“The Only Women I Attract are Obese”
I have been fishing again for someone to date through various apps. My problem is the ONLY women who show any interest in me have been obese. I am totally turned off by this and, although I have been open-minded all my life, now I want to make a change, and I actually would like to date someone who is not big, not way outta shape and so forth. That said, I also do not want a skinny rail or a Barbie either. At the very least, I would like a woman who is HWP (height weight proportionate) – a curvy woman who is thick in the right places.
I have never really let the physical attributes be a big factor before, but now I feel I have earned the right to be a little bit more picky. Am I wrong for feeling this way? What is it about me that seems to only attract the big women? I am only 5’7″ or 5’8″ tall, and kind of skinny at 150lbs, with blond hair and blue eyes. I am not big or muscular. I would really like your opinion on this, Wendy, along with the commenters’. — Not a Chubby Chaser
This line truly sums up your letter best: “I have been open-minded all my life and now I want to make a change […].” The truth is, you were never open-minded. You just didn’t care about a woman’s weight until now. For some reason, you’ve decided that you’ve “paid your dues” in the dating game by dating chubby gals and now you “deserve” more of a prize girlfriend for your past nobility. But that’s not the way dating works. You don’t rack up points by dating women you feel are less desirable so that you can cash them in later for a bigger prize. You have no more “earned the right to be a little picky” than, say, a woman who has dated nothing but, oh I don’t know, short men.
The truth is, there are certain attributes that are more desirable to potential matches than others. For a woman, it’s easier to land a man if she’s young and fertile, thin and pretty. For a man, it’s easier to land a woman like that if good-looking, tall, muscular, funny, and has a successful career. I don’t know what your career status is, but I do know, by your own description, that you’re short … and kind of skinny with no muscles. And in dating apps, where women browse for dates by clicking very specific criteria, you are falling off the radar by being only 5’7″ (and let’s face it, when a guy says he’s 5’7″, most of us assume he’s probably closer to 5’6″ or even 5’5″). If you don’t have a handsome photo, an impressive career, and a witty profile, you’ve fallen off the radar even further. Does that sound shallow? Definitely! But so does ruling out women who are heavyset and referring to their size as “physical issues,” like being overweight is a deformity.
I’ll make this as clear as I can: You are being ruled out for having characteristics that are unappealing to the majority of online daters. That probably stings a little, but it’s the truth. And no amount of dating women who are also overlooked in favor of more conventionally desirable competitors is going to “earn you the right” to be pickier. It doesn’t sound like you can afford to be picky. If you could, it wouldn’t be so difficult for you to attract the kind of woman you say you now want.
My advice to you is to continue working on that “open-mindedness” you say you have. If you want to be accepted for the benefits you can bring into a relationship and the love you can offer a partner, you need to look past outward appearances and search for something a little deeper. It’s certainly okay to have preferences, but beware of being too preferential that you rule out the women who are more willing to accept you exactly how you are.
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If you have a relationship/dating question I can help answer, you can send me your letters at wendy(AT)dearwendy.com.
Awesome response, Wendy.
LW, I have a feeling that part of the reason you aren’t attracting the “quality of women” you’re seeking is something you probably haven’t even considered (because, shockingly enough, it has nothing to do with physical attributes!). Based on the way you wrote your letter, which ironically combines an inflated sense of self AND a complete lack of self-awareness, I imagine you’re likely writing a dating profile that reflects those less-than-charming characteristics, too.
A picture may say 1000 words, but as a writer, I can tell you that the way you choose to represent yourself in words will go a LONG way toward success (or complete failure) in online dating.
So, what does your profile say? Are you bragging all over it? Acting more intelligent/smart/successful than you are? Is there anything crude in it? Do you discuss the “size” of woman you’re looking for (because I can tell you right now — any dude who makes mention of the size of woman he wants on a reputable dating site isn’t going to get many bites from self-respecting women. I imagine most women would want a dude with enough class to not make that the thing they lead with).
And speaking of class, I think that’s likely what you lack. And likely what’s pretty damn obvious to most women looking at your profile.
None of this is to say that the only reason you’re getting hits from just “big” or “obese” women is because those women lack certain standards or class. Not at all. I think because you’re likely advertising “size” at all, that you’re getting women who are more attuned to that kind of profile. I think the vast majority of women would likely be turned off by the fact that you mention size; because it makes it seem like “I’m too good for anyone who isn’t this, this and this.” And more so than physicality, women REALLY don’t want to date a douchebag.
