There is a vast body of evidence indicating that men and women
are biologically and psychologically different, and that what
heterosexual men and women want in partners directly corresponds to
these differences. The features men evolved to go for in women—youth,
clear skin, a symmetrical face and body, feminine facial features, an
hourglass figure—are those indicating that a woman would be a healthy,
fertile candidate to pass on a man's genes.
These preferences span borders, cultures, and generations, meaning yes, there really are universal standards of beauty.
And while Western women do struggle to be slim, the truth is, women in
all cultures eat (or don't) to appeal to "the male gaze." The body size
that's idealized in a particular culture appears to correspond to the
availability of food. In cultures like ours, where you can't go five
miles without passing a 7-Eleven and food is sold by the pallet-load at
warehouse grocery stores, thin women are in. In cultures where food is
scarce (like in Sahara-adjacent hoods), blubber is beautiful, and women
appeal to men by stuffing themselves until they're slim like Jabba the
Hut.
Men's looks matter to heterosexual women only somewhat. Most
women prefer men who are taller than they are, with symmetrical
features (a sign that a potential partner is healthy and parasite-free).
But, women across cultures are intent on finding male partners with
high status, power, and access to resources—which means a really short
guy can add maybe a foot to his height with a private jet. And, just
like women who aren't very attractive, men who make very little money or
are chronically out of work tend to have a really hard time finding
partners. There is some male grumbling about this. Yet, while feminist
journalists deforest North America publishing articles urging women to
bow out of the beauty arms race and "Learn to love that woman in the
mirror!", nobody gets into the ridiculous position of advising men to
"Learn to love that unemployed guy sprawled on the couch!"
Now, before you brand me a traitor to my gender,
let me say that I'm all for women having the vote, and I think a woman
with a mustache should make the same money as a man with a mustache. But
you don't help that woman by advising her, "No need to wax that lip
fringe or work off that beer belly!" (Because the road to female
empowerment is...looking just like a hairy old man?)
But take The Beauty Myth
author Naomi Wolf: She contends that standards of beauty are a plot to
keep women politically, economically, and sexually subjugated to
men—apparently by keeping them too busy curling their eyelashes to have
time for political action and too weak from dieting to stand up for what
they want in bed. Wolf and her feminist sob sisters bleat about the
horror of women being pushed to conform to "Western standards of
beauty"—as if eyebrow plucking and getting highlights are the real
hardships compared to the walk in the park of footbinding and
clitoridectomy. Most insultingly, Wolf paints women who look after their
looks as the dim, passive dupes of Madison Ave nue and magazine
editors. Apparently, women need only open a page of Vogue and
they're under its spell—they sleepwalk to Sephora to load up on
anti-wrinkle potions, then go on harsh diets, eating only carrots
fertilized with butterfly poo.
It turns out that the real
beauty myth is the damaging one Wolf and other feminists are
perpetuating—the absurd notion that it serves women to thumb their noses
at standards of beauty. Of course, looks aren't all that
matter (as I'm lectured by female readers of my newspaper column when I
point out that male lust seems to have a weight limit). But looks matter
a great deal. The more attractive the woman is, the wider her pool of
romantic partners and range of opportunities in her work and day-to-day
life. We all know this, and numerous studies confirm it—it's just heresy
to say so.
We consider it admirable when people
strive to better themselves intellectually; we don't say, "Hey, you
weren't born a genius, so why ever bother reading a book?" Why should we
treat physical appearance any differently? For example, research shows
that men prefer women with full lips, smaller chins, and large
eyes—indicators of higher levels of estrogen.
Some lucky women have big eyes; others just seem to, thanks to the
clever application of eyeshadow. As the classic commercial says, "Maybe
she's born with it. Maybe it's Maybelline." (If it increases her
options, who cares which it is?)
