[sheepmullet]

> Imagine how a man might pick a woman if attractiness was completely off the table

Loyalty, playfulness, flexibility, kindness, intelligence, high energy levels, ability to have kids, doesn’t already have kids, etc.

None of which are positively correlated with a woman’s age.

[JimboOmega]

Some of these I would argue are positively correlated, especially loyalty and kindness. Some I would argue are a bit of a toss up, like intelligence. I am not sure what flexibility means (ability to adapt to change? I would argue that a 40 year old is more capable than a 20-something on average in that regard). Some I feel are more about having a similar level to a partner rather than being an absolute value (energy level).

I feel like this list is really answering the question "what do I find attractive, besides her face/body?", and not "what kind of traits in a partner actually bring me happiness?" - with the exception of kindness and loyalty.

Even as someone who used to identify as a man and thus was in the dating market as such, I can't understand how emotional maturity is of no value; it's one of the most important traits to me in a partner and essentially the reason I picked my last partner for a long term relationship.

[neetdeth]

You're trying to contort a mate selection process that has an inherently sexual-reproductive basis (for most people) into an exercise in platonic pair bonding. It doesn't make sense as such, and it isn't supposed to. People are seeking fulfillment of motivations that are fundamentally evolutionary in nature.

For everything else, we have friendship. (Setting aside the evolutionary advantages of e.g. male coalition-building, which we really can't, but whatever!)

[JimboOmega]

From my perspective: Bullshit.

I am someone who exists outside of evolution's traditional goals. I'm a transwoman, and predominantly lesbian at that. In all honesty, I'm so far outside the norm (even for a transwoman) that it causes most people I date not to have a script for it; the usual reaction is for them to become "starry eyed" and metaphorically eat out of my hand.

This is extra bizarre to me, as someone who used to be read as a relatively uninteresting, effeminate male; being passably female in pretty much every sense (including hormonally) should not increase my attractiveness to other women, yet it does. Not a single woman I've dated has expressed any particular interest in me as a fertile partner, and in what biological sense am I, really? While I have banked sperm, my testosterone levels are lower than most cisgender women's - in all likelihood, I am not fertile. There's very little way for a casual observer - even one who has access to my blood to run non-genetic tests on - to recognize that I am transgender.

I'm not just bragging; I straight up don't understand it. It was one of the things that kept me from transitioning for so long - being afraid women would have no interest in me if I did. I have postulated that the unique mix of hormones that I currently have, somehow, smells like perpetual ovulation; and yet if so why am I apparently far more attractive to women than men? Most girls I date seem particularly attached to my smell in a way they weren't before, but the interest I get from men is somehow less than before I transitioned.

I am promiscuous and unwilling to commit; I neither seek nor am particularly attractive to women seeking someone to support them and potentially their children. I regularly date women who have or have previously had male partners (in an ethical way).

Unless my humanity itself, the fact that I am living authentically and being who I truly am is more attractive, more valuable to the women I date, I simply have no explanation for the reactions I get now.

As a result - my own lived experience tells me that humans, and our relationships, are so much more than evolutionary motivations - at least as we understand them.

The testosterone running through my veins was just as real as the estradiol running through them now; the queerness of my life does not in any way diminish my humanity nor that of those who have interacted with me.

If you come at it from a queer perspective, you plainly see that your argument falls apart. Us queers are very sexual people, but by nature of being queer, don't feel compelled to follow any particular script; as a result our interests are very diverse. Some lesbians might prefer childbearing hips; the ones that date me definitely don't! And yet my femininity is nonetheless compelling; I've had girls tell me how nice it was to date someone so feminine (and how hard that was to find).

The women I find the most attractive tend to be KPop stars; east Asian (usually Korean) women in their early 20s (if that), often who are borderline underweight. The woman who I bonded with like nobody else in my life, the one I loved, the one I always thought was beautiful even when she couldn't see it, the one who gave my life meaning, the one who I still sometimes weep about even months after I last saw her was an obese scots woman in her early 30s with a serious disability.

And she was beautiful to me. Even before I transitioned.

Humans are wonderfully, fabulously, beautifully complex creatures. Our culture and social complexity has run far ahead of our genetics in so many ways. If we accept we have gone past our genetically programmed ways to figure out what to eat, consuming endless salt and sugar, causing us cavities and diabetes and unhappiness, why can't we accept that, too, our genetics were never meant for a world with Tinder and plastic surgery or even fast fashion? That our basest instincts do not bring us happiness - unless we examine them from a perspective that we are something greater, that we can be better than that?

The truth is, we can. The truth is, happiness - mediated by oxytocin and dopamine and all of that evolutionary history - DOES exist beyond merely eating and sex. We are programmed for empathy, for cooperation, for belonging. For love. We may desire things that will make us unhappy but we can make a choice.

If you ignore that, whether you are male or female- if you insist that, no, your life is just about having sex with the most attractive partner because evolution demands it - you will wind up like the parent of this entire conversation. You will be sad. Whether you are a 60 year old man or a 35 year old woman, you will realize at some point what you have been doing is refusing to be human, to have real relationships; you have been using sexuality to protect your feelings, and suddenly, it doesn't work any more.

Choose to be human; choose to be more than your selfish genes.

[MRD85]

I get where you are coming from but attraction is still a thing. I'm a guy and for me, physical attraction is a minimum standard that loses value after the minimum is met. Once someone reaches the standards for the physical attraction I value other traits vastly more. These physical standards aren't even all that hard to meet if someone looks after themselves.

[JimboOmega]

I actually agree with you (I was a bit drunk when I wrote that rant). If someone meets a relatively low standard of physical attractiveness, the rest matters more. I may be off in queer lala land, but that still is roughly true for me.

The argument I am encountering, the one I disagree with, is that attractiveness is a linear function and substantially the only thing that matters when dating. By virtue of being in her mid 30s, the letter writer is right to realize her value is low and declining. She will only find low value partners and even those doors are closing as she creeps closer to menopause.

I'm trying to argue that no, her value as a person AND as a romantic partner is much more than that.

I'm even going one step farther than that to say that picking a mate based on attractiveness as correlated with age is a strategy that will not bring you happiness whether you are a man, woman, or a queer degenerate like myself.

A lot of people follow other strategies, even if they are in the minority, and while it might take some time, she should seek out those who do, who value the things she has done in her life, the perspectives she's gained, all of that, and not just her youthful good looks.

tl;dr - Girl needs to chill. Her life (even romantic life!) isn't over because she's single and 35. She needs to stop evaluating herself that way.

[sheepmullet]

> positively correlated, especially loyalty

How does a string of short term relationships show loyalty?

> flexibility means (ability to adapt to change?

Yes and the willingness.

I’ve known plenty of early 20s women who will drop their careers to follow their boyfriend overseas and very few in their 30s who will.

> I can't understand how emotional maturity is of no value

Why should a man find it valuable in a partner?

[JimboOmega]

> How does a string of short term relationships show loyalty?

Age says nothing about what prior relationships someone has had, other than that they've had more time to have them.

It translates to loyalty (albeit weakly) in that a woman who is older has better self awareness and knows what she wants in a relationship, where a younger woman might still be figuring that out (and realize only later on that her relationship isn't what she wanted)

>I’ve known plenty of early 20s women who will drop their careers to follow their boyfriend overseas and very few in their 30s who will.

So it's more valuable to have a woman who isn't independent? Who doesn't have her own life or hobbies and gets fulfillment solely through her partner?

> Why should a man find it valuable in a partner?

Seriously? You don't know why emotional maturity is valuable in a partner?

[sheepmullet]

> It translates to loyalty (albeit weakly) in that a woman who is older has better self awareness and knows what she wants in a relationship, where a younger woman might still be figuring that out

Than why are there clear correlations (for women) between # of monogamous relationships and likelihood of divorce? As well as between # of sexual partners and likelihood of divorce?

> So it's more valuable to have a woman who isn't independent?

Of course! More flexibility and dependence up to a point is certainly better.

Of course the idea that this means a woman can’t have her own hobbies seems to be taking things to the extreme.

> Seriously?

Yes and honestly.

I married young and I think the troubles we went through together have deepened our relationship in a way that would never have been possible if we were both “emotionally mature”.

I’d also question whether people really do mature “globally” that much - vs maturing in specific contexts and relationships.

For example if women matured significantly in a “global” sense between mid-20s to mid-30s you would expect a big drop in obesity as women started taking better care of their health. But you don’t. Etc etc.