NerdLounge
Would you like to react to this message? Create an account in a few clicks or log in to continue.

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

+10
Kiskadee
kath
jcorozza
nearly_takuan
Enail
eselle28
Werel
reboot
Caffeinated
reboundstudent
14 posters

Page 1 of 2 1, 2  Next

Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Wed Nov 04, 2015 4:38 pm

I don't have a lot of standards, but one of the standards I have is that as soon as I discover a guy wasn't really, really attracted to me physically from the get-go (as in, in the top 2-3 women in the room) OR I'm outside his usual type, I start to really back off from the idea of dating him. This has long, long roots in my history, where I am frequently the girl who a guy "settles for" because he can't get the women he's actually attracted to, or I'm the girl who "won him over" with my personality.

I get a lot of push back (here, from friends) on the 2nd reason, because what's wrong with being liked for your personality? But I have just gotten really, really sick of being the Awesome Personality Alternative prize, where my personality "makes up" for my looks. My history also suggests that a guy who is into my personality, but not really my looks, will eventually dump me when he finds a woman where he's attracted to both her personality and her looks.

Perhaps this kind of standard is unfair, since I am an ugly gal. It seems like a ridiculously high expectation that a guy be really into my looks, when my looks are awful. But I just.... cannot feel excited or attracted to someone knowing that they look at me and think "Meh, good enough" instead of "Hot damn!"

So is this truly unreasonable? Is it wrong to want to be lusted after, for my looks? Is it wrong that I want a guy who looked at me and thought "I gotta talk to her," instead of one who said "Well I've eliminated you, and you, and you, so I guess Rebound's next"?
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Caffeinated Wed Nov 04, 2015 6:53 pm

I think it's very reasonable. Life is too short to be with someone who's not attracted to you (or who you believe is not attracted to you, which is effectively the same).

As for the personality winning someone over thing, I don't know, I guess some people are cool with that. But that doesn't mean a person has to be cool with that. Myself, I am only up for it (relationship-wise, anyway) with someone who is into both my looks and my personality, not just one or the other.
Caffeinated
Caffeinated

Posts : 455
Reputation : 273
Join date : 2014-12-08

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboot Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:04 pm

I do not think it is unreasonable unless you want to be number 1, 2,3 etc in the person's lifetime. That might be a bit less doable than being number 1, 2, 3 etc in a moment/event/gathering. That said, if you are one of the unattractive (as I am), it means accepting that few or no people will ever feel that way about you and you might have to accept being single for a long time/forever or being wanted for your personality. It sucks, but it is how it is.

I was pushing back on your ideas on Prime because you were taking a relationship/dating/hooking up in a friend group mindset and applying it to a ONS with a stranger you are not going to continue to know scenario. It was more about you trying to make apples into oranges than having any quibble with what you were saying about oranges.
reboot
reboot
Moderator of "Other Relationships" and "Gender, Identity and Society"

Posts : 2514
Reputation : 1005
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Werel Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:26 pm

It's certainly not "wrong" to want to be physically desired. That's legit, and if you don't feel that someone is physically attracted to you, you're a totally reasonable person for moving on from them & finding somebody who desires you in the way you want.

That said, you may be setting yourself up for hurt if you will not accept any kind of attraction other than instant, skin-deep lust. Some people experience attraction more strongly once they've got a read on someone's personality (or only then), and you're pretty much tossing those guys out of the running, if I'm reading you right.

Curious: do you see cases in your life (other than yourself, where we all have some blinders) of happy couples where one person is not physically attractive/the other partner's physical type? Can you believe that other people can have real, lasting sexual attraction based on primarily non-aesthetic factors, but it's something you don't want/distrust due to your history? Or is it that you don't view attraction which grows around neutrality towards someone's looks as being of equal value to AWOOGA wolf-whistle insta-boner attraction, in general?

