The inverse relationship between looks and character

[Colossus]

I have long held that there is an inverse relationship between a woman's looks and her quality of character.

Now before everyone jumps all over me, let me add the disclaimer that this is a general observation based on my experiences.

I have met a surprising number of quality, substantial women (more than our anecdotal statistics would suggest exist) that are a 7 or below in looks. These women usually have great personalities; they are very feminine in the traditional sense---like to cook, take care of their man, have all sorts of useful skills like knitting, accounting, entertaining, planning, and coordinating, and they often have kick-as$ outdoor hobbies like me so they are always up for stuff most women wont touch; like backpacking, climbing, kayaking, et al.

In short I have met a number of women who would probably make excellent girlfriends or even wives. They are loyal, respectful, kind, have superb motherly qualities and basically just think the sun shines out of my arse....but they don't blow me away with their looks.

Conversely, most of the hotter women I have dated (8-9.5) are FVCKED UP in the head. They have been manipulative, bipolar, disloyal, dishonest, flaky, and disrespectful. Any good times with them were usually short-lived. Many of them had been abused in some way and they almost ALL had sex issues.

Can any of you corroborate this phenomenon? I'm starting to think it's better to pick a girl who isn't jaw-droppingly hot but brings a lot of good qualities to the table.

 

[Jitterbug]

It's a Western / Anglosphere thing.

 

[jophil28]

I have long held that there is an inverse relationship between a woman's looks and her quality of character.

This is true enough.
Really gorgeous woman get attention and fawning from the majority of men just by being in the room.
However occasionally I have met a great woman who was HOT who did not act like an entitled baitch. They are rare.

The grand daddy of all mistakes that woman make is to reply on their looks and appearance to attract men. However, it works so well that HOT woman have no need to develop themselves as quality women, but they forget that looks ALWAYS fade over time, so their main game is destined to be LESS effective in achieving their objective as they age.

If you make your way by offering yourself as a shiny "trophy", it is likely that your appeal will diminish when the shine wear off and your appeal as a "trophy" reduces .

As so they wind up on POF at age 47 ,talking about their "few extra pounds" and lamenting the shortage of " good men". Boo hoo !

 

[insidious]

Totally, totally, agree with you.
It's a zero-sum game with women. One trait rises, the other falls... It's rare that you get a stunning woman with a stunning personality & intellect. Rare I said.

A word of caution...in terms of the bell curve, this works for women in the 6-8 range. Once you get women below that who fall towards the ugly end of the spectrum, they tend to be just as phucked up in the head as the really hot chicks, but for entirely different reasons.

The nature of woman is such that she won't take it upon herself to trash the paradigm and be way more than she needs to be. If she can sack a man and have a baby or babies, that's more than enough for her. Beyond that, what need for excellence exists in a woman's life?

 

[Mike32ct]

I agree completely. I'm at the point where I will only approach, talk to, and date women in the 6 to 7 category (preferably 7). I really don't bother with women who are 8+s because it usually isn't worth it. They have way too much ego, a sense of entitlement, and a horrible attitude.

 

[flexion_]

Yes I agree. I've always looked at it as "hot chick - 1" in a math sense; not so much a true inverse relationship though.

Whenever I'm in a group I will approach the second best looking woman based on what I find "hot". The really "hot" ones I pick usually are insecure and ultimately a PITA.

 

[jophil28]

A word of caution...in terms of the bell curve, this works for women in the 6-8 range. Once you get women below that who fall towards the ugly end of the spectrum, they tend to be just as phucked up in the head as the really hot chicks, but for entirely different reasons.

Belll Curve model on the Hotness v. Character/sanity grid ..Good insight there.

 

[azanon]

RT - looks like we need your help here. (some of?) these guys want a new excuse for going for lower quality women. I know this fits into one of your lessons, but I forgot which.

From what I've been able to tell 36 years and counting, I don't notice this phenomenon at all. More attractive women have more options, and logically take advantage of this. This does not make their character low.

 

[insidious]

RT - looks like we need your help here. (some of?) these guys want a new excuse for going for lower quality women. I know this fits into one of your lessons, but I forgot which.

From what I've been able to tell 36 years and counting, I don't notice this phenomenon at all. More attractive women have more options, and logically take advantage of this. This does not make their character low.

