If steroids are one hidden aspect of bodybuilding’s appeal, so too are its obvious associations with gay culture. This is partly the secret success of body building: its assertion of martial discipline and self-control combined with the invitation to look, to gaze upon and appreciatively asses other men's bodies. There is the frisson in Pumping Iron of the male gaze turning away from the Chicken (Cort) to the Beefcake (Schwarzenegger).
And it is to the male gaze that we will now turn.
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