Unfortunately, because Americans are so conflicted and dishonest about the power of beauty,
we approach it like novices. At one end of the spectrum are the "Love
me as I am!" types, like the woman who asked me why she was having such a
terrible time meeting men...while dressed in a way that advertised not
"I want a boyfriend" but "I'm just the girl to clean out your sewer
line!" At the other extreme are women who go around resembling
porn-ready painted dolls. Note to the menopausal painted doll: Troweled
on makeup doesn't make you look younger; it makes you look like an aging drag queen.
Likewise, being 50 and trying to look 25 through plastic surgery
usually succeeds in making a woman look 45 and fembot-scary—an object
of pity instead of an object of desire. Plastic surgery you can easily
spot is usually a sign—either of really bad work or of somebody who's
gone way over the top with it, probably because she's trying to fill
some void in her life with silicone, Juvederm, and implanted butt
cutlets. There are women who just want to fix that one nagging
imperfection. For others, plastic surgery is like potato chips, as in,
"Betcha can't eat just one." A woman comes in for a lunchtime lip job—an
injection of Restylane or another plumping filler—and ends up getting
both sets of lips done. Yes, I'm talking about labioplasty. (Are your vagina lips pouty?)
Once
women start seeing wrinkles and crow's feet, the desperation to look
like they were born yesterday often makes them act like it, too. Women
want to believe there's such a thing as "hope in a jar"—and there is:
hope from the CEO selling the jars that you and millions of others will
buy him a new yacht and a chateau in the south of France. There actually
is hope to be found in a plastic bottle—of sunblock, the kind that
protects against both UVA and UVB rays (the skin-aging ones). But the
Beauty Brains, a group of blogging
cosmetic scientists, write, "The sad truth is that creams that claim to
be anti-aging are not much more effective than standard moisturizing
lotions."
French women, too, buy into the idea that there's some
fountain of youth at the Clarins counter. But, perhaps because feminism
never seeped into mainstream culture in France like it did here, they
generally have a healthier and more realistic relationship with beauty,
accepting it as the conduit to love, sex,
relationships, and increased opportunities. They take pleasure in
cultivating their appearance, and in accentuating their physical
differences from men. They don't give up on looking after their looks as
they age, nor do they tart themselves up like sexy schoolgirls at 50.
They simply take pride in their appearance and try to look like sensual,
older women.
To understand what it takes to be beautiful, we
need to be very clear about what being beautiful means—being sexually
appealing to men. And then, instead of snarling that male sexuality is evil,
we need to accept that it's just different—far more visually-driven
than female sexuality. To focus our efforts, we can turn to an
increasing number of studies by evolutionary psychologists on what most
men seem to want. For example, the University of Texas' Devendra Singh
discovered that men, across cultures, are drawn to a woman with an
hourglass figure. Men like to see a wom an's waist—even on the larger
ladies—so burn those muumuus, which only reveal your girlish figure in a
Category 5 hurricane, and if you don't have much of a waist, do your
best to give yourself one with the cut of your clothes or a belt.
Too
many women try to get away with a bait-and-switch approach to
appearance upkeep. If you spend three hours a day in the gym while
you're dating
a guy, don't think that you can walk down the aisle and say "I
do...and, guess what...now I don't anymore!" A woman needs to come up
with a workable routine for maintaining her looks throughout her
lifetime and avoid rationalizing slacking off— while she's seeking a man
and after she has one. Yeah, you might have to put five or ten extra
minutes into prettying up just to hang around the house. And, sure, you
might be more "comfortable" in big sloppy sweats, but how "comfortable"
will you be if he leaves you for a woman who cares enough to look hot
for him?
Like French women, we, too, need to understand that a
healthy approach to beauty is neither pretending it's unnecessary or
unimportant nor making it important beyond all else. By being honest
about it, we help women make informed decisions about how much effort to
put into their appearance—or accept the opportunity costs of going
ungroomed. The truth is, like knowledge, beauty is power. So, ladies,
read lots of books, develop your mind and your character, exercise the
rights the heroes of the women's movement fought for us to have, and
strive to become somebody who makes a difference in the world. And,
pssst...while you're doing all of that, don't forget to wear lipgloss.
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