I found this absolutely remarkable photoshop job that compares Arnold and Ron Coleman at their primes.
It's easy to think, "hey, maybe they took one of the best Arnold pics and matched it against the worst of Coleman's and make Ron look bad," right? Actually, the Coleman pic was taken from the 2000 Mr. Olympia, which incidentally, he won.
It just goes to show there's been a transformation in the aesthetics of the bodybuilding world, and it rhymes with "steroids!"
To be as clear as possible: the problem isn't just bad pharmacology, because chemicals have always played a role in bodybuilding and sports. Rather, the problem is how they've transformed the exercise patterns of bodybuilders, how they've gone from a supplementary role to the centerpiece of training. Previously, bodybuilders trained year-round. Now, bodybuilders train for several weeks prior to a competition and pump their bods full of chemicals. The winner isn't the person that's trained the hardest, but the guy with the genetics to blow up like a sponge in a few weeks with heavy training.
The problem isn't just steroids, but how bodybuilding has totally deviated from ideals of health and beauty and has started to speak its own language. Mass and training have become ends in and of itself, and the press (notably the mysoginistic, homophobic IRONMAN) have become so insular. Because of the development of bodybuilding as a niche subculture that speaks its own language, there's an extreme lack of introspection. Nobody ever tells these guys, "y'know, your thighs look like a bagful of cats." A generation or two ago, bodybuilders produced movie stars like Steve Reeves and Lou Ferrigno; it'd be impossible to do this today.
The net result of all this is an unwholesome, bloated, somewhat grotesque appearance with big roid guts. For heaven's sake, look at Ron's calves and compare them to Arnold's: they look like a bag stuffed full of cats.
What happened to the idea of bodybuilding promoting a physically healthy, attractive ideal male body? Ron, the winner of the Mr. Olympia and thus the poster boy for the entire culture, has an unattractive body with an emphasis on mass alone, trained and bloated by pharmacology with a build that is something like the human evolutionary equivalent of a peacock's tail, without the peacock's tail's attractiveness.
It's worth noting the only truly good looking bodybuilding men are the naturals: Konstantin Ruzanov, Ulisses Jr., Denis Sergovisky, Mike O'Hearn.
2 comments:
Much as I love musclemen, I've never felt very attracted to them when they're in 'competition' shape. I think it's the low bodyfat ratio that weirds me out. It makes the muscles too defined to the point where they start looking less like a whole body and more like a bunch of rocks heaped together in the shape of a man. Roids worsen the effect and make them look like more like a pile of bloated balloons.
there has definitely been a push over the years to MOAR!!!11 mass, etc, size bulk. I think its a natural phenomenon for men to push towards the extremes, though it does make the sport feel more like a circus in a certain respect.
The fact is, there are more bodybuilders today going to these bodybuilding events. they take steroids, even if they dont compete, and they're huge (bodybuilding events are great places to see big hot bodybuilders off-stage) I think that in order to compete with the spectators, champion bodybuilders have to out-do the audience and judges (who are all big already)thus the push to the extreme.
Bob Paris might be up your alley, since he seemed to be more interested in the aesthetics than the sheer mass
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