Like, seriously, I have had a few people talk about how my fiancé wasn’t conventionally attractive, but he’s attractive to me :)

Plus, he’s good to me, and I don’t date for looks. I’ve had conventionally attractive exes too who have been horrible people, so…

  • @owenfromcanada@lemmy.ca
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    117 days ago

    People notice things that they are self-conscious about. Not even that they’re necessarily insecure about it, but when you think about something a lot, you tend to notice it in other people as well.

    So I’d say it’s because your friends and family think a lot about their own appearances. Likely because they’re insecure about their own appearances.

      • volvoxvsmarla
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        56 days ago

        My mom and sister used to say my husband looks like he just got released from Auschwitz so I feel you 🫠

        Maybe it’s because your dad wants you to get a perfect person. Someone who is nice and loving and interesting and attractive and successful and rich and a good cook and volunteers and whatnot. My guess is not that they would prefer you to have someone handsome and unloving instead, but someone who is both handsome and loving. Because to them, you’re perfect. So they want you to have the (what they assume would be) perfect match. Most of this is probably not an active thought process but just some subconscious thinking.

      • erin (she/her)
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        236 days ago

        Nothing irks me more than the “sharing your unasked for opinion at any time is just telling the truth” crowd. Come on. You must know the difference between honesty and integrity for the sake of good communication and being insensitive because it’s “the truth.” You’re not being honest, regardless of the truth of your beliefs, you’re being a dick if you tell someone they’re not attractive without being asked.

        If someone asks, “Am I attractive,” not fishing for compliments but asking for an opinion, you wouldn’t be a dick for saying “I wouldn’t describe you as conventionally attractive,” or “you aren’t my type, so not to me.” You would still be a dick for saying either of those things to someone who didn’t ask, or delivering your answer in an inconsiderate manner. Truth doesn’t make your words right. You can be correct and still very wrong.

      • @Empricorn@feddit.nl
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        217 days ago

        Honesty is telling the truth to people. Openness is feeling free to express yourself. Empathy is considering other people’s perspectives and taking their feelings into account. People should practice the last one before impulsively acting based on the first 2. It’s called being an adult member of society.

        • @masterspace@lemmy.ca
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          -137 days ago

          Lots of people navigate the world being more open and honest about things the way they are, rather than beating around the bush about everything that could possibly be sensitive.

          Being nervous and awkward and avoiding the elephant in the room can draw more attention and self consciousness to it then not.

          Being nervous and repressed doesn’t make you the be all arbiter of how to navigate the world.

          • @SolOrion@sh.itjust.works
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            127 days ago

            It’s not about being open and honest. It’s about that not being relevant. Your opinion on how someone looks isn’t relevant, helpful, or necessary unless it’s directly asked for.

            There’s nothing awkward, nervous, or repressed about not going out of your way to open your mouth and make someone feel bad about themselves. You can simply not fucking say something that crosses your mind.

            “Brutally honest” people are incredibly annoying. They think they’ve discovered a social cheat code so they can get away with being an absolute ass because they’re just an Honest Person™.

            • @masterspace@lemmy.ca
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              6 days ago

              It’s not about being open and honest. It’s about that not being relevant. Your opinion on how someone looks isn’t relevant, helpful, or necessary unless it’s directly asked for.

              They could have literally been having a conversation about their relative attractiveness when it came up. At the time I posted this, we didn’t have more context on what exactly was said, beyond the initial incredibly vague description of “people talk about how”.

          • @Empricorn@feddit.nl
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            87 days ago

            beating around the bush

            everything that could possibly be sensitive

            Being nervous and awkward

            avoiding the elephant in the room

            self consciousness

            You’re literally strawman-ing what I said. Empathy is considering others. It really is that simple…

            • @masterspace@lemmy.ca
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              6 days ago

              I’m not straw-manning any more than you were, given the information at available at the time. and it’s perfectly possible to have commented on someone’s unattractiveness in an empathetic way.

              In this case it sounds like neither their friend nor their father did, and I personally wouldn’t because it seems like a minefield, but I have seen cleverer friends and family navigate those minefields.

          • @Pandemanium@lemm.ee
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            177 days ago

            Your personal judgements about others are not “an elephant in the room” that needs to be talked about. They are not objective facts. Ask yourself, when you think someone is unattractive, why is it so important to you that they know you think they are unattractive? What do you think you are accomplishing by bringing it up?

            • @masterspace@lemmy.ca
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              -66 days ago

              Let’s use the power of imagination, I can imagine a party where a group is having a conversation where everyone is talking about relative attractiveness and how privileged that’s made them in life, and the rather obviously unattractive partner has walked up and has been quiet for a while so someone makes a joke about the elephant in the room and they move on.