HB9.3 with 95 IQ & boring personality = low quality
HB7.3 with 120 IQ & interesting personality = high quality
That's my yardstick and I don't care what your yardstick is. I'm not dating you and obviously we are not competing for the same women LOL

Now am I saying all 9.3's have low intelligence and bad personalities? Not at all. Just like I'm not saying all 7.3's will be necessarily intelligent or even interesting.

All the unusually beautiful sexy women I've known and been acquainted with are usually very friendly and welcoming...zero soul though. I prefer women with... nuances shall I say?

 

[STR8UP]

Hmmm....I dunno...I haven't noticed that women are a whole lot different across the board.

I don't tend to hang out with the "hottest of the hot" crowd, but honestly, I think some of the most attractive women I have ever met have been the most interesting. Could be their personalities making them look closer to "10's" than they actually are, but regardless, my experiences with the hotter women have been positive for the most part.

I've actually worked with quite a few of these 9's recently and found them to be rather engaging. Granted, it's mostly work related and I haven't spent a lot of one on one time with them, but most of them are pretty cool.

If anything it's the 7-8's that get a ton of attention from guys so they THINK they are 10's. If I had a nickle for each one of these above average looking women thinking they are ALL THAT, I'd have, well, a lot of money.

 

[jophil28]

RT - looks like we need your help here. (some of?) these guys want a new excuse for going for lower quality women. I know this fits into one of your lessons, but I forgot which.

From what I've been able to tell 36 years and counting, I don't notice this phenomenon at all. More attractive women have more options, and logically take advantage of this. This does not make their character low.

"Character" is about how she conducts herself and that forms into what the posters here frequently refer to as "quality" in regard to women's social performance.
It is no small coincidence that, in this thread at least , there is early agreement that very hot women make little effort to act respectfully toward men or conduct themselves in admirable ways.

THis seems to be the observation of several posters so far, mine included. Perhaps you have not seen what we have seen.

Secondly,. "taking advantge of one's options" is not a license to act poorly just because she thinks she can do so with impunity.

 

[Rollo Tomassi]

RT - looks like we need your help here. (some of?) these guys want a new excuse for going for lower quality women. I know this fits into one of your lessons, but I forgot which.

Well, this may come as a shock for you, but I don't entirely disagree with this observation. Strictly, from a behavior-to-reward practicality, COLOSSUS is really pointing out the obvious - exceptionally attractive women are more often rewarded and reinforced by unsolicited attention from both genders. In this instance he's referring to how it affects men's prospects of a long term commitment with a woman, but bear in mind that attention IS currency for women's social constructs as well as for their own personal affirmation.

Have a skim back through my thread Compensation. In a similar fashion, less physically attractive women (and therefore less attention generating women) are prompted to compensate for this deficiency by cultivating other aspects of themselves in order to compete with more attractive females. There are a whole host of compensation mechanics women will use in order to remain competitive. From the physical (breast enhancement, hair color, style of dress) to the psychological, to social contrivances, the order is to stay a step ahead of a (imagined or real) physically superior and sexually available female.

This then is of course aided by the fact that more physically desirable women are less inclined, prompted or motivated to entertain the efforts necessary to develop the character attributes less attractive women have had, by necessity, to develop. Attention is the coin of the realm in Girl-World and the HB9 has never had cause to develop novel ideas in order generate what comes to her by default. Being flirtatious, dressing provocatively, showing outward signs of sexual availability, are all she's had to cultivate in herself. Similarly, very attractive men (the naturals) are often some of the biggest AFCs you'll ever know because they have had little cause to consider the mechanics of their own attraction. They know the TV works and they like it, who cares HOW it works, right?

So it comes as no surprise that less attractive women will have a higher preponderance of, and occasion to develop, character traits that are meant to offset physical deficiencies. The HB7 who could stand to lose 15lbs. may be an excellent conversationalist, or seems like a good mother candidate, but understand, she HAS to be. Overweight women will often be the most sexually adventurous; they HAVE to be in order to secure long term provisioning. It's not that an HB5 and an HB9 have any more or less a natural capacity to be more intellectually stimulating or are more or less capable of developing their characters - it's that each have had differing conditions and reinforcements that led them to develop into who they are.

