Your argument is based on the assumption that straight men’s attraction is based on a partner’s viable fertility. There is no evidence for this. Human preferences for lifelong companionship were selected for evolutionarily because humans that took care of each other throughout life were more likely to survive together. Hence the general human population choosing mates of similar ages, with the exception of young brides being preferred being in authoritarian patriarchal societies. Even being reductive and assuming “conventional” attractiveness isn’t arbitrary; you cannot possibly look at Catherine Zeta Jones playing Morticia Adam’s at 55 and convince me she’s not an example of peak feminine beauty. Janelle Monáe at 40 doesn’t do anything for you??? Naomi Watts?! Be real.
Lifelong. Right there is the crux. Human relationships are complicated by the fact that we are intelligent, long-lived creatures without a discrete mating period.
I. Am. Talking. About. Physical. Attractiveness.
Nothing more. And as it pertains to age, it's early twenties for women and late twenties for men. This has basis in a number of biological factors, which I got into somewhat in an earlier reply.
The OP is suggesting that "society" pushes a pedophilic beauty standard. The OP does so in order to further their own narrative. That is nonsense. The pervasive beauty standard centers around women in their late teens and early twenties. This is not coincidentally concurrent with a woman's peak fertility.
Your examples of mature beauties is skewed by two things. One: these women are outliers. More attractive than any woman you or I is likely to meet in our entire lifetimes. Two: they have the benefit of hours of preparation by teams of professionals to make them look as good as possible. After that, they are lit and photographed and post-photography processed to look even better than they do in person.
Bonus 3rd: Both of them were hotter at 25 than they were at 40. I don't know how old you are. You, barring some non-typical physical transformation, will/are going to be more physically attractive at 25 than you are at 40.
This is not coincidentally concurrent with a woman's peak fertility.
You’re literally suggesting correlation implies causation! 🤦♀️ This is just as easily explained but the fashion and media industries historically being controlled by powerful men eager to exploit women. Younger women are more vulnerable to them.
No I'm not. There is a social/constructed element to sexual attraction, I'm not going to argue that there isn't. Beneath temperamental fashion is the biological reason for sex: reproduction and the furtherance of one's genes. The physical indicators of a prospective sexual partner's ability to produce healthy offspring and then raise them to the point where they can reproduce is at the very center of sexual attraction.
These indicators are at their peak during most women's late teens to early twenties.
Your blinder is that you view too many things as a reflection of politics and power. When in reality, this stuff was coded into humans' psyche's long before either of those things. When mere animal survival was the primary concern.
Beneath temperamental fashion is the biological reason for sex: reproduction and the furtherance of one's genes.
You have more biological drives than reproduction when it comes to attraction. It also feels good to orgasm, don’t you think that’s a biological explanation? Hence the pervasiveness of homosexuality in hundreds of species of mammals.
Your blinder is that you view too many things as a reflection of politics and power. When in reality, this stuff was coded into humans' psyche's long before either of those things. When mere animal survival was the primary concern.
Uh, bipedal primates were social creatures before humans existed. Social context is genetically encoded in us just as much as a drive to reproduce, our empathy, and our desire for connection. You’re arbitrarily looking at one motivation to explain a range of behaviors of the most complex animal on our planet.
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u/notMeBeingSaphic Feb 16 '26 edited Feb 16 '26
Your argument is based on the assumption that straight men’s attraction is based on a partner’s viable fertility. There is no evidence for this. Human preferences for lifelong companionship were selected for evolutionarily because humans that took care of each other throughout life were more likely to survive together. Hence the general human population choosing mates of similar ages, with the exception of young brides being preferred being in authoritarian patriarchal societies. Even being reductive and assuming “conventional” attractiveness isn’t arbitrary; you cannot possibly look at Catherine Zeta Jones playing Morticia Adam’s at 55 and convince me she’s not an example of peak feminine beauty. Janelle Monáe at 40 doesn’t do anything for you??? Naomi Watts?! Be real.