          • Rhynoplaz
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            37 days ago

            Sounds like someone didn’t check their empathy before posting honestly!

  • @Pacattack57@lemmy.world
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    66 days ago

    You don’t have to explain if you’re attracted to your partner or not. Some people are assholes who can’t be happy unless others are unhappy. Personally I would tell them to fuck off and just not talk to them anymore.

  • @qwestjest78@lemmy.ca
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    167 days ago

    Lots of people care only about status. If someone is better looking then that means to them that other people will see that they have won.

    They would rather have someone they can show off at a party than a person who is actually compatible with them.

  • Onno (VK6FLAB)
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    137 days ago

    I’m pretty sure that it boils down to successful procreation genetics. As in, the more attractive you are the bigger the selection of mates you have access to. It’s been happening for as long as life has existed here.

    No doubt this has across history been heavily distorted by culture, art and religion and in more recent times by fashion, marketing, advertising and media.

    • @octobob@lemmy.ml
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      46 days ago

      Two gay men can’t make a da baby, and the gays can be very into their looks and physical attraction.

      Speaking from experience as a gay man

    • @flicker@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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      56 days ago

      Please don’t believe literally anything you read that references procreation genetics. It turns out, humans are complicated, wars happen, some people value people for their feet more than their faces… there’s literally no data that’s concrete enough to be valuable enough, and anyone telling you otherwise is doing so either because they’re lying to themselves, to you, or selling something.

      Source: having read quite a lot of it over my many years on this earth, and watching it be destroyed time and again. Hell, I could write a paper arguing that people typically choose mates based on their appearance, their intelligence, their height, their income, their geography, their history of family trauma, their interests, their smell… And find documentation of various dubiousness to support each argument.

      • Onno (VK6FLAB)
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        -46 days ago
        1. I’ve been here for almost six decades.
        2. I don’t know what the topic of “procreation genetics” means outside this thread where I was attempting to answer OP’s question and put those two words in sequence to explain myself.
        3. I think that life has an imperative to procreate and has done so since it started.
        4. Life, as we currently know it, appears to revolve around genetics.
        5. I’m not sure what you’re talking about.
  • Rhynoplaz
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    327 days ago

    There are people who dress for comfort or the weather, and others dress to impress.

    You can drive a car that’ll get you there, or you can drive one that makes people jealous.

    The people who are concerned with how attractive their partner is to others, are the same people that are worried about how others view their material possessions.

  • I need to feel some level of attraction for it to work, but i try not to care about what others think. I also find that people i like/love grow more attractive over time.

  • @nyamlae@lemmy.world
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    166 days ago

    These comments are crazy lol.

    The idea of “shallowness” is stupid. It’s a normal part of human attraction to prefer people that are visually attractive, so it’s unusual when people ignore that and take conventionally unattractive partners.

    It’s similar to having a partner who’s kind of an asshole. Why would you do that? Cuz they’re hot? It’s just as odd and one-sided in the reverse.

    Now, if you just find conventionally unattractive people to be attractive, then that’s another story – that would show that you’re not making excuses for ignoring basic elements of human attraction.

    Also, if you truly don’t value physical attractiveness to the degree that other people do, and are not just saying that to cope with having a less beautiful partner, then that’s totally fair. People are just commenting on it because for most people, physical beauty is a core part of attraction, and ignoring that fact is a big sign of denial and deeper unhappiness. But if that doesn’t apply to you, then rock on.

    • Thank you so much!! Attractiveness truly doesn’t matter to me. (I mean, it does to an extent, if they’re covered in oozing sores like someone said, I would care.) But I do find him attractive physically and personalitywise!!

      To me, he looks like your typical young man and my perfect fiancé ❤️.

  • @Randomgal@lemmy.ca
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    136 days ago

    You’re getting a lot of answers from chronic singles on this thread.

    The answer is: It depends on where you are in life and what you needs as a person.

    Generally you value different things in a partner as you grow older. A loving, caring, responsible person may be less appealing if you don’t live with them and share no responsibilities and instead are looking for fun and trouble, so you can prioritize other things you like.

    As you grow older, you expect different things and reorganize your priorities. You might be more concerned about someone’s personality if you want then to raise your child, than if you want them to get you Molly and fuck.

  • @the_riviera_kid@lemmy.world
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    117 days ago

    I seriously don’t know anyone who thinks that way, I’m sorry you have to deal with those sort of people.

    The majority of people I have met only care that you are happy and the rest I ignore.