Interesting article. It seems that women can live without a man far easier than the reverse. Also, too many seem content with adult material and video games rather than trying to meet a woman in real life.
This is interesting science. I've never considered myself an attractive girl, I was the "big" girl in the 80s (at a size 4) because I liked to eat and couldn't participate in the anorexia culture of the time... Starving myself didn't make sense. I was a competitive gymnast then as well and didn't have boobs until I quit when I was 17. Males did not pay attention to me until then. My best friends were male, we hung out and they didn't ignore me, they sought me out for advice on dating my other friends. No dating me, not even a kiss. Boobs arrive and suddenly I'm visible. It was strange. These studies in your article focus on face, but it wasn't my face that changed when I went through my late puberty, not that much. However, I always got good grades, my teachers and employers have liked me. I was a software engineer until I had my second kid and was on a very fast leadership track at my company. So, while I felt invisible to the male gaze till 17, I was always treated well and didn't experience this despair. Instead, I married up at age 26 (husband is way more attractive than I but just as smart, also a software engineer, intelligence always matters most to me) and was able to miss all of the messy, lonely aspects of modern dating. Something that kept running through my head while reading this is the idea of enforced monogamy and how the destruction of marriage in our society, mostly by women who believe marriage is only for a man's benefit, has left so many women alone. I'm Polish and my grandmother told me about the "matchmaking" that went on in Poland until WW2. Even the "ugly" found a match because the community supported their young adults in this way. Not perfect, and it would make most Americans cringe, but most of her stories were funny and endearing. I remember thinking I'd love to be an old woman matchmaker in pre-industrial Poland. Anyway, thanks for this. Good morning reading.
Exactly! I've been researching Poland a bit more lately, and it appears that in many villages, the custom was for there to be a male and female matchmaker, both elders in the community, who "brokered" together. There were all sorts of little customs built up around this relationship. The male elder represented the groom, the elder female the bride, but the two arranged all the marriages. He'd speak with her first to be sure that the pairing even had a chance. Like, hey, Josef here is interested in Marianna, what's the chance? The old lady would chat with Marianna and her parents to get a sense, then return with a yes, no, or maybe. If the chances were high, the male matchmaker would work with Marianna's father on behalf of Josef to arrange a meal at their house where they both would attend and make the proposal. Marianna still had the chance to say no by whether or not she served an after dinner drink, vodka most often. If she didn't serve the drink, Josef knew she wasn't interested, if she did serve the drink, then he would be allowed to court her. Not for long, the engagement would soon follow. It was a practical thing. My grandmother grew up here in America, but still only dated my grandfather for two weeks before marrying him. She said when you know, you know. Why bother waiting? Life doesn't wait for you. Anyway, so many stories out there, each village was different, this is entirely peasant class stuff as well. A different sort of matchmaking went on in the upper classes. Still, the old lady was in charge, connecting people to one another. What an interesting archetype.
This was all depressing to read lol
Some copy-editing of the links
First link to PMC is dead, archive.org is disallowed, better to link to the current one: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4011637/
Second one the hypertext is broken.
https://web.archive.org/web/20181202022942/http://www.psypost.org/2010/04/happy-marriage-attractive-husband-562
Interesting article. It seems that women can live without a man far easier than the reverse. Also, too many seem content with adult material and video games rather than trying to meet a woman in real life.
This is interesting science. I've never considered myself an attractive girl, I was the "big" girl in the 80s (at a size 4) because I liked to eat and couldn't participate in the anorexia culture of the time... Starving myself didn't make sense. I was a competitive gymnast then as well and didn't have boobs until I quit when I was 17. Males did not pay attention to me until then. My best friends were male, we hung out and they didn't ignore me, they sought me out for advice on dating my other friends. No dating me, not even a kiss. Boobs arrive and suddenly I'm visible. It was strange. These studies in your article focus on face, but it wasn't my face that changed when I went through my late puberty, not that much. However, I always got good grades, my teachers and employers have liked me. I was a software engineer until I had my second kid and was on a very fast leadership track at my company. So, while I felt invisible to the male gaze till 17, I was always treated well and didn't experience this despair. Instead, I married up at age 26 (husband is way more attractive than I but just as smart, also a software engineer, intelligence always matters most to me) and was able to miss all of the messy, lonely aspects of modern dating. Something that kept running through my head while reading this is the idea of enforced monogamy and how the destruction of marriage in our society, mostly by women who believe marriage is only for a man's benefit, has left so many women alone. I'm Polish and my grandmother told me about the "matchmaking" that went on in Poland until WW2. Even the "ugly" found a match because the community supported their young adults in this way. Not perfect, and it would make most Americans cringe, but most of her stories were funny and endearing. I remember thinking I'd love to be an old woman matchmaker in pre-industrial Poland. Anyway, thanks for this. Good morning reading.
Reminds me of my favourite character in "Fiddler on the Roof"-- Yente!
Exactly! I've been researching Poland a bit more lately, and it appears that in many villages, the custom was for there to be a male and female matchmaker, both elders in the community, who "brokered" together. There were all sorts of little customs built up around this relationship. The male elder represented the groom, the elder female the bride, but the two arranged all the marriages. He'd speak with her first to be sure that the pairing even had a chance. Like, hey, Josef here is interested in Marianna, what's the chance? The old lady would chat with Marianna and her parents to get a sense, then return with a yes, no, or maybe. If the chances were high, the male matchmaker would work with Marianna's father on behalf of Josef to arrange a meal at their house where they both would attend and make the proposal. Marianna still had the chance to say no by whether or not she served an after dinner drink, vodka most often. If she didn't serve the drink, Josef knew she wasn't interested, if she did serve the drink, then he would be allowed to court her. Not for long, the engagement would soon follow. It was a practical thing. My grandmother grew up here in America, but still only dated my grandfather for two weeks before marrying him. She said when you know, you know. Why bother waiting? Life doesn't wait for you. Anyway, so many stories out there, each village was different, this is entirely peasant class stuff as well. A different sort of matchmaking went on in the upper classes. Still, the old lady was in charge, connecting people to one another. What an interesting archetype.