Thank you Regina! I’m not thin but I do consider myself to be HWP (new term to me btw, glad for the link!) and do get attention from guys when I am out. If I were single and looking on dating sites for a guy, anyone who mentions the specific body type they are seeking would be automatically eliminated. Anyone with class wouldn’t even mention that on their profile. If you like their personality, ask for a picture. It’s like that stupid sticker that extra-douchy guys like to put on their lowered pickup trucks saying “No fat chicks!” Every time I see it, I see a man I would never associate with.
No one reads dating profile descriptions.
Yeah, they do.
Well said
Something we’ve consistently talked about on DW is to attract a quality person you need to BE a person of quality. And the quality of a relationship depends heavily upon the quality of the two people in it. From this letter I don’t see the LW as having much to offer to a hot girl with a great personality.
Exactly! Aside from personality, he seems to want a woman who takes care of her body, yet his skinniness indicates that (*if* he works out) he is not doing any weight training. People with shared interests are attracted to each other. LW, it doesn’t seem like you share an interest in gym time with the physically fit (and, yes, I feel that hwa folks are often physically fit) woman you are looking for.
Wow. Wendy said exactly what I was thinking as I read this, but never thought she’d actually say. Spot on, as usual.
Ha, same here. Especially when I got to here “You have no more ‘earned the right to be a little picky’ than, say, a woman who has dated nothing but, oh I don’t know, /short/ men.”
I thought of that very article as well.
Wow, thanks for linking. What a great read. Upsetting, but great.
You want upsetting? Read the comments on that article.
I’m not finished reading it, but it’s very interesting.
I just had to jump back here to bring up the Harry Potter reference in point one (bc I know how much Wendy loves Harry Potter!). Hermione does have a say in how her romantic life plays out. So that’s a bad example of a woman not having any agency in which male “gets” her. But that’s it! I’m an HP nerd and I’ve read each book more times than I will ever honestly admit. 🙂
Tara, had the exact same thought. Although I agreed with his overall point.
I definitely agreed with the overall point, but I just couldn’t bear to see my beloved, brilliant Hermione taken out of context! I was thinking “Hey now- we don’t get strong, independent role models like Hermione ever day- don’t lump her in with those other flat characters used only to support the male gaze!” That said, the ideas in that piece are well-known feminist ideas, but he wrote them in an engaging way. And don’t read the comments. They’re depressing in how un-ironically some men are on there basically saying that the whole piece is bullshit and then screeching about how all women are sluts-bitches-whores etc.
The article is getting at the fact that the male (Ron) is worried that the more “deserving” man (Harry) will get the “prize”.
Fantastic article! Thanks for the link.
Like Wendy said, there’s no cash in tokens. If you want to desire a woman more of what you are looking for, it’s going to be hard at 5’7 and 150lbs. You would need to be 5’7 and weigh roughly 15 to 20lbs more with that added weight being muscle. With your height and weight, I would think you would attract the opposite ends of the spectrum. You attract the same skinny ’emo’ style girls or you attract the heavier set women, for which you no longer feel you have an attraction too.
I’ll give you points for discovering that you don’t want to be a ‘chubby chaser’ anymore, but I’m going to take away points for not wanting to be a ‘chubby chaser’ anymore. You say you fell in love with these women, even though you don’t discredit their weight. That’s where my problem lies. If you fell in love with them, why didn’t you encourage them to lose a couple of pounds, by working out with them. You could have put on some muscle while they shed some weight to feel not only better for themselves, but to make their man more attracted to them. It seems you are looking for this perfect cookie cutter girl, that just doesn’t exist much anymore for men you’re age. I’m 28 and the girls that were attracted to me in my early 20’s are not the same that are attracted to me in my late 20’s.
What’s more important to you, a girl that constantly looks young and works herself to death to stay the desired weight for you, or a girl that may add a few pounds, but loves you unconditionally? It may be time to do some inward investigation to see what you ultimately want out of a relationship long-term. I can be a stickler for weight too, but weight, to an extent, can be lost. I find obese to be in the eye of the beholder and not just some BMI chart.
Give it some time and really think what you are after. At this point, I think you have a complex of what you feel you deserve, and in all rights, you just may not!
“(…) why didn’t you encourage them to lose a couple of pounds, by working out with them. You could have put on some muscle while they shed some weight to feel not only better for themselves, but to make their man more attracted to them.”
WHAT?! Why do people always assume that overweight girls feel bad about themselves, or that they need men to be attracted to them as their only source of self-esteem? There’s nothing in the letter about him not being attracted to his exes, so that wasn’t the issue. Not at all.
As a big girl, I respect his choice of not wanting to date big girls- we are all attracted to what we are attracted to, and no one wants to date someone who feels they are settling down. What I do think is weird is that he’s dismissing girls he hasn’t met based on a single criteria, a criteria that was never a deal-braker in the past, and something that actