Integrating The Burning House

Jewel Woods is pissed that Venus and Serena Williams were left off the Australian Open's  official Most Beautiful Women at the Open list:

As the husband of a woman who looks like Venus and Serena, it offends me that my standards of beauty are not recognized or validated in professional sports. And as the father of a 6-year-old black girl who loves to run, jump, sweat, grimace, grunt and do all the things that are necessary for her to excel as an athlete, it pains me to think of the choices that will be forced upon her as she gets older because of these standards.

I have more sympathy for the latter than the former. I think, if I had a daughter, I'd spend a lot of time worrying about beauty standards. But here's the thing--if I were white I'd be doing the same thing. I guess I'd do more worrying as a black guy, but I've never been white, so I don't know.

Leaving aside the weirdness of judging an athlete by her appearance, my big problem with this argument is its rather cloying, begging nature. This is the old Malcolmite in me--I think Serena Williams is gorgeous by the light's of my standards (and Brett Ratner's. Jews FTW. Again.). Fuck their standards. Why do we care? Seriously is this the argument now, "Our women deserve to be leered over and have their professional achievements ignored too!!" Meh. Our ice melts just like their ice--just like all ice.