The decline in the amount of serious attention paid to love may be attributed in part to the fact that many of the great discourses on love belong to religious literature, and ours is a secular age. In part, it is because philosophy—the last great sanctuary of questions relating to the “soul” and the one discipline where love was addressed seriously—has itself largely been transformed and now addresses analytic and linguistic questions rather than metaphysical and transcendental concerns. And perhaps the twentieth-century response to love as a fit subject for discussion and thought has also to do with our rejection of what we see as the nineteenth century’s sentimentality and its animosity to sexuality. In fact, we have come to think of passionate love as symptomatic of the nineteenth century and the sentimental corollary of its repressive attitude towards sexuality. Hence, as we celebrate our own permissive sexuality we downplay the importance of love, demonstrating once more what is so evident in our own culture: the tendency to isolate sexuality, to reduce its contextual importance, even as we acknowledge our fascination with it.
The main reason for the virtual disappearance of discourse on love, though, is the enormous prestige of science in our age, and science’s propensity to value only that which it can explain. But that dismissal of what does not seem amenable to testing, quantification, verification, and replication, of what is judged to be sentimental or based on feeling, is itself often pseudoscientific, irrational. It denies what we know of the limits of reason, and of reason’s easy corruptibility by unconscious forces; and it ignores the finiteness of what we now “know” or can ever know. Even so, the pseudoscientific point of view remains very powerful, and it tends to discredit the immense importance of all passions and feelings in our lives.
E S Person, M.D
Dreams of Love and Fateful Encounters:
The Power of Romantic Passion
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 1:38 AM
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 2:05 AM
I'd say the girl in the poster you linked to probably has a .7 or thereabouts, the ratio the late Dev Singh found that men across cultures prefer. Why does this disturb you so?
PS Women with this WHR have been shown to be more fertile and healthier than women with more android WHRs, so having sex with a woman with an hourglass figure would increase your chances of spreading your genes.
Oh, and you're welcome. I was thinking of titling it "This One's For Crid," since it's been a long time since I posted Welder's Wife Tail.
Love has been downgraded by the emasculation of males.
Metro-sexuals. Emo-boys. Mixed PE in school that downplays male physical superiority. Males not allowed to express male emotions. The new myth that violence is evil and wrong. The demise of spanking which is an important tool of fathers that teaches young males their place in the pecking order. The increase in fatherless birth events and home life.
Look at the number of TV commercials and sit-coms that make men look silly and stupid!
There is not much left for women to love.
And now a woman can by a custom cock online....
Sheridan
at August 6, 2010 7:13 AM
> Women with this WHR have
> been shown to...
Right-right-right, they have much more love in their lives.
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 7:32 AM
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740141">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]
They're surely pursued more. What the research tells people on a practical level: Men look for a waist on women, and women who don't really have one or very much of one should affect one with a belt, etc. Also, women should never wear those mumu outfits, even if they're fat, because the waist is a very important area to the male eye.
You like to knock anything about sex/relationships that isn't ephemeral, and that's just silly. Some things can be measured, and it's usually or often helpful to have the measurements.
Conclusions:
The research summarized in this article validates the assertion that selection designed psychological mechanisms in humans to attend to bodily features that convey reliable information about phenotypic and genetic quality and to judge such bodily features as attractive. WHR is a reliable indicator of a woman's various aspects of reproductive capacity (postpubertal premenopausal status, hormonal status and probability of conception and parity), early sign of pregnancy, potential parasite infestation and risk for various diseases. Given that WHR is a heritable trait, an ancestral man selecting a mate with low WHR would have assured his offspring of high quality maternal care (lower risk for diseases) and the genetic gift of good health.
It could be the link between phenotypic quality and WHR that explains the appeal of an hour-glass figure with full breasts and wider hips set against a narrow waist. Women seem to know that the hour-glass figure is sexually appealing to men and attempt to highlight it by manipulating their waist size. When asked how they embellish their appearance around men, young women in the U.S. report "sucking in" their stomachs as the most frequently used tactic after facial makeup and clothing. Similarly, the past popularity of the corset, in spite of the internal injury it caused women, and the currently popularity of abdominoplasty (tummy tuck) are testimonials of the importance of waist size in defining a sexually attractive body. Alternately, women who wish to conceal their sexual attractiveness, such as executive businesswomen, choose clothing that hides rather than highlights their body shape. Nuns' habits, for example, disguise WHR and send a message to males that the women inside the costume are not potential sexual mates.
Yes, yes, but it ignores the boobies, which figure into the equation. So while HTW ratio may explain a sizable portion of the variance (and thus may trump cup size), adding cup size will likely explain the variance up to the 95th percentile.
I think we need to get a grant and...study this phenomena.
I R A Darth Aggie
at August 6, 2010 7:52 AM
> a very readable bit of the late
> Dev Singh
A-MY. Peer review isn't a fan club. The "readable" part is the problem, OK?
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 7:53 AM
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740152">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]
Crid, there's evidence that men go for women with this figure, and evidence that those women are healthier and more fertile, which would explain the evolved preference by men for this figure in women. Why is that so troubling to you?
The machinery of the natural world in these respects is something I was compelled to make peace with some time ago. The part that offends is the way teenage-snot energies transmute so readily into this new, "readable" language: Dearie, men like girls who look different than you... Don't you understand? It's in the numbers... I can't help you...
It's got nothing to do with science. And it's got nothing to do with the thousands of women I see on the streets of Los Angeles (with their children) every day who are, no doubt, loved. This is not about "evidence".
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 8:30 AM
One last passage from Person:
"The rationalist mode of thinking about romantic love prevails in our professional literature, whether of psychology, sociology, or philosophy. It has been said that the three great languages of contemporary Western culture—Christian, psychoanalytic, and Marxist—all conspire to devalue love. A more recent view, that of neuroscience, contributes to the negative valuation by re- ducing love to no more than a biochemical excitation."
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 8:57 AM
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 8:58 AM
Nice ass. The lack of a tramp stamp is a definite plus.
Eric
at August 6, 2010 10:23 AM
Crid, ever stop to think that the women you see who dont have that figure did before the kids and that how they got fucked in the first place?
lujlp
at August 6, 2010 10:28 AM
>>I'd say the girl in the poster you linked to probably has a .7 or thereabouts, the ratio the late Dev Singh found that men across cultures prefer. Why does this disturb you so?
Amy,
You're most often precise about these things, so are we sure his ratio applies "across cultures"?
I quoted this bit (below), when Singh's ratios came up on a previous thread. It appears to describe the much more limited scope of his research.
The quote suggests - possibly it's not accurate?- that the ideal ratio was derived from the very specific prejudices of US girlie mag photo editors and beauty contest judges?
"Devendra Singh scrutinized statistics for body measurements for Playboy Magazine centerfolds between 1955 and 1965 and of Miss America contest winners from 1923 to 1987. In line with earlier research, he found that there was a reduction in body weight over the years. Thus, as far as total weight is concerned, the women were getting lighter over time. However, he discovered that the waist-to-hip ratio of these beautiful women remained within a narrow low range."
Jody Tresidder
at August 6, 2010 10:49 AM
"Crid, ever stop to think that the women you see who dont have that figure did before the kids and that how they got fucked in the first place?"
Maybe they did before the first child. After the first child, I don't think so.
There are reasons why most of the cultures insist that sex acts to be done at night or in the dark while you are drunk. Then, the WHR suddenly do not really matter anymore.
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740216">comment from Jody Tresidder
"Devendra Singh scrutinized statistics for body measurements for Playboy Magazine centerfolds between 1955 and 1965 and of Miss America contest winners from 1923 to 1987. In line with earlier research,
Note the words "in line with earlier research." In other words, the pageant and Playboy bunnies aren't all he scrutinized. His research has been repeated by numerous grad students, Lassek and Steve Gaulin at UCSB, and numerous others. (They added boobs to the equation, and what hip fat seems to mean versus belly fat on a woman.) In fact, we are all so sick of hearing grad students repeat Dev's research and present it at conferences, that I breathed a sigh of relief that nobody at the last ev. psych conference stood up and wasted 20 minutes of our time to proclaim, "Dev Singh was right!"
> ever stop to think that the women you
> see who dont have that figure did before
> the kids and that how they got fucked
> in the first place?
You might have a point, if so many of the little dumplings I see in the neighborhood weren't trailed by loving husbands. To many if not most men, this just ain't that big a deal
Crid [cridcomment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 3:08 PM
Well, let's say Amy is completely right and this .7 ratio is the one every last man on earth would prefer. Let's be real - only a small percentage of women in the human population actually have it. By the same token, only a small percentage of human men in the population have what women are crazy for. Please feel free to fine-tune my interpretation, Amy, but I'm thinking those things are wealth, power, and the alpha tendencies that got them that wealth and power in the first place. In Road Pirate lingo, the word is "game."
So the alphas (that small percent of the population) find each other, and the rest of us go on about our business. Here's where Crid comes in - the rest of us still value love too, and find it with each other. My sweety isn't rich or powerful, but he's smart and hard-working. And I'm healthy and fit but my figure isn't head-turning. There are more beautiful women out there than me, and there are wealthier and more powerful men out there than my sweety. Neither of us feels like we're settling, though. A more wealthy and powerful man could come along and it wouldn't turn my head. I don't think my sweety would ditch me for a younger, more beautiful woman, either.
Amy, you seem to think that for the average person, only perfection will do, which is what I think Crid objects to. And Crid, you seem to ignore the fact that the man married to the 200-lb. woman wouldn't rather she took off a few pounds. (Of course maybe he needs to take off a few pounds, too.) I find myself falling in the middle, between your views. Not that I don't enjoy watching the squabble from the sidelines. I wish Tressider would say something. ;-D
Pirate Jo
at August 6, 2010 4:54 PM
Tragically, I agree with Crid, Pirate Jo - even rather warmly*.
And if the idealized whatever-blah-blah ratio is rare, then practically, your ideal woman is the broad you pick at the time based on a ton of things (and, ideally, the one who loves you back).
Frankly, I just find the late Singh's calculations fucking silly. And strangely dodgy.
For the record, I'm far, far from overweight - so there's no self-serving shit going on here.
(Not a virtue - genetics!)
*But I'm about to leave for a week in a lovely rustic shack with a jetty, on its own island, in a lake, so this may be due to my merry mood:)
Jody Tresidder
at August 6, 2010 5:33 PM
I was fortunate to meet and eventually marry a woman with a 0.7 ratio. The minute I met her, I had the hots for her, and lucky for me, she found me attractive too.
Tony
at August 6, 2010 8:19 PM
she blinded me with Science!.
a preference is just that, like: I like brunettes. But there was this red-head once... If you look at people with a lot extra in the trunk... is the ratio still true? I see them all the time and the interest still holds because of that wiring in my brain. It holds because I can evaluate it at a distance, AND in motion. I may not be able to see how well she is stacked, or how clear her skin is, or her age, but it is one preferrence overcome.
SwissArmyD
at August 6, 2010 9:41 PM
They're surely pursued more. What the research tells people on a practical level: Men look for a waist on women, and women who don't really have one or very much of one should affect one with a belt, etc. Also, women should never wear those mumu outfits, even if they're fat, because the waist is a very important area to the male eye.
Lots of us gals like a waist on a man too. Cumberbund? Something to show a waist even if you love your bowling shirt?
> you seem to ignore the fact that the man
> married to the 200-lb. woman wouldn't rather
> she took off a few pounds.
The "fact", you say. What fact? PJ, how many of these men have you tied to a post and shot full of sodium pentathol while holding a pistol to their puppy's skull while shouting an interrogation?
Many men are probably unhappy. But many more, I submit, are pleased with the company of the people they spend their lives with. Whatever wishes they have for flesh tone or eye color or any other magazine fantasies are diminished by the very real fulfillment of having someone in their life with whom they feel comfortable. Those who'd break the deal for a waist-to-hip ratio were having other problems anyway.
This is a fun fight to pick. So many of Amy's blind spots are lined up in this one little zone....
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 6, 2010 10:14 PM
So is tremendous wealth. But you'd be amazed how many poor people get laid. Get married, even. Happily.
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 7, 2010 12:38 AM
> you seem to ignore the fact that the man
> married to the 200-lb. woman wouldn't rather
> she took off a few pounds.
The "fact", you say. What fact?
I'm not talking about .7 ratios anymore, Crid, I'm talking about the astonishingly high percentage of Americans who are not just overweight, but obese. Yes, the partners of these people would be more attracted to them if they were not obese. No fair pointing to the tiny, tiny number of chubby-chasers out there. If it's true 99% of the time, I call it close enough for government work. However, that doesn't mean their partners don't love them.
Pirate Jo
at August 7, 2010 7:13 AM
> No fair pointing to the tiny, tiny number of
> chubby-chasers
Sorry, Miss Bicycle-Rider, but as with Amy, I sense quite a bit of ego on the line here. There's no more reason to believe "it's true 99% of the time" than to believe it's a (comforting) "fact". Perhaps you'd imagine your own life to be a loveless, sweltering Hell if you were overweight— But there's no reason to think that's how it works for even a (slender) majority of the heavier women out there.
Nor is there any way to find out. After a lifetime of disapprobation, they're well-programmed to report misery when you –or any boney, screeching interrogator– approached them in the shopping mall with a clipboard and a questionnaire... But for all you know and will ever know, their interior lives are typically calm neighborhoods of strong connections and good weather.
The "No Fat Chicks" bumper sticker is famous for its audacious impatience. But was that tobacco-chewer really going to be the guy to teach us about typical human attachment? Is he where you'd go for instruction?
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 7, 2010 9:33 AM
I think I missed the point of this thread...
Cousin Dave
at August 7, 2010 1:39 PM
Me giving Amy a rough time for something small but silly she said years ago.
Crid [cridcomment at gmail]
at August 7, 2010 3:49 PM
No, it IS true 99% of the time. And I might be able to ride 700 miles on my bike during a week and a half, but I'm not buff. There is no self-serving defensiveness going on here. I'd do a little dance of glee if a beer-belly was the new hotness.
No, men don't care about ten or fifteen pounds here or there. (When I have a chubby belly my boobs look great! Non-carbing down to six-pack abs flattens my chest completely. The only thing I have to work with is body fat, and I don't get to decide where it goes or stays.) No, I don't think most men are obsessed with the p's and q's of a normal, healthy weight range. My sweety likes my boobs when they are larger, my belly when it is smaller, and therefore he gets to pick one of the two, at any given time. This doesn't present an issue of any significance. I agree with you there.
But if I put on 70 pounds? If I was topping 200? My poor sweety. I have never, ever ever met a guy who was interested in dating a woman that large. In every case where I've met a guy who was already WITH a woman that large, she was NOT that large when he started dating her. He sticks around because he loves her, but I still feel kind of sorry for him. Stop pretending you don't understand that! For a woman, it would be the same thing as marrying a guy who promptly quit his job and started playing video games in the basement all the time.
Pirate Jo
at August 8, 2010 10:14 AM
> No, it IS true 99% of the time.
Oh. It just IS. You know this. Somehow.
Crid [CridComment at gmail]
at August 9, 2010 9:48 AM
Gonna need a ratio judgment, Amy. Go or no-go?
_____________________
The decline in the amount of serious attention paid to love may be attributed in part to the fact that many of the great discourses on love belong to religious literature, and ours is a secular age. In part, it is because philosophy—the last great sanctuary of questions relating to the “soul” and the one discipline where love was addressed seriously—has itself largely been transformed and now addresses analytic and linguistic questions rather than metaphysical and transcendental concerns. And perhaps the twentieth-century response to love as a fit subject for discussion and thought has also to do with our rejection of what we see as the nineteenth century’s sentimentality and its animosity to sexuality. In fact, we have come to think of passionate love as symptomatic of the nineteenth century and the sentimental corollary of its repressive attitude towards sexuality. Hence, as we celebrate our own permissive sexuality we downplay the importance of love, demonstrating once more what is so evident in our own culture: the tendency to isolate sexuality, to reduce its contextual importance, even as we acknowledge our fascination with it.
The main reason for the virtual disappearance of discourse on love, though, is the enormous prestige of science in our age, and science’s propensity to value only that which it can explain. But that dismissal of what does not seem amenable to testing, quantification, verification, and replication, of what is judged to be sentimental or based on feeling, is itself often pseudoscientific, irrational. It denies what we know of the limits of reason, and of reason’s easy corruptibility by unconscious forces; and it ignores the finiteness of what we now “know” or can ever know. Even so, the pseudoscientific point of view remains very powerful, and it tends to discredit the immense importance of all passions and feelings in our lives.
E S Person, M.D
Dreams of Love and Fateful Encounters:
The Power of Romantic Passion
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 1:38 AM
Even better version! Note helpful graphics!
Science!
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 2:05 AM
I'd say the girl in the poster you linked to probably has a .7 or thereabouts, the ratio the late Dev Singh found that men across cultures prefer. Why does this disturb you so?
PS Women with this WHR have been shown to be more fertile and healthier than women with more android WHRs, so having sex with a woman with an hourglass figure would increase your chances of spreading your genes.
Oh, and you're welcome. I was thinking of titling it "This One's For Crid," since it's been a long time since I posted Welder's Wife Tail.
Amy Alkon at August 6, 2010 6:53 AM
Love has been downgraded by the emasculation of males.
Metro-sexuals. Emo-boys. Mixed PE in school that downplays male physical superiority. Males not allowed to express male emotions. The new myth that violence is evil and wrong. The demise of spanking which is an important tool of fathers that teaches young males their place in the pecking order. The increase in fatherless birth events and home life.
Look at the number of TV commercials and sit-coms that make men look silly and stupid!
There is not much left for women to love.
And now a woman can by a custom cock online....
Sheridan at August 6, 2010 7:13 AM
> Women with this WHR have
> been shown to...
Right-right-right, they have much more love in their lives.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 7:32 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740141">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]They're surely pursued more. What the research tells people on a practical level: Men look for a waist on women, and women who don't really have one or very much of one should affect one with a belt, etc. Also, women should never wear those mumu outfits, even if they're fat, because the waist is a very important area to the male eye.
You like to knock anything about sex/relationships that isn't ephemeral, and that's just silly. Some things can be measured, and it's usually or often helpful to have the measurements.
Amy Alkon at August 6, 2010 7:45 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740143">comment from Amy AlkonHere, Crid - a very readable bit of the late Dev Singh's work on this:
http://humanattractiveness.com/P_singh_neuro.html
An excerpt:
Amy Alkon at August 6, 2010 7:50 AM
Atleast shes not a hairy plumber
lujlp at August 6, 2010 7:50 AM
Even better version! Note helpful graphics!
Yes, yes, but it ignores the boobies, which figure into the equation. So while HTW ratio may explain a sizable portion of the variance (and thus may trump cup size), adding cup size will likely explain the variance up to the 95th percentile.
I think we need to get a grant and...study this phenomena.
I R A Darth Aggie at August 6, 2010 7:52 AM
> a very readable bit of the late
> Dev Singh
A-MY. Peer review isn't a fan club. The "readable" part is the problem, OK?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 7:53 AM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740152">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]Crid, there's evidence that men go for women with this figure, and evidence that those women are healthier and more fertile, which would explain the evolved preference by men for this figure in women. Why is that so troubling to you?