I found this article beautiful and very good food for thought, and it's mighty relevant: "I have never turned heads:" What it's like when you're not the object of desire
Werel
Werel
DOCTOR(!)

Posts : 2056
Reputation : 1273
Join date : 2014-09-25

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:29 pm

reboot wrote: I was pushing back on your ideas on Prime because you were taking a relationship/dating/hooking up in a friend group mindset and applying it to a ONS with a stranger you are not going to continue to know scenario. It was more about you trying to make apples into oranges than having any quibble with what you were saying about oranges.

Well, I've gotten pushback on this topic in other posts. I recall a post a while ago where I mentioned that if I was talking to a guy, and an attractive woman came up to speak with him and he seemed to be paying more attention to her, I'd bow out for similar reasons (I am no longer number 1 pick), and I remember getting a lot of push back then.

I guess I see them as similar because I work relatively the same when it comes to ONS or dating. I said this on Prime, but bears repeating; my attraction seems to be based a lot on whether he's attracted to me. Like, a guy becomes instantly attractive or unattractive based on how interested in me he is. My assumption would be, even if a guy doesn't mention how attractive he finds other women (though seriously, I have a super power to be a magnet for guys who want to sigh about their unrequited love), if I'm not his #1 pick, it'd still leak into his behavior somehow. And once I get the impression he's less attracted to me than I'd like, I wouldn't bother, even if it was an ONS with a stranger. Heck, I think I may have stricter standards for an ONS.... like, if it's gonna happen, he better come close to combusting on the spot with desire for me.
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by eselle28 Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:32 pm

I don't think it's unreasonable. I think you see push back on it on the prime site because topics on the prime site tend to be tied to concepts other than your specific feelings as applied to you. There, the one night stands versus relationships is involved, as is a discussion about being someone's first choice in a broader sense and whether everyone cares about that or no one cares about that or some people do and some people don't.

This is one place where we're different. I want to be with a guy who thinks I'm pretty and sexy, but I want to be liked for the package of both my looks and personality, and I'm okay dating someone who noticed one before the other. That's just a difference, though, between people who want slightly different things out of relationships and who have different relationship histories.
eselle28
eselle28
General Oversight Moderator

Posts : 1994
Reputation : 999
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:48 pm

Werel wrote:
That said, you may be setting yourself up for hurt if you will not accept any kind of attraction other than instant, skin-deep lust. Some people experience attraction more strongly once they've got a read on someone's personality (or only then), and you're pretty much tossing those guys out of the running, if I'm reading you right.

I would strongly consider tossing those guys out of running. Part of it is that kind of attraction comes down to a timing mismatch. For me, attraction is pretty instant; personality can enhance or diminish it, but I have never gone from "I don't find you attractive" + getting to know them = sexual attraction. I also tend to lose attraction if a guy doesn't seem interested in me. So let's say I meet a guy who gets attracted to personality. I find him attractive instantly, but he doesn't seem equally into me. My attraction levels drop to "platonic."* His attraction level, meanwhile, might go up as he gets to know me. But by the time he's decided he's interested, I've moved on, because I figure there's no chance with him.

Now I've never had cause to see what would happen if a guy I'd moved on from came back saying he wanted to date me; I've never had any guy friends get crushes on me. However, I'd guess that I would never be able to summon back my attraction. It's the curse side of never getting stuck in unrequited crushes/becoming awesome platonic friends with exes; my attraction, when gone, is gone forever.


*There are two examples, and two only, where this wasn't the case. One is a crush at work where I've just never had any occasion to find out if he likes me (though the crush has diminished as time has gone on cause let's be honest, if he was at all interested he would have done something by now), and the other is my long-term on-again-off-again boyfriend, because even during "off" periods, we never reached comfortable-platonic levels, and he always seemed at retain some interest in me.

