Why Do Men Like Attractive Women ??

[Miss M]

Hey Carnatic, nice to see you again.

 

You make some interesting points, but I also never intended to make this a discussion about whether different types of "attractions" are better/worse, or shallower. I just thought the OP's questions were interesting. And I also thought it was interesting to look at how our "primal urges" in regard to selection and attraction of our partners gets interspersed, overridden, derailed, or defeated by the other primal urges like fear, or a sense of deprivation, or even shades of other emotional urges. If a primal urge is to natually choose what looks symmetrical, healthy, beautiful, I find it interesting that emotional fear (another primal urge) is powerful enough to override that, and causes someone to purposefully choose what's ugly, sickly, or even abusive and harmful. We now seem to be governed by so many conflicting and out-of-whack primal urges that it's all an odd mish-mash that just can't be explained easily or simply.

[Miss M]

It's heartening though that some people are prepared to step back from this attractiveness virtue and look for other, more relevant characteristics, but this is still sexual selection at the end of the day, just on different grounds

Carnatic, I also should add...

Yes, I tend to look beyond the surface for something "attractive," but I agree, that even that's yet another type of primordial urge. I'm really intensely uncomfortable, insecure and fearful around people who never go beneath the surface of things. And yes, I absolutely feel safe and secure around those who look deeper into the soul of a person. I tend to look beneath the surface, and I'm intensely attracted to the types of guys who also look beneath the surface. So yes, at the most basic level, even that is also a primal urge. And I also have other fear-based emotional primal urges that defeat me as well, because I've most often ended up with emotional abusers, guys with whom I was completely incompatible for long-term survival.

[DN]

Carnatic, I also should add...

Yes, I tend to look beyond the surface for something "attractive," but I agree, that even that's yet another type of primordial urge. I'm really intensely uncomfortable, insecure and fearful around people who never go beneath the surface of things. And yes, I absolutely feel safe and secure around those who look deeper into the soul of a person. I tend to look beneath the surface, and I'm intensely attracted to the types of guys who also look beneath the surface. So yes, at the most basic level, even that is also a primal urge. And I also have other fear-based emotional primal urges that defeat me as well, because I've most often ended up with emotional abusers, guys with whom I was completely incompatible for long-term survival.

 

That's very interesting because it seems very contradictory. Which feelings and emotions so often are.

 

When you look beneath the surface of the emotionally abusive guys what do you see? And when they look beneath your surface, what do they see?

[itsallgrand]

Just a silly little thought of mine...

 

-at 18 I thought attractive was youth and beauty

-at 22 I thought attractive was passionate, hot, and sexy

-at 25 I thought attractive was sexy, beautiful, and someone with strong values

-at 27 I think attractive is kind, warm, caring, sharing similiar goals as me, and sexy, and ....on and on.

 

What is attractive to us changes, does it not?

 

When I am 40, I want to make sure I am with someone who isn't in the mindset that youth and beauty are the only gauge of attractiveness. Y'know, attractive=being able to have babies.

'Cause if that were so, I would not be considered attractive as I got older!

 

I have been attracted to sick people in the midst of illness. It's interesting to think about.

I'd like to believe that I could be attractive even if I were ill or unable to have babes, too ( to someone who wasn't messed-up in the head, either.)

 

Maybe, just maybe, we are partially in control of our own sense of attraction....who we are and how we choose to develop influencing who we get the hots for. Self-conditioning! ?

[Dako]

itsall,

You mean the attractiveness of others isn't dictated by advertising aimed at 20somethings? You mean the reproductive urges of hormonal kids isn't the rule here? You mean porn isn't the master plan of a happy life?

 

You mean we all get a vote?

Have you gone senile?

[itsallgrand]

LOL. Senility is bliss.

Now where did I leave those condoms?

[Miss M]

That's very interesting because it seems very contradictory. Which feelings and emotions so often are.

I totally agree. And that's why I've spent years in therapy trying to figure it out

 

When you look beneath the surface of the emotionally abusive guys what do you see? And when they look beneath your surface, what do they see?