Amy Alkon at August 6, 2010 7:56 AM
> Why is that so troubling to you?
The machinery of the natural world in these respects is something I was compelled to make peace with some time ago. The part that offends is the way teenage-snot energies transmute so readily into this new, "readable" language: Dearie, men like girls who look different than you... Don't you understand? It's in the numbers... I can't help you...
It's got nothing to do with science. And it's got nothing to do with the thousands of women I see on the streets of Los Angeles (with their children) every day who are, no doubt, loved. This is not about "evidence".
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 8:30 AM
One last passage from Person:
"The rationalist mode of thinking about romantic love prevails in our professional literature, whether of psychology, sociology, or philosophy. It has been said that the three great languages of contemporary Western culture—Christian, psychoanalytic, and Marxist—all conspire to devalue love. A more recent view, that of neuroscience, contributes to the negative valuation by re- ducing love to no more than a biochemical excitation."
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 8:57 AM
Y'know.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 8:58 AM
Nice ass. The lack of a tramp stamp is a definite plus.
Eric at August 6, 2010 10:23 AM
Crid, ever stop to think that the women you see who dont have that figure did before the kids and that how they got fucked in the first place?
lujlp at August 6, 2010 10:28 AM
>>I'd say the girl in the poster you linked to probably has a .7 or thereabouts, the ratio the late Dev Singh found that men across cultures prefer. Why does this disturb you so?
Amy,
You're most often precise about these things, so are we sure his ratio applies "across cultures"?
I quoted this bit (below), when Singh's ratios came up on a previous thread. It appears to describe the much more limited scope of his research.
The quote suggests - possibly it's not accurate?- that the ideal ratio was derived from the very specific prejudices of US girlie mag photo editors and beauty contest judges?
"Devendra Singh scrutinized statistics for body measurements for Playboy Magazine centerfolds between 1955 and 1965 and of Miss America contest winners from 1923 to 1987. In line with earlier research, he found that there was a reduction in body weight over the years. Thus, as far as total weight is concerned, the women were getting lighter over time. However, he discovered that the waist-to-hip ratio of these beautiful women remained within a narrow low range."
Jody Tresidder at August 6, 2010 10:49 AM
"Crid, ever stop to think that the women you see who dont have that figure did before the kids and that how they got fucked in the first place?"
Maybe they did before the first child. After the first child, I don't think so.
There are reasons why most of the cultures insist that sex acts to be done at night or in the dark while you are drunk. Then, the WHR suddenly do not really matter anymore.
The WHR is in the eyes of beholder.
Chang at August 6, 2010 12:25 PM
The lack of a tramp stamp is a definite plus.
Amen.
lsomber at August 6, 2010 12:34 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740216">comment from Jody Tresidder"Devendra Singh scrutinized statistics for body measurements for Playboy Magazine centerfolds between 1955 and 1965 and of Miss America contest winners from 1923 to 1987. In line with earlier research,
Note the words "in line with earlier research." In other words, the pageant and Playboy bunnies aren't all he scrutinized. His research has been repeated by numerous grad students, Lassek and Steve Gaulin at UCSB, and numerous others. (They added boobs to the equation, and what hip fat seems to mean versus belly fat on a woman.) In fact, we are all so sick of hearing grad students repeat Dev's research and present it at conferences, that I breathed a sigh of relief that nobody at the last ev. psych conference stood up and wasted 20 minutes of our time to proclaim, "Dev Singh was right!"
Amy Alkon at August 6, 2010 12:57 PM
> ever stop to think that the women you
> see who dont have that figure did before
> the kids and that how they got fucked
> in the first place?