Werel wrote:
Curious: do you see cases in your life (other than yourself, where we all have some blinders) of happy couples where one person is not physically attractive/the other partner's physical type? Can you believe that other people can have real, lasting sexual attraction based on primarily non-aesthetic factors, but it's something you don't want/distrust due to your history? Or is it that you don't view attraction which grows around neutrality towards someone's looks as being of equal value to AWOOGA wolf-whistle insta-boner attraction, in general?


If there were cases, I wouldn't know them, as very few of my friends have said plainly that they have A Type, and their partner isn't strictly attractive/their type. All of my friends talk about their partner as being extremely attractive, and don't really profess to having a type at all. If I know they do have a strict type, their partner is that type.

I believe that other people can have lasting, sexual attraction based on primarily non-aesthetic factors. But it is not something I fully understand, and it's absolutely not something I want. If that kind of attraction is pointed towards me, I will always mistrust it. Truth be told, I'd even probably find it insulting. I've had several boyfriends pull the "I like you despite your looks", and it's become a major trigger for me. I'm gonna need wolf-whistle, insta-boner attraction to believe my partner finds me sexually attractive because in the past, when there's been smoke (a lack of insta-boner attraction) there's been fire (they're not really attracted to me physically at all.)
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Wed Nov 04, 2015 7:54 pm

Werel wrote: I found this article beautiful and very good food for thought, and it's mighty relevant: "I have never turned heads:" What it's like when you're not the object of desire

I remember that article, and it was one of the most profoundly depressing and sad things I've ever read. Trying to be more incredulous than patronizing, you really found it beautiful?? Why??
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboot Wed Nov 04, 2015 8:08 pm

It is funny how people always want what they do not get on the reg. One of my friends is beautiful, as in looks like the all-American Ralph Lauren model ideal beautiful. She does the exact opposite of you. If I man complimented her on her looks or mentioned being physically attracted, he was off the list. The man she is everything but married to was someone who said that her intelligence was the first thing that made him talk to her, her personality made him keep wanting to talk and her laugh is what made him want to ask her to meet 1:1. She loved the fact that it took him until right after they had sex to say, "My god, you are beautiful".
reboot
reboot
Moderator of "Other Relationships" and "Gender, Identity and Society"

Posts : 2514
Reputation : 1005
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Enail Wed Nov 04, 2015 9:14 pm

I'm like you, Marty, in that I don't think I'd be very happy with someone who wasn't into me based on looks; the idea of my personality "making up for" what they considered deficient looks sounds kind of ...heart-shriveling. (I also wouldn't be very interested in someone who was just like 'you look hot, I pick you," though.) I think I define "being into you based on looks" a bit differently from how you do, though.

My default mode in many contexts is kind of "not really thinking about attraction," so I can be around someone for quite a long time before some random thing puts me into attraction mode, at which point I could be like "wait, she's really hot, where the hell did that come from!?" So I kind of see there as being a possibility that's not technically immediate attraction, but that also isn't non-attraction or even "attraction that only activates with personality or grows with time or whatever." It's got that visual, wolf-whistle quality, the message just gets delayed.

And I guess also for me there's a component to attraction that's sort of about personality, but it's actually visual? Like, you know how some ads have these sort of dead-eyed, air-brushed models in some generic sexy pose? If you take someone I normally find super-hot, and put her in one of those ads, it does nothing for me. There's a kind of spark of personality animating peoples' looks, and without that, I can know that theoretically they have top marks in their Objective Attractiveness Rating, but they give me no more pants-feelings than a mannequin or a piece of toast. It's purely visual, I don't ever need to know how charming they are or how smart or how much they care about puppies, but it's about something other than their technical looks?
Enail
Enail
Admin

Posts : 4853
Reputation : 2868
Join date : 2014-09-22

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Werel Wed Nov 04, 2015 9:59 pm

reboundstudent wrote: Like, a guy becomes instantly attractive or unattractive based on how interested in me he is.
Shocked Back atcha with "incredulous not patronizing," but... do you have ESP? Is your attraction radar just superhuman? Do you really trust your gut to instantly assess guys' interest? People spend so much time training themselves not to throw off overt attraction signals in most circumstances, and those signals can be so subtle and variable, and... man, that's quite a hurdle for your attraction to leap, and it must eliminate the possibility of attraction to all kinds of dudes who are attracted to you but have good poker faces. But if it precludes all painful unrequited crushes, that's a neat perk...