Now, all that said, we come back once again to that nebulous prize, the "quality woman". While I will agree that there are in fact contributing conditions that make more attractive women less likely to hold desirable character qualities, this doesn't make them intrinsically less desirable. Lets face facts for a moment; most guys (even attractive guys) are intimidated by an HB9. We come up with our own set of social contrivances ("she's outta my league") in order to compensate with an inability to get after what we really want (a hot piece of ass). It's an ego insulation - when you lower your expectations you can always come out a winner. Just as some guys construct a "preference" for fat women, for single mothers, for underage girls, or any other Buffer he can come up with that staves off or lessens the impact of personal rejection, so too is it in writing off exceptionally attractive women. So we "develop" preferences for HB 6-7s because, in all honesty, they're easier to engage, and fraught with less potential for rejection. And if they do reject you; hey she wasn't all that good looking anyway, right?

I think we have an externalized ideal of what a "Quality Woman" should be. We can build some list of esoteric attributes she should have, but honestly this is equally as pollyanna as women with extensive laundry lists for the men who'd meet their own criteria. The externalized ideal is what a lot of poster go on about here on SS. The difficulty with this proposal is that our internalized idea of "Quality", only in rare exceptions, never matches the external. Most men are far more likely to consider an HB9 who's unbelievable in bed as "Quality" in spite of any character flaws. The woman who DOESN'T reject them becomes a "force-fit quality woman."

There's a common proverb we like to laugh at: You can't make a 'ho a housewife. However you are far more likely to make a 'ho a housewife than a housewife become a 'ho. Ideally we'd love our future wife to be a great mother, refined, gracious, intellectual, appreciative and of course ƒuck us like rabid porn star 4 nights a week. We all want a slut, we just want her to be our slut. Most men, even experienced DJs (and often PUAs) don't know how to make very attractive women respond to them sustainably.

It's no secret that the most attractive women are oft the most insecure and attention-dependent. It's also no secret that the successful guy will be the one who can get the HB9 to qualify to him. Some guys can do this in the short term and get sex with that HB, but sustaining it is what confounds most guys. So that hottie starts to become flawed, "low quality", when in fact the guy is simply falling back into old AFC mental schemas and self-defeating. However, for the Man with enough confidence, who's unafraid of mastering a dominant, positively masculine role, his HB 9 can become his housewife if she's motivated and inspired to do so.

It is far easier to encourage and mold social skills and desirable character traits for a properly motivated HB9 than it is to work up to better physical /sexual standards for an HB 6-7 who's internalized her self-worth based on who she already is after years of compensating and competition anxiety. In other words, you're more likely to offend the HB 6 by suggesting she get to the gym, than you are to offend the HB 9 by suggesting she read a newspaper or book.

 

[TheHumanist]

^^^So in shorter terms, paraphrasing the above: You noticed the pattern but you see as a reward-compensation model which the lesser looking women cultivate better personalities because they have to. The more attractive ones never do for they have nothing to drive them so. Those with preferences with 6-7s or "chunky" women and so on are just rationalization to women who they really want, but don't think/can't get. Men are far more likely to give up other requirements and blatantly ignore them for a hotter woman rather than give up looks for personality. Quality is along she's hot even if she a dud everywhere else. Finally, you believe the saying "you can make a ho a housewife" is wrong as it is actually easier to make a ho a housewife than the reverse. Your reasoning is the housewife would be far more resistant to hit the gym than the ho to hit the books.


Well thought out as a usual RT, but I do find some troubling things in mind. Especially the last sentences...

1. What does this mean for the less attractive women? They develop their personalities to be better. However, not all of their flaws is just 15 pounds of fat. Some physically flaws just can't be remedied by the treadmill. Should a women then look for surgery to fix flaws (like breast implants or something, that reminds me of stuka's arguments). This reminds me of an essay I once read when I used to work at the university's admissions office, the applicant tale was how she gained an epiphany after going through surgery to remove a wart off her face. Is that her entire summer before high school about? Is her value just a little blemish removal? The rest of the application shows she went on to do very well in high school, my memory says she won a 3 year pre-med program with a scholarship. However, at the beginning, she naturally cared much about looks enough to go to surgery. How far should compensation go? Then there's some that even surgery cannot fix, then what?