You might have a point, if so many of the little dumplings I see in the neighborhood weren't trailed by loving husbands. To many if not most men, this just ain't that big a deal
Crid [cridcomment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 3:08 PM
Well, let's say Amy is completely right and this .7 ratio is the one every last man on earth would prefer. Let's be real - only a small percentage of women in the human population actually have it. By the same token, only a small percentage of human men in the population have what women are crazy for. Please feel free to fine-tune my interpretation, Amy, but I'm thinking those things are wealth, power, and the alpha tendencies that got them that wealth and power in the first place. In Road Pirate lingo, the word is "game."
So the alphas (that small percent of the population) find each other, and the rest of us go on about our business. Here's where Crid comes in - the rest of us still value love too, and find it with each other. My sweety isn't rich or powerful, but he's smart and hard-working. And I'm healthy and fit but my figure isn't head-turning. There are more beautiful women out there than me, and there are wealthier and more powerful men out there than my sweety. Neither of us feels like we're settling, though. A more wealthy and powerful man could come along and it wouldn't turn my head. I don't think my sweety would ditch me for a younger, more beautiful woman, either.
Amy, you seem to think that for the average person, only perfection will do, which is what I think Crid objects to. And Crid, you seem to ignore the fact that the man married to the 200-lb. woman wouldn't rather she took off a few pounds. (Of course maybe he needs to take off a few pounds, too.) I find myself falling in the middle, between your views. Not that I don't enjoy watching the squabble from the sidelines. I wish Tressider would say something. ;-D
Pirate Jo at August 6, 2010 4:54 PM
Tragically, I agree with Crid, Pirate Jo - even rather warmly*.
And if the idealized whatever-blah-blah ratio is rare, then practically, your ideal woman is the broad you pick at the time based on a ton of things (and, ideally, the one who loves you back).
Frankly, I just find the late Singh's calculations fucking silly. And strangely dodgy.
For the record, I'm far, far from overweight - so there's no self-serving shit going on here.
(Not a virtue - genetics!)
*But I'm about to leave for a week in a lovely rustic shack with a jetty, on its own island, in a lake, so this may be due to my merry mood:)
Jody Tresidder at August 6, 2010 5:33 PM
I was fortunate to meet and eventually marry a woman with a 0.7 ratio. The minute I met her, I had the hots for her, and lucky for me, she found me attractive too.
Tony at August 6, 2010 8:19 PM
she blinded me with Science!.
a preference is just that, like: I like brunettes. But there was this red-head once... If you look at people with a lot extra in the trunk... is the ratio still true? I see them all the time and the interest still holds because of that wiring in my brain. It holds because I can evaluate it at a distance, AND in motion. I may not be able to see how well she is stacked, or how clear her skin is, or her age, but it is one preferrence overcome.
SwissArmyD at August 6, 2010 9:41 PM
They're surely pursued more. What the research tells people on a practical level: Men look for a waist on women, and women who don't really have one or very much of one should affect one with a belt, etc. Also, women should never wear those mumu outfits, even if they're fat, because the waist is a very important area to the male eye.
Lots of us gals like a waist on a man too. Cumberbund? Something to show a waist even if you love your bowling shirt?
Suki at August 6, 2010 9:57 PM
> you seem to ignore the fact that the man
> married to the 200-lb. woman wouldn't rather
> she took off a few pounds.
The "fact", you say. What fact? PJ, how many of these men have you tied to a post and shot full of sodium pentathol while holding a pistol to their puppy's skull while shouting an interrogation?
Many men are probably unhappy. But many more, I submit, are pleased with the company of the people they spend their lives with. Whatever wishes they have for flesh tone or eye color or any other magazine fantasies are diminished by the very real fulfillment of having someone in their life with whom they feel comfortable. Those who'd break the deal for a waist-to-hip ratio were having other problems anyway.
This is a fun fight to pick. So many of Amy's blind spots are lined up in this one little zone....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 6, 2010 10:14 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740373">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]Those who'd break the deal for a waist-to-hip ratio were having other problems anyway.
This is an important element of attraction -- in the beginning.