reboundstudent wrote:I remember that article, and it was one of the most profoundly depressing and sad things I've ever read. Trying to be more incredulous than patronizing, you really found it beautiful?? Why??
Hah, I can see why you found it depressing; it does deal in sadness. But I read it as a piece which complicated the experience of being unattractive, taking it past “this sucks and I’m very sad about it,” to something like “here are some ways in which this pains me, but here are some ways I deal with it, and here are some ways it’s actually not the worst.” And I read it as about a person coming to terms with an absolutely unchangeable flaw, which is only guaranteed to get worse with time, and being like “well, I will confront this disappointment and then focus on finding satisfaction in ways I realistically can.” (Plus, I'm always happy on the rare occasions I get to read about women who feel more comfortable in the role of desirer than desired.) And it ends on an up note, I think:
And although this is not the passion I am used to, it’s still passion, and the heat of it is not diminished simply because I was the one who struck the match.


Enail wrote:the idea of my personality "making up for" what they considered deficient looks sounds kind of ...heart-shriveling.
Yeah, maybe this is where I'm missing what you're really saying, RBS. It's one thing to consider someone's looks neither a plus nor a minus; it's quite another to see them as a failing or a deficit. If somebody thought I were ugly and got with me anyway because I "won them over," that sounds pretty crushing. If it were more "I'd never really thought much about your appearance until I became attracted to your other facets," I could deal with that. But it sounds like the latter is not something you'd be okay with?

Enail wrote:And I guess also for me there's a component to attraction that's sort of about personality, but it's actually visual?... There's a kind of spark of personality animating peoples' looks.... It's purely visual, I don't ever need to know how charming they are or how smart or how much they care about puppies, but it's about something other than their technical looks?
Yessss, I have this same thing! Makes it tough to figure out if someone's attractive if I've only seen a still image of them, though.
Werel
Werel
DOCTOR(!)

Posts : 2056
Reputation : 1273
Join date : 2014-09-25

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Wed Nov 04, 2015 11:39 pm

Werel wrote:
Shocked Back atcha with "incredulous not patronizing," but... do you have ESP? Is your attraction radar just superhuman? Do you really trust your gut to instantly assess guys' interest? People spend so much time training themselves not to throw off overt attraction signals in most circumstances, and those signals can be so subtle and variable, and... man, that's quite a hurdle for your attraction to leap, and it must eliminate the possibility of attraction to all kinds of dudes who are attracted to you but have good poker faces. But if it precludes all painful unrequited crushes, that's a neat perk...

Well ya gotta remember that I have never been asked out or hit on, and even when single, the number of men who I got out on dates is incredibly small. So right off the bat, guys signal their disinterest very clearly by not asking me out or paying any attention to me; the only men who do are the ones I force. From there, it's actually not that hard to gauge attraction signals. Maybe years of rejection (and thus having to be very careful about what men I force interactions with) has given me superhuman radar. I have yet to come across a single situation where a guy was totally into me and I somehow missed signals. This might be one of those "Uglies live in a different reality," where you're really not going to be eliminating a lot of guys and having a difficult time figuring out if a guy is into you, because when there's such a stark existence, it's pretty easy to discern. For example, I've lost count of the number of men my age at work who will be very friendly and talkative with other folks, but avoid me like the freaking plague until forced to deal with me. (One guy is apparently so terrified of being anywhere near me he will avoid or leave the lunch line if I come near it.)