The answers aren't simple, and can't be adequately explained here, but a few key points comes to mind right now...

 

I figured out that in the guys, I saw something that was better than what was actually there. That's because even in the worst people there is also some good, and it seems I fixated on that and was too optimistic about what I saw. Scoping out the "good" was basically a coping mechanism learned in childhood while trying to survive an emotionally abusive family. In childhood I had learned to detect the tiniest bits of good, fiercely latch onto that, as a way to survive. And not adequately doing that meant anniliation.

 

And in myself, I saw something that was actually worse than what was there, a very inaccurate interpretation of myself. In order to survive an abusive childhood, I also had learned to devalue, diminish, self-abandon, self-hate. I learned that doing those things in opposition to myself (self-defeat) were paramount to my most basic survival... In other word, just the classic abuse victim programming, "Stockholm Syndrome." And it doesn't make any sense to anybody who hasn't lived it.

 

And when they look beneath your surface, what do they see?

As far as I could tell (in hindsight), they saw someone accomodating, compliant, self-sacrificing, but also self-accusing, self-blaming, someone who didn't adequately value herself. From what I've learned that's typically what abusers look for, someone "nice" who doesn't know she's nice, someone who can be persuaded to perceive herself as a villainess, someone who can be convinced that she's responsible for the bad feelings and bad behavior of another.

 

This is the short answer... and yeah, it's all very contradictory and complicated, but even all of that contradictory and complicated stuff is yet steeped in the natural primoridal urges.

 

======================

 

You mean the attractiveness of others isn't dictated by advertising aimed at 20somethings? You mean the reproductive urges of hormonal kids isn't the rule here? You mean porn isn't the master plan of a happy life?

I happen to think all of those things are also key factors. Insidious advertisers are absolute geniuses at manipulating the basic primordial urges.

[DN]

Actually, MissM, it was a very self-aware explanation and well expressed. Something is going right with the therapy.

 

It's also interesting that you used the word survival here:

In order to survive an abusive childhood

 

Because this whole topic is about the primordial survival instinct - that of the individual and of the species.

[hopelesslee]

My response is...that is a sweeping generalization. Men like attractive women, but they also like unattractive women. I don't think there's much to it--if you like someone, you like someone. If a guy is incredibly superficial, then obviously he will like someone who is very attractive. However, shallow guys are sometimes not even motivated by the attractiveness of a girl...instead they decide to pursue her because of her social status, her aura of confidence in herself (even if she is ugly), or because she refuses to give them a second glance.

 

So...I don't think it's true that guys will choose an attractive woman over an unattractive woman...it has more to do with the way the women carry themselves and the specific history the guy has with each woman. In my experience, very attractive women are often more insecure than unattractive women...which essentially cancels out their beauty.

 

Don't stress over something like this, because while it is true sometimes that men prefer attractive women, in my experience it is most definitely not always the case.

[Tesseract_Witch]

I mean, there is no difference between an attractive woman and an unattractive one.

 

No difference? Look at your prefix; "unattractive."

It's what you make "attractive" or "unattractive."

[Pippa]

Look the answer is simple!

 

Men like attractive women.......because they are better to look at!! LoL

 

Boom boom!

[Carnatic]

My response is...that is a sweeping generalization. Men like attractive women, but they also like unattractive women. I don't think there's much to it--if you like someone, you like someone. If a guy is incredibly superficial, then obviously he will like someone who is very attractive.

 

I take exception to that comment, my argument before was that being attracted to physcially attractive women does not make a man superficial (or vice versa). I agree with the rest of what you say about different people wanting different things for different reasons; it just annoys me somewhat when guys who look only at a girl's personality and totally disregard the way she looks (and vice versa) take the moral high ground and seem to talk to the rest of us as though they are better than everyone else (I'm not saying you are one of these people, your comment just seemed to support that view)

 

Anyone who values physical appearance in the sex they are attracted to can also and probably will also look at a whole host of other things, none of these methods of sexual selection are better or worse than any other, but somehow physical attractiveness seems to be endlessly villified.

