of food thing is coming at an interesting time for me - during a cleanse where i am on a restricted diet - not quantity-wise, but content-wise - which is bringing up all sorts of food issues for me
i contemplated joining the blog... but i think i need to stop obsessing over food right now

[cindymonkey.livejournal.com]

i don't actually think that the relationship that men have to food is all that different - at least in the men i know. there is shame and concern and body image issues and it all gets coupled with the issue of being tough about it. of not talking. which is socially constructed and all the more reason to look at this critically.

the men are from mars thing i have found to be a total social construct in my experience and i like looking at the ways that the guys i know, who are for the most part feminist critically thinking men who try to not fall in lock step with the usual expectations of their gender.

funny - the effect the blog is having on me is less of a food obsession. i am becoming bored with paying attention to it...

[cindymonkey.livejournal.com]

ah there you have it - the men i am referring to are a mix of male identified queer bot straight and homo with a variety of bio origins

the straight bio men - as a group that tends to bring up peeps like my brother... and that is a whole different ball of wax

[substitute.livejournal.com]

I spent a year changing my dietary habits around so as not to get diabetes and die. As part of that I did foodlogging, but not on the Internet, just locally. It was very helpful. It just went more easily for me if it wasn't public, for some reason.

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

Thank you for the conversation, btw.

P.S. If men just do, and women fret, rationalize, process and then do, then no wonder I have gender issues -- I just do, and *then* I process, worry, fret, and rationalize :)

[expanding-x-man.livejournal.com]

Interesting question. Amy has brought up doing this before, as a helpful thing, and like some of the other guys here - I just thought it was "too much bother". Now, I do like to list, and list daily usually what I want to accomplish that day and that week. It helps me a lot. So, why is food different?

I didn't even pay attention to the fact that it was all women doing it, in fact - I haven't even looked at it but only know of its existence from my friends page. It just wasn't something I care to do or read.

I do have body issues, although I am lucky in that most of my life, I have largely conformed to the weight that is expected for one's gender. I was a slender female, and for many years, a slender male. I am now, a middle-aged guy, turning fifty in three months, who is about 25 pounds overweight by my own estimation. Some see it, other people laugh when I say I want to lose weight. But, believe me, I know very well the difference in look and feeling between my best weight (140-150 somewhere) and THIS, which is -- 175 lbs. on a 5'9" (almost) body. No, I am not obese, but I want to look my best. So, yea I got "body issues". I want more muscle too, of course, but I don't want to look like Hulk Hogan.

It would probably be helpful to journal food, but it seems so boring! Just boring! It feels painful to keep track of every freakin' thing I eat and then -- write it down!

I am not sure that has anything to do with being a guy, but frankly, I just eat and think later. I am not big into reading or thinking about food. I just eat it.

[expanding-x-man.livejournal.com]

That said, I've noticed that many FTMS at least, have workout journals. I also am considering one.

Not sure why that is different than chronicling my food intake, but yea - maybe it is more "manly" (I guess) except it does leave one open to ridicule as well, and scrutiny. After all, writing about one's attempt to become fit and buff often reveals all too acutely one's lack. All of sudden, in a workout journal, one's body is subject to scrutiny publicly. And, to being exhibited publicly as to one's progress or lack thereof.

Still, it seems more compelling and interesting than a food journal. I would not do it due to it's manliness, but I would for it's effectiveness. Also, it is more inherently of interest to me than food. I hate reading about recipes too ya know, and I dislike cooking. Although I am not a big sports fan, I admit I would rather watch boxing than a cooking show.

So, is that more info toward an answer? I don't know.

[pantryslut.livejournal.com]

Interesting comparison re: workout journals. I work out, but I have no interest in keeping a workout journal, none.

[amarama.livejournal.com]

I know there's at least one man in there, but he may be the only one. I wrote something related to this yesterday:

http://community.livejournal.com/incendiaryfood/41525.html?mode=reply

[crayonbeam.livejournal.com]

one of my non-female identified flist friends is doing the project, but I have to say that this person is not a typical average male

[claudimp.livejournal.com]

Hmmm. Well, partly, I'm having trouble so much as answering my email, this fall, never mind taking on new projects. So it hadn't really occurred to me, just on those grounds.

Also, when you publicly cop to being upset concerned about something, you're inviting people into the topic. And they'll generally come in, albeit often with the best & most caring intentions. I don't Do That -- if I've got a problem, I go off and brood darkly until I feel like I have a handle on What's Up. I suppose this may well be gendered behavior. It just feels like Me, though.

More specifically, I'm currently amping up the exercise, precisely in order to avoid changing my diet. Food is the last sensual pleasure I have, and I'm feeling very protective about it.

Don't know if any of this is germane -- but take it as a data point, from one guy who's overweight and not liking it but IDon'tWannaTalkAboutIt... <g>

[gordonzola.livejournal.com]

do you want my honest answer?

I find people's what-I-had-for-dinner posts, before this blog project even started, to be incredibly dull and I almost always scroll right past them. (I should note that is is different than discussions about food) I am not reading anyones, though i am reaing the dicussion about the process because I find that interesting.

I am no stranger to food issues, but what I eat in a given day is not what triggers me. I do think women are judged a lot more for their food intake than men and that there are socio-political reasons for it. This "art project" doesn't speak to me, but it obviously is speaking to a lot of (women) folks. though certainly not all or even most of my FL.

[cindymonkey.livejournal.com]

of course i want your honest answer...

and i scroll past them too

[gordonzola.livejournal.com]

I think it gets to the heart of why we have online journals. My LJ is decidedly not a diary. The fact that I am putting it out there for others to see makes me feel a responsibility not to bore people. not all my entries have been stellar, to be sure. But the cumulative effect on my friendspage this week has been dreadful.

I understand that not everyone does an Lj for the same reason I do, so I wouldn't have brought this up un-asked.

[cindymonkey.livejournal.com]

interesting - thanks for your honesty.