Werel wrote:
Hah, I can see why you found it depressing; it does deal in sadness. But I read it as a piece which complicated the experience of being unattractive, taking it past “this sucks and I’m very sad about it,” to something like “here are some ways in which this pains me, but here are some ways I deal with it, and here are some ways it’s actually not the worst.” And I read it as about a person coming to terms with an absolutely unchangeable flaw, which is only guaranteed to get worse with time, and being like “well, I will confront this disappointment and then focus on finding satisfaction in ways I realistically can.” (Plus, I'm always happy on the rare occasions I get to read about women who feel more comfortable in the role of desirer than desired.) And it ends on an up note, I think:
And although this is not the passion I am used to, it’s still passion, and the heat of it is not diminished simply because I was the one who struck the match.

I.... guess I actually find that line unbelievably sad, since her entire well of evidence about her lack of desirability and ugliness comes from her husband, who seems flat-out like a manipulative jerk. My take is I don't see the article articulating ways to deal with it when it seems her husband is repeatedly throwing it back in her face by not initiating when he knows how important it is to her. Perhaps I'm conditioned from so many Captain Awkward letters, but there seem to be some pretty messed up power dynamics going on there, where he doesn't seem to express desirability for her at all.  

Werel wrote:
Yeah, maybe this is where I'm missing what you're really saying, RBS. It's one thing to consider someone's looks neither a plus nor a minus; it's quite another to see them as a failing or a deficit. If somebody thought I were ugly and got with me anyway because I "won them over," that sounds pretty crushing. If it were more "I'd never really thought much about your appearance until I became attracted to your other facets," I could deal with that. But it sounds like the latter is not something you'd be okay with?

No, I would not be okay with it. That still has the veneer, for me, of personality "making up" for looks. Like, my looks weren't enough to make you attracted to me, they're only attractive as some kind of by-product.[/quote]
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Enail Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:04 am

reboundstudent wrote:
I.... guess I actually find that line unbelievably sad, since her entire well of evidence about her lack of desirability and ugliness comes from her husband, who seems flat-out like a manipulative jerk. My take is I don't see the article articulating ways to deal with it when it seems her husband is repeatedly throwing it back in her face by not initiating when he knows how important it is to her. Perhaps I'm conditioned from so many Captain Awkward letters, but there seem to be some pretty messed up power dynamics going on there, where he doesn't seem to express desirability for her at all.  

I found it very sad too, and not quite right in some way. I'm not sure if I'd call it power dynamics, but it sounds to me like she believes she is too unattractive to be desired for her body and that's why he doesn't initiate, while he doesn't seem to show any sense of lack at having no apparent physical interest in his wife, which kind of gives me the feeling that he just isn't that into sex, or isn't into it in that way, at least. I'm not sure that the compromise in this situation is the one she thinks it is.
Enail
Enail
Admin

Posts : 4853
Reputation : 2868
Join date : 2014-09-22

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Werel Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:53 am

Huh. I read it as her acknowledging that she'd put a lot of rough years on her body, which neither she nor those around her had ever considered particularly attractive in the first place ("Even in my youth, I was plain, perhaps pretty for a year or two in my early twenties and maybe again a little elegant during a stretch of good months in my thirties, but being beautiful has always been beyond me. If people find me so, it’s only after they’ve come to know me. I have never turned heads."), and her husband being honest about the fact that it is not her body he's attracted to, but her intangible qualities. If it were an advice column, sure, I'd give the standard finger-wagging about compromise and him meeting her needs by initiating in the way she wants (assuming she's asked for that, which it's not clear she has)--but it's not, it's a piece by a woman who seems mostly at peace with her choices & options, even if she sometimes dreams of impossibilities like we all do.

