Is there an “ideal” male body? A case against the inactive

In this essay, I make a case that men should work on their body in a way that strengthens it. In addition to this, I provide my own experiences and will share photos of myself (waist up) to prove that I am not only arguing from theory but experience. Lastly, I make a case against being inactive: making a call that all human beings should at minimum consistently engage in some sort of physical activity no matter how miniscule. If you feel uncomfortable with seeing a man shirtless, I advise you click off now.

Mankind is latent with potential. Like the block of marble that had been destined to be carved into the statue of Heracles: each and every person has the likewise ability to grow into what “they are”. If another species exists other than humanity that can consciously decide to be (or not to be) something, I ask the reader to provide me one. Humanity’s ability to intentionally guide the direction of its development can be considered a blessing— or for the more secular among us, a privilege.

However, despite our innate potential modern mankind does seem to suffer from something. Certain thought-forms persistently exist in some people: “I was not born perfect, therefore I will give up”; “I did not get it right the first time, therefore I was not cut out for it”; “I tried, and failed. Therefore I would never succeed.” in such a way that can be labelled as self destructive. We can say an individual who persistently suffers these thoughts is affected by a fatalist conception of the world: a mentality of victimhood and self pity that serves to erode rather than realize innate potential within him.

If it is not a waste to never realize what is latent within us, I cannot find an example. We cannot discount a waste in never allowing individuals to be pushed forward: an internal dialogue of ever-increasing aspiration and ambition is not necessarily harmful. What excuses should we provide ourselves then, when we sit, wait and or wallow expecting something “to happen”? Or, worse even, decide to work actively against what aptitude we do have for whatever reasons? Do these excuses really end in helping us achieve tenable, real-world results that we can say positively influences our lives?

Of all things latent, the physical body is the most obvious: evident by its ability to grow. The physical body is additionally integral for our presence in the world. At least, we rely on it everyday for absolutely everything if we wish to move things “in this reality”. Assume a famous philosopher philosophizing and giving a famous lecture while dead (and not waking up), or a particularly influential person being unable to enjoy the gifts of his or her work because they are in failing health. This physical body we “inhabit” is the medium we use to interact with the world around us. A famous saying exists, “mind over matter”: however mind could not exist nor influence it’s surroundings without the ability of the body. It is a strong argument, therefore, that to care for one’s body as much as one’s mind is not a bad idea (indeed, I take it as a good idea).

Why are there people who exist, then, that disregard a mind-body connection? Moreover, why do people exist saying health exists “at all levels” or as “anything”? It is absolutely not the case that health, or the direction to realize one’s bodily potential, exists as an expression of just “anything”. Most commonly, this latter point of view is often held by self-described “fat-activists” and or a portion of the body positivity movement. I can go into why I think they believe what they do in later parts of this essay, but for now let’s just assume they do so out of laziness or just being a victim to their circumstances.

It should be stated here that I subscribe, and very heartily, to an objective conception of health: id est, it is strength, fitness, and longevity. I do not want “strength”, “fitness”, and “longevity” to be muddied or subject to what I consider post-modern solipsism (and in my opinion the working of people who would rather argue over semantics than hold themselves accountable for destroying their lives) so I will describe strength as the capacity to produce force with ease at will, fitness the ease and tenacity we can continue to perform physically demanding tasks, and longevity as the body’s ability to continue on functioning without any significant problems (like Diabetes, heart disease, broken bones, mental disease, et cetera).

To assert people do not exercise or take care of themselves because they are lazy, unmotivated or victims to whatever afflicts them is an inflammatory remark. With the exception of circumstances people cannot change I don’t argue this stance is particularly hard to come by. We all, after all, have probably come across times where we went against our better judgment, and acted in ways we likely came to regret. We understand, also, that our choices are ours to make. We cannot, therefore, shift responsibility away from ourselves onto something else. We recognize intuitively that we ourselves are responsible for our own life choices. Any words aside this likely result from some sorts of cognitive dissonance.

To make regrettable decisions, those things we do not want, consistently, however, can be a problem. Forgiveness for one’s self for making poor choices can only go so far. We operate in a world consisting of bottom lines, ultimately. Nature itself is often binary: e.g. zero sum. It is hard to argue consistently that humanity, a subject to nature, and society— a construction from subjects of nature— operate on a fundamentally totally different level. It, too, is an unfortunate reality that we are defined not by our thoughts but our actions. We can desire to be whatever we want but it takes movement in the real world to achieve what we want.

To avoid doing something just because it is difficult is weak. Hopefully we all understand that being weak is bad. There does seem to be some mental illness affecting the youth, particularly my generation, that trying is weak— or some strange thing passed around during and after the 2020 COVID pandemic that being weak is “good”? I have my own reservations and theories on where this comes from (odd that trying is weak and being weak is bad for one camp, yet being weak is good for another: yet both refuse to try because it espouses weakness? These two viewpoints that claim to support each other lead to a contradiction if set beside one another.) but I do believe the pandemic itself had a strain on everyone’s mental health as a whole. As a result, most people are probably lingering out of some sort of neuroses that they have yet to still fully recover from. Just know I abhor whatever mentality this is named.