I agree with this but I think there’s an opposite tendency in the way women are viewed/validated—the idea of “effortless beauty,” that it’s more admirable for a woman to be skinny & perfect without doing any work to get that way (or without appearing to). Many men think it’s lame for women to diet, and that it’s vain and shallow to put effort into your appearance—but of course they don’t want a fat, ugly girl. I would venture to guess that “working” to be attractive is more valued in all-female social spaces (where it’s part of normal conversation to validate others by talking about things you need to “fix” about yourself), but effortless perfection is often more valued in other contexts.