I also read her husband as a self-described sapiosexual, in which case it's goofy of the author to expect body-based desire anyway? I'm not sure he's a bad dude for marrying someone whose body doesn't make him go AWOOGA if other facets of attraction are really more important to him, as he says. Unless the author feels, like RBS, that insta-boner type physical attraction is a must, in which case she shouldn't have married this man.  And... well, I'm not sure it's a bad thing that the author views herself as not having a very desirable body. It's okay not to have a desirable body, as she says ("better to be interesting"), and sometimes I feel like the kneejerk "oh honey but you ARE beautiful and he should tell you so" reaction to women who express that feeling carries the message that it's not okay to be a physically unattractive woman.

But I think we can conclude that the author's husband is not somebody RBS would want to date, so we got that cleared up! Razz
Werel
Werel
DOCTOR(!)

Posts : 2056
Reputation : 1273
Join date : 2014-09-25

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboot Thu Nov 05, 2015 9:12 am

I think there is a difference between calling your standards "bad" or "wrong" and calling them "unlikely" or "difficult" to meet. Much like how we push back on anyone who have unrealistic standards. It is OK to want anything, but it is also wise to recognize that, given circumstances that cannot be changed, finding someone who meets your standards may be unlikely. When you are an unattractive person, attractiing someone primarily on looks is unlikely to occur and just needs to be accepted.

tl;dr Nothing wrong or bad about wanting what you want, RBS, but you need to recognize and accept that, if you are not attractive, initial attraction on looks alone is unlikely to occur.
reboot
reboot
Moderator of "Other Relationships" and "Gender, Identity and Society"

Posts : 2514
Reputation : 1005
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:11 pm

reboot wrote:I think there is a difference between calling your standards "bad" or "wrong" and calling them "unlikely" or "difficult" to meet. Much like how we push back on anyone who have unrealistic standards. It is OK to want anything, but it is also wise to recognize that, given circumstances that cannot be changed, finding someone who meets your standards may be unlikely. When you are an unattractive person, attractiing someone primarily on looks is unlikely to occur and just needs to be accepted.

tl;dr Nothing wrong or bad about wanting what you want, RBS, but you need to recognize and accept that, if you are not attractive,  initial attraction on looks alone is unlikely to occur.

Probably. Though honestly, I find the whole "they'll be attracting to your personality" bit disingenuous, as well. Like, it seems to me that ugly people are expected (like in the article) to just smile and accept having a romantic partner not be attracted to them, because what can they expect, price of admission, and so on. But what about situations where a person's personality isn't that great, either? I think part of the reason I don't feel any conflict over possibly excluding guys who would find my personality attractive is that they don't exist either. Hell, sometimes I think finding a guy who is really into my looks is easier than finding someone who is into my personality. Cause my personality? Not so great or attractive either. So what do you do when you're both ugly and pretty average, personality wise?

Guess I'm just fucked all the way through.

reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboot Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:34 pm

Well, there is always the option of staying single until you meet someone who is immediately and overwhelmingly physically attracted to you. It might be a long wait, it might not ever happen, but if it is critical to being happy in a relationship you do not have much choice. I would say wait until you find someone who vales your personality as well, but it sounds like that matters less to you, so why overcomplicate?

reboot
reboot
Moderator of "Other Relationships" and "Gender, Identity and Society"

Posts : 2514
Reputation : 1005
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:36 pm

reboot wrote:Well, there is always the option of staying single until you meet someone who is immediately and overwhelmingly physically attracted to you. It might be a long wait, it might not ever happen, but if it is critical to being happy in a relationship you do not have much choice. I would say wait until you find someone who vales your personality as well, but it sounds like that matters less to you, so why overcomplicate?


No need to be snarky....
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboot Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:39 pm

That actually was not meant to be snark. Sorry about that! It was that you already said you do not want a man to value for your personality alone, so waiting for that would overcomplicate and not make you happy anyway.
reboot
reboot
Moderator of "Other Relationships" and "Gender, Identity and Society"

Posts : 2514
Reputation : 1005
Join date : 2014-09-24

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:46 pm

reboot wrote:That actually was not meant to be snark. Sorry about that! It was that you already said you do not want a man to value for your personality alone, so waiting for that would overcomplicate and not make you happy anyway.
I would say wait until you find someone who vales your personality as well...