2.Azanon's post also got my mind thinking, should a man take a 6,7,8, even a 9 with the idea that we want the best we can get? Those who are married, the wife no matter what will eventually no longer look as much as when she was young... however the old man ability to gain attention actually rises, at least for so many years, what should a DJ husband react with the mentality that a major part of attraction is physical.

3. I kinda have to admit I feel "off" on your argument that making a ho into housewife is easier than the reverse. Your point about making a girl read is much easier than making a girl run. I would see far more people offended by a man saying go hit the treadmill than go pick up a book. An attractive woman with a DJ who have the skill keep her interest going can get her to read a book. However, can she develop genuine interest in what she just read? Can this women gain the character traits of compassion, patience, and understanding by sheer desire to get the man? Can it make her act with discipline and a conscious when no one is watching her? Can she gain self-awareness and willingness to be responsible by sheer desire?

Can a man change a women who is "manipulative, bipolar, disloyal, dishonest, flaky, and disrespectful... Many of them had been abused in some way and they almost ALL had sex issues" into a "loyal, respectful, kind, have superb motherly qualities and basically just think the sun shines out of my arse." Can a masculine man change her thought process to be sincere instead of overly calculating? Can the woman learn to respect others when she don't need something from them? Can she learn loyalty in hard times or in front of temptation? Can you make her learn about being as honest during confrontation? Can you instill a system of morality and ethics while picking up hobbies by a single man's masculine influence? Can you make her victim mentality disappear? Can you make her have some confidence so she won't be so insecure about herself. Can you make her forget her history of "abuse" so many seem to find about them.

That's a lot of "cans" and to be honest, I have doubts on that. My thinking says you can get to her to read Confucius, but it doesn't mean she actually going to take genuine interest in it. To actually find what she just read fascinating. It seems to be many character traits requires some kind of actual experience or even hardship than just wanting to learn it. I have doubts that by sheer masculinity that by cultivated such high interests she will not just avoid steering **** up because she doesn't want to rock the boat, but have a mindset, mentality, and code that she wouldn't.

 

[Colossus]

I think we have an externalized ideal of what a "Quality Woman" should be. We can build some list of esoteric attributes she should have, but honestly this is equally as pollyanna as women with extensive laundry lists for the men who'd meet their own criteria.

I see what you are saying but I don't think making a "list" per se is necessarily an exercise in fantasy. It highlights why it is so important to expose yourself to many different types of women (spin plates) while you are young so can start to chisel out a defined, internalized ideal of what you want in a woman.

I actually sat down recently and made a spreadsheet for myself, as silly as it may sound. All I really did was make a table of 7 broad aspects and list what I want under each column, and color-coded them as to how negotiable or mandatory each specific quality is. These are just general qualities, nothing absurdly specific. All of them are based on my own experiences with women, positive and negative. Of course it could change a little over time, but it was more just an exercise in delineating what "quality" is to me. I know what I am looking for in an LTR, so I think it can be helpful to refer back to the list periodically and see if I am making choices just based on superficiality.

Of course, for just sex, it doesn't need to be said that the only condition necessary is that she needs to be hot; for any man. But I am trying to get away from making my decisions with women purely based on how much my d!ck flutters. Yes, it is absolutely an indispensable, but there are other attributes which are just as important for overall satisfaction.

We all want a slut, we just want her to be our slut. Most men, even experienced DJs (and often PUAs) don't know how to make very attractive women respond to them sustainably.

This I completely agree with. In no arena is it easier to revert back to AFC ways than in the context of an LTR. We get comfortable, we let our guard down, and we start to be less disciplined with our actions because we get lulled into this false sense of security thinking we have 'secured' her to the point staying on top of our game is no longer an issue. That's when critical mistakes are made.

HB9.3 with 95 IQ & boring personality = low quality
HB7.3 with 120 IQ & interesting personality = high quality
That's my yardstick and I don't care what your yardstick is. I'm not dating you and obviously we are not competing for the same women

This is a great point. We all have different measuring parameters. The fact that almost all of the responses to my post have corroborated what I described just illustrates what most of us know intuitively. It's nothing earth-shattering nor is it an excuse to go after 'low-quality' women. It's not about 'settling', it's about recognizing what is most important. She still has to be attractive to me, no matter how much her other qualities stand out.

