Feedback on the controversial article ‘The Prince and the Porker’ (Briefing #293).
Candy or Depardieu?
If Ms McPhearson’s experience of her husband’s and her friend’s husband’s view of female bodies is true, she and her friend both have my deepest, male sympathies. But let’s be honest with ourselves! Is it only men that are guilty of this crime? As a “fat and ugly” (not my words) bachelor, I daily live with the fact that I won’t find a wife until I lose weight—a fact told to me not only by a Christian woman but by a Christian woman who is actually in full-time ministry teaching other Christian women!
Your Elle states that she is trying not to become bitter and twisted in her marriage context. This John Candy is trying not to be bitter and twisted about his bachelorhood, about the way Christians are more image-focused than unbelievers, and trying not to be angry at God, Romans 9:20-21 style.
Please Briefing, some balance! Not all men are shallow and it’s not just the men who are guilty of such shallowness!
John Candy (or Gerard Depardieu?)
Email
Men beautiful on the inside
An anonymous male friend of the pseudonymous female Briefing contributor (Feb 2003) said, “All men want to marry beautiful women, but because most can’t, they settle for second best.”
She couldn’t believe he said this; but as we know it is a sad fact of life.
The important thing is that it is consistent with taking the Bible seriously. There are plenty of men who take 1 Peter 3:1-7 very seriously indeed. They want to marry beautiful women, “like Sarah, who obeyed Abraham and called him her master.” But because such women (beautiful on the inside) are so hard to find, the men settle for second best—beautiful on the outside!
I agree with the contributor: “If girls knew what matters most to men is what is on the inside, perhaps the fashion, dieting and cosmetic industries would collapse. But I can’t even imagine that happening in a Walt Disney movie!”
Women, think hard, am I wrong!
Professor Henry Higgins
Email
Appearances matter too much to Elle
Unlike McPhearson, who has a random sample of one (excluding herself) to base her argument on, I checked with some Christian husbands, and not one said their marriage vows would be on “shaky ground” if their wives were 15 kilograms over their ideal body weight. Either that or they weren’t willing to admit otherwise. The concept of men needing to be kept is rather patronising. Would McPhearson also like us to believe Wayne Carey’s behaviour is “typically male”?
I will continue to thank and praise God for you Elle, that you have not let bitterness and feelings of being “twisted” destroy your marriage. To your husband “it must be hell living with Elle”, knowing your wife can only “sometimes” wear size 10 clothes.
I will ask the same question to Elle that she asks of men. “Do appearances matter too much to you?” Do you take seriously the way the Bible adorns women? Can you be radically different to the world at this point? It appears from her article Elle’s answers are “yes”, “no” and “no”.
Peter Lloyd
Asquith, NSW
And a woman’s perspective
I think I should preface this letter by saying that I am five months pregnant and feeling like a fat cow. However, I found the article, ‘The Prince and the Porker’ infuriating and most unhelpful. I am really disappointed that your magazine ran the article.
I understand the purpose of the article, that is, to suggest that men should ‘own’ women’s obsession with weight as their problem. But I disagree with the points the author made and quite frankly feel that she and her friends have settled for second best in the husband stakes rather than the other way around!
Few of my female friends have perfect bodies and none of us have ever lived under the illusion that we have—especially since bearing the odd child or two. However, we have lived with husbands who have accepted our imperfections, as we have theirs, knowing that there’s so much more to a person and a relationship than physical appearance. Having come to terms with this situation, reading the article made me (and 99% of my friends) wonder whether our husbands had been lying to us all this time? I think not. I don’t believe my husband has been less honest than others. Rather, I think Elle McPhearson (very wise to use a pseudonym) has a problem—what on earth does she have to complain about if she’s able to wear size 12 clothes, sometimes, size 10? Nothing, except that she’s exactly the kind of woman who fuels other women’s obsession with weight. Those of us who select clothes from the other end of the rack think that if someone like her is worrying about her weight then we had better, too.
Michelle Dudley
Doncaster, VIC
A feast awaits us
It began with a rich contentment where size was not the issue. Joy, pleasure, plenty and fulness were simply to be enjoyed with thankfulness. After that one significant piece of fruit, which was taken with lust, desire and rebellion in the back of the throat, the eating became complex, spoiled, confusing and full of regret and sorrow.
There’ll be a day when the unthinkable will happen. We will feast without guilt. We will be ourselves without shame. We will relate without fear. We will work together again, on the basis of beautiful complementarity. We will not compare differences out of a sense of competition, but enjoy them and delight in each other’s uniqueness. We will have the wonderful freedom of self-forgetfulness—lost in absorption of the Creator. Who cares what size we will be?
Rhonda Watson
Haberfield, NSW
And Interchange on the Interchange …
I was disturbed by the advice that “John Candy/Gerard Depardieu” received from the female in full-time ministry regarding his excess weight as a reason for his ongoing singleness. It made me wonder whether the same woman would offer a similar reason for Jesus’ singleness? He after all was notoriously ugly (Isaiah 53:2). If only Jesus looked a bit more like he did in the movies, maybe he would’ve been snapped up at an earlier age and been able to avoid all that nasty cross business.
On a more serious note, Jane Tooher’s article on self-esteem was really good, and a helpful corrective to our society’s self-obsession. One thing I notice is that at certain key points the Bible applies the language of beauty not to individuals but to the entire church—see, for example, Ephesians 5:25-27 and Revelation 21:1-2. This beauty is a moral purity not an external prettiness. It means that my beauty is found not in the mirror, but in the holiness and goodness of the people of God. So we have even less reason for narcissistic individualism.
Gordon Cheng