Except I do want a guy who values my personality. I want him to value both. I just don't dig this idea that he's going to dig my looks only/primarily because he digs my personality. I want him to value my looks, and then value my personality, as two separate and parallel entities. Don't like my personality more because of my looks, and don't like my looks because of my personality. Like them both. Is that really so much to ask?
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Enail Thu Nov 05, 2015 12:59 pm

It doesn't sound like so much to ask. But if you have trouble finding it, it kind of doesn't matter whether it's too much to ask or not, does it? On the practical level, your choices are pretty much going to be the same either way - find ways to show your looks and/or personality that might be more appealing, look in different places, compromise that standard in one way or another, or accept that it might not happen. That's true whether it's the smallest, most reasonable ask in the world, or the most bizarre, demanding and unrealistic.
Enail
Enail
Admin

Posts : 4853
Reputation : 2868
Join date : 2014-09-22

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by reboundstudent Thu Nov 05, 2015 1:11 pm

Enail wrote:It doesn't sound like so much to ask. But if you have trouble finding it, it kind of doesn't matter whether it's too much to ask or not, does it? On the practical level, your choices are pretty much going to be the same either way - find ways to show your looks and/or personality that might be more appealing, look in different places, compromise that standard in one way or another, or accept that it might not happen. That's true whether it's the smallest, most reasonable ask in the world, or the most bizarre, demanding and unrealistic.

True. Damn, it is ironic how we always want what we cannot have. I'd give anything to be attractive.
reboundstudent
reboundstudent

Posts : 460
Reputation : 261
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by nearly_takuan Thu Nov 05, 2015 5:50 pm

If it's wrong then I don't want to be right. I find superficial compliments extremely gratifying.

That being said... I have to agree with Werel about possibly being too hasty to rule out people who just have really good poker faces. Recently a woman I had thought incapable of hiding her feelings about anything (which, by the way, I also don't perceive as a bad thing; suits her personality) informed me that the first time we met, she'd been warned by mutual friends not to flirt with me in case I found it frightening. She'd held back telling me she thought I was physically attractive until she found out I was getting into a committed relationship making it "safe" to talk about that stuff. People make mistakes with the best of intentions. Razz

reboundstudent wrote:Damn, it is ironic how we always want what we cannot have. I'd give anything to be attractive.
Hey, so...you don't have to answer, obviously, but which do you think you feel more strongly: the desire to be attractive to a general crowd of people, or the desire to find specific people who think you're attractive and will tell you so? I don't think those are necessarily the same exact want.
nearly_takuan
nearly_takuan

Posts : 1071
Reputation : 461
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by jcorozza Sat Nov 07, 2015 10:14 pm

This is all odd to me, because while I'm not conventionally attractive AT ALL, most of the messages I get from guys are about my appearance. And I hate it. For one, I find them incredibly insincere. Some of them act like they're doing me this incredible favor by giving me these compliments (or occasionally, for finding me attractive at all).

At the same time, I think it's very possible to, say, fall for someone's brain or personality, and THEN start to think that they are physically very attractive. Which isn't quite the same as falling for them *despite* their looks.
jcorozza
jcorozza

Posts : 460
Reputation : 191
Join date : 2015-03-08

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by kath Tue Nov 10, 2015 1:12 am

I agree that you probably are ruling out people with good poker faces ... but that you get to do that if it makes you more comfortable? It sounds like you've considered the possibility and decided that you are OK with that, and since that's so, that's so.
kath
kath

Posts : 352
Reputation : 159
Join date : 2014-10-01

Back to top Go down

Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire? Empty Re: Is It Wrong to Want Superficial Desire?

Post by Sponsored content


Sponsored content


Back to top Go down

Page 1 of 2 1, 2  Next

Back to top


 
Permissions in this forum:
You cannot reply to topics in this forum