VERY attractive women generally have less of an impetus to develop character and personality attributes that we consider 'quality', because they have gotten all the attention they need throughout their life because of their attractiveness. That's not to say 8's and 9's cant have high character as I would define it, but in my experience, and probably most everyone else's, this is rarely the case.

 

[Colossus]

A word of caution...in terms of the bell curve, this works for women in the 6-8 range. Once you get women below that who fall towards the ugly end of the spectrum, they tend to be just as phucked up in the head as the really hot chicks, but for entirely different reasons.

Another great observation. The 'inverse scale' applies mostly to women in the 6-9 range.

I would define a "6" as your average woman; cute enough to fvck, but rather ordinary for the most part. "7" I would say is cuter than average, but not a show pony. "8" is very cute, and "9" is exceptional. A "10" is more subjective than any other number in our scale, but I think we can agree it refers to our idea of female physical perfection.

Anything below 6, IMO, is entering into the ugly realm. Unfvckable, in other words.

 

[Rollo Tomassi]

First of all, it's important not to think in terms of absolutes. I use the overweight issue to describe less than desirable traits with regards to an HB6-7 for sake illustration. What is it that separates an HB 5 from an HB 9? I key this on physical, sexual desirability and sexual availability. No doubt in a perfect world our ideal would consist of a gorgeous HB9.5 with the heart of a saint, a perfect yin to our yang intellectually and socially well adjusted, but the fact remains that our initial attraction and arousal is based upon physical criteria. Ergo, you don't get to know much about her charming personality and endearing traits if she's doesn't meet a physical minimum attraction.

Qualifying as a an HB 7 (which is a subjective scale) may not have anything to do with weight issues, but the criteria IS physical. I should also add that this physical criteria is echoed in women's social acceptability to modify their appearance. Make up, high heels, push up bras, breast augmentation, hair color, etc. are not only acceptable but encouraged.

It's also equally unfair to assume that "hot ones never get smarter". Again this is an absolute. There should be at least a basic understanding that women's sexual marketability declines with age, so even the hottest HB9.5 will at some point find it necessary to modify her behavior to accommodate a future long term provisioning opportunity. When the guy comes along who meets her own criteria for an LTR/Marriage commitment her behavior has to be changed from one of sexual selection to one of sexual investment. This necessitates a change in behavior, attitude and perspective. While facing the social and physical effects of aging, she's forced into a position of becoming some one new - particularly in light of not having spent the time and effort in developing herself personally during her formative years.

Few women can outlive their sexuality so they need to form new strategies in order to sustain long term interest in their committed males. Sometimes this may be a woman having an epiphany and learning social graces. However, most are unprepared for this and so rely on pre-constructed social contrivances (i.e shaming, entitlement, etc.) ready made for them and meant to keep a man in a perpetual state of qualifying to her. How many times have you heard your married friends state "I'm lucky to have her" as opposed to a woman saying the same of her spouse?

My point with Ho's and Housewives is going to be controversial, but look at it from a societal pressure point of view. If you've got a consistently unfaithful GF in her party years there's really two problems; her own dishonesty and self-expectations of fidelity (or monogamy) in her age/physical condition, and a guy's expectation that she will or should be faithful to him under the same considerations. I have no doubt that there are plenty of innocuous, unassuming Soccer Moms with 2 kids and married for 7 years at 38 who lived entirely different lives in their college/party years. Looking at her coming out of the mini van or at bible study you'd never guess she used to do three-ways with her dorm mate and her BF back in college. Yet there she is getting the kids off to school.

I think it's actually more difficult to get the girl who's been perpetually coddled and primed for a lifetime to be the perfect homemaker. A lot of the marital discord I hear from religious friends of mine comes from this very dynamic. They did everything "by the book" so to speak and the sex has never been anything more that missionary position twice a month for the past 6 years. Social pressure is on her side in this, and again shaming and social conventions arise; "why should he expect anything more?", "what's giving him these ideas of flipping me over and taking me from behind? Porn maybe?"

That's only one perspective though. The other is the HB6-7 who's prided herself on her internal rewards and feels she's good enough as is. After all, she's successfully beaten out the competition by getting her guy to commit. By him expressing his dissatisfaction with her physically or sexually she's already in a societal position of power in her own expectations to "be happy with who she is". And if he can't appreciate it he's "shallow" and "superficial" and really isn't what she thought he was or whom she thought he misrepresented himself to be.

