Silly Science: Hourglass Figure Not Good for Women

"Best Female Figure Not an Hourglass"
LiveScience (December 3, 2008)

"An imperfect body might be just what the doctor ordered for women and key to their economic success, an anthropologist now says.

"While pop culture seems to worship the hourglass figure for females, with a tiny waist, big boobs and curvy hips à la Marilyn Monroe, this may not be optimal, says Elizabeth Cashdan of the University of Utah.

"That's because the hormones that make women physically stronger, more competitive and better able to deal with stress also tend to redistribute fat from the hips to the waist...."

The scientist who thought that up has at least one oar in the water. The next paragraph says: "So in societies and situations where women are under pressure to procure resources and otherwise bring home the bacon, they may be less likely to have the classic hourglass figure, Cashdan hypothesizes in the December issue of the journal Current Anthropology...."

Elizabeth C. may be right, but this sounds a lot like the 'women are men, or should be' feminism of the sixties and seventies.

There's More to Life Than Hunting and Gathering

I don't question the facts: a woman who had to rely on her own resources for running down antelope and digging up roots might be better off with a mannish physique.

On the other hand, I have trouble imagining a woman who looked like Marilyn Monroe or Dolly Parton needing to rely strictly on her own food-gathering abilities, as long as there was a marginally healthy man in the general area.

Besides, it doesn't matter if Ms. He-Man is an incredibly capable hunter, if she doesn't have children. Evolutionary scientists seem to recognize that "survival of the fittest" "...deals with the reproductive success of the organisms, not solely their relative strength or speed." And, for Homo sapiens sapiens, it does look like a woman's ratio of body fat is a fertility factor.