[Miss M]

Sometimes I have this insane fantasy of being able to peel back the skin of everyone on the planet just to see how we would all look and act. Ah, but I guess that's just me having a fantasy about "going past the surface stuff" again.

 

Also the words "superficial" and "shallow" can be viewed as descriptions, not disdainful judgments. Those words can just mean "on the surface" and "not deep," but that's not necessarily villifying anyone.

 

And despite all the various points of view in a discussion about it, I don't think anyone can force himself to feel attracted to what he's not.

 

Mrocza once wrote a post in a thread titled "Unattractive Men" and her words stayed with me, and always come to mind at times like this...

 

 

I also had a friend who had the reverse experience of Mrocza. She went from being quite ugly to being drop-dead gorgeous because of corrective dental surgery. She also was very turned-off by the hordes of men who flocked to her after the surgery. After years of feeling painfully ignored and rejected by men, she was then insulted by their subsequent interest because she felt it had nothing at all to do with the person she was on the inside.

[Carnatic]

Interesting stuff, I've only had the most minor change in the way I look, and that was more a fashion thing, I have noticed the difference in the way people behave towards you though. Can't say I resent it.

 

I should make an extra comment in case anyone thinks I'm trying to kick up a flame war. Hopelesslee's comment wasn't really inflammatory, it just made me want to make that point as it reminded me how much it annoys me when someone with whom I'm discussing a girl we might have seen dismisses her as boring, nothing between the ears just because she is attractive.

 

I value looks in a girl, I also value other things and I'm aware that other people value different things; and that some don't value looks at all. It just gets to me a little when people take the moral high ground and assume that becuase I value looks then I am shallow and materialistic.

[Alexi]

I think to what extent you value looks is the big thing. If thats all you go for then that is shallow & materialistic but from your explination you dont.

[Miss M]

I've only had the most minor change in the way I look, and that was more a fashion thing, I have noticed the difference in the way people behave towards you though. Can't say I resent it.

And I can also make a minor change, perhaps a pair of sparkly earrings, and I notice the difference too. So yeah, "attraction" is a "good" thing, in the right amounts, and in the right perspective.

 

Hopelesslee's comment wasn't really inflammatory, it just made me want to make that point as it reminded me how much it annoys me when someone with whom I'm discussing a girl we might have seen dismisses her as boring, nothing between the ears just because she is attractive.

And I've had quite a few times when I've been "challenged" by men (complete strangers) to prove that I have a brain. Yeah, they wanted evidence that I wasn't just a pretty face. That kind of impromptu challenge is also an "interesting" experience, and also a HUGE insult. In other words, the same mindless idiots that are annoying you in that way, are also annoying to her. (So, does that tell you anything?

 

I value looks in a girl, I also value other things and I'm aware that other people value different things; and that some don't value looks at all. It just gets to me a little when people take the moral high ground and assume that becuase I value looks then I am shallow and materialistic.

I agree with Alexi... if you could stop letting others opinions of you annoy you, you could actually be the kind of guy an attractive girl might find refreshing, and appealing. No matter how attractive a girl is, she still wants a good relationship where a guy values ALL of her. And yes, even an attractive woman would still appreciate it a LOT that a guy finds her attractive, so long as that's not the only thing he likes about her. So if you get a girl and also think she's attractive, and you also value her intellect, emotions, all the rest... well yeah, that could be a seriously good combo from her point of view as well. And it's not like you'd even have a lot of guys to compete with you at that level because attractive women encounter an excess of idiot guys. She might actually be very grateful to finally encounter a guy who stands out from the crowd. (and C, it seems you and I have had this kind of conversation before? )

[Carnatic]

(and C, it seems you and I have had this kind of conversation before? )

 

We seem to have it all the time, don't worry I take it in, the fact that people might have opinions of me that annoy me doesn't make me want to react to it in a way that might put girls off.

[DN]

Stay on topic please everyone.

[poetsheart]

Iceberg couldn't have said it any better... Brad Pitt, Fat Bastard.... lol.