The long and short is that there is no mythical "Quality Woman". You're always going to exchange advantages for disadvantages. The best you can do is to get close to optimal advantages, but it's important to understand that what you think is important now may not be in the future. However, it's equally important to also understand that what you think "shouldn't matter" or isn't important now, may well be the cause of your divorce in the future.

 

[Duffdog]

Interesting post Rollo, but I find that there are a great deal of assumptions you make. One, that there is a finite number of "points" a female can accumulate in her life and if she has used up all her points on looks, then she MUST suck in all other aspects of life. Conversely, females who appear or enjoy the motherly aspects of life have to be unattractive because there is no way that some female can be everything you want and hot too. And two, the old "can't turn a ho into a housewife"... This sort of bugs me, as in my experience, all females of all types are *****s, they just have different prices. Some may want attention or power while others want diamond rings, 2.5 kids, a 5 bedroom house and a volvo.

I don't feel that any qualities are mutually exclusive on any type of female, but I do feel that males rationalize away any positive internal qualities once they decide that "she is out of my league." Since she is now out of my league, to make myself feel better, I will construct an array of deficiencies which she MUST have in order to exist. It must exist because there is no way a woman can exist who is hot, smart, successful and...wait...doesn't like me!!! NOoooooo...!

This same thought process occurs in females, but then again, that is the reason that this forum exists, right? Though there is no female equivalent to this forum, we males are discussing how to become attractive, confident, successful AND desired by females. Now tell me, does that logic only apply in one direction-- I.e, females can either be hot or smart, therefore males can only be hot or smart? Or are males immune to those categorizations?

 

[Colossus]

The long and short is that there is no mythical "Quality Woman". You're always going to exchange advantages for disadvantages. The best you can do is to get close to optimal advantages, but it's important to understand that what you think is important now may not be in the future. However, it's equally important to also understand that what you think "shouldn't matter" or isn't important now, may well be the cause of your divorce in the future.

There's everything you need to know right here. As INSIDIOUS said, it's a zero-sum game.

 

[sodbuster]

The difference between men and women? HOw many men do women marry for their looks? Sex,FB's,boyfriends yes A husband who can't provide? Rarely happens. I'm sure you can find the exceptions,but it's not the norm. We have to develope.

NOW how many women are hot and got married on the basis of looks only? I'd be willing to bet 10X more than men. They don't need to develope more because there will always be a man ready to date/marry them based on looks alone. So, we have this dynamic.

 

[TheHumanist]

The long and short is that there is no mythical "Quality Woman". You're always going to exchange advantages for disadvantages. The best you can do is to get close to optimal advantages, but it's important to understand that what you think is important now may not be in the future. However, it's equally important to also understand that what you think "shouldn't matter" or isn't important now, may well be the cause of your divorce in the future.

You know, for some reason, while you message is many times very similar to others (in this case insidious as in zero-sum game), yours always have that "mechanicaly-coldness" I have to get over before I can start think about it. Anyone else ever sense that also? Not trying to be too critical, just make it harder for me to swallow even though your point is well done.

Granted, we can't think in absolutes here. As you said, the 38-year old unassuming soccer mom, many of them was the sluttly college girl. Though with time that hot slutty girl may change as conditions force her to or at least use/collectively develop contrivances to shame men into their arms. Still, my question was being the masculine man who can sustain the interest and make the ho into a housewife. What you siad doesn't address your point on ho and housewife, though perhaps I'm looking at the wrong point of view since you said societal. That saying exist is because men who took women known to have bad character, the character just doesn't change, it falls right to the Law of Avoiding the Unhappy and Unlucky which is from your favorite book. She may change, but at that point, she's not here yet and it is risky to try to change the ho into the housewife (Of course, I'm not saying that all hot women are "low quality" but in this discussion of the general person, many are).

and to Duff, I think Ho means more also the bad qualities Colossus said at topic post than just willingness to sleep around. In an LTR, there's hopefully more than just exhange of everything for sex. That's part of the problem of today of women as many point out around this forum is some seem to expect the world in return for access to her gold-lined *****.

BTW, isn't the concept of quality woman is the getting the optimal amount of advantages over disadvantages? At least that what I think. I guess the quality woman ideal risk becoming a laundry list which is I think your point, but we need to have some expectations.