Amy Alkon at August 7, 2010 12:06 AM
So is tremendous wealth. But you'd be amazed how many poor people get laid. Get married, even. Happily.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 7, 2010 12:38 AM
> you seem to ignore the fact that the man
> married to the 200-lb. woman wouldn't rather
> she took off a few pounds.
The "fact", you say. What fact?
I'm not talking about .7 ratios anymore, Crid, I'm talking about the astonishingly high percentage of Americans who are not just overweight, but obese. Yes, the partners of these people would be more attracted to them if they were not obese. No fair pointing to the tiny, tiny number of chubby-chasers out there. If it's true 99% of the time, I call it close enough for government work. However, that doesn't mean their partners don't love them.
Pirate Jo at August 7, 2010 7:13 AM
> No fair pointing to the tiny, tiny number of
> chubby-chasers
Sorry, Miss Bicycle-Rider, but as with Amy, I sense quite a bit of ego on the line here. There's no more reason to believe "it's true 99% of the time" than to believe it's a (comforting) "fact". Perhaps you'd imagine your own life to be a loveless, sweltering Hell if you were overweight— But there's no reason to think that's how it works for even a (slender) majority of the heavier women out there.
Nor is there any way to find out. After a lifetime of disapprobation, they're well-programmed to report misery when you –or any boney, screeching interrogator– approached them in the shopping mall with a clipboard and a questionnaire... But for all you know and will ever know, their interior lives are typically calm neighborhoods of strong connections and good weather.
The "No Fat Chicks" bumper sticker is famous for its audacious impatience. But was that tobacco-chewer really going to be the guy to teach us about typical human attachment? Is he where you'd go for instruction?
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 7, 2010 9:33 AM
I think I missed the point of this thread...
Cousin Dave at August 7, 2010 1:39 PM
Me giving Amy a rough time for something small but silly she said years ago.
Crid [cridcomment at gmail] at August 7, 2010 3:49 PM
Crid is wrong. Happens occasionally.
Amy Alkon at August 7, 2010 5:41 PM
How dare you.
Crid [cridcomment at gmail] at August 7, 2010 6:17 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740701">comment from Crid [cridcomment at gmail]Just opened a little blog form and typed!
Amy Alkon at August 7, 2010 6:22 PM
The unmitigated temerity of this woman....
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 7, 2010 9:09 PM
Amy Alkon
http://www.advicegoddess.com/archives/2010/08/06/back_end.html#comment-1740726">comment from Crid [CridComment at gmail]Tee hee!
Amy Alkon at August 7, 2010 9:49 PM
No, it IS true 99% of the time. And I might be able to ride 700 miles on my bike during a week and a half, but I'm not buff. There is no self-serving defensiveness going on here. I'd do a little dance of glee if a beer-belly was the new hotness.
No, men don't care about ten or fifteen pounds here or there. (When I have a chubby belly my boobs look great! Non-carbing down to six-pack abs flattens my chest completely. The only thing I have to work with is body fat, and I don't get to decide where it goes or stays.) No, I don't think most men are obsessed with the p's and q's of a normal, healthy weight range. My sweety likes my boobs when they are larger, my belly when it is smaller, and therefore he gets to pick one of the two, at any given time. This doesn't present an issue of any significance. I agree with you there.
But if I put on 70 pounds? If I was topping 200? My poor sweety. I have never, ever ever met a guy who was interested in dating a woman that large. In every case where I've met a guy who was already WITH a woman that large, she was NOT that large when he started dating her. He sticks around because he loves her, but I still feel kind of sorry for him. Stop pretending you don't understand that! For a woman, it would be the same thing as marrying a guy who promptly quit his job and started playing video games in the basement all the time.
Pirate Jo at August 8, 2010 10:14 AM
> No, it IS true 99% of the time.
Oh. It just IS. You know this. Somehow.
Crid [CridComment at gmail] at August 9, 2010 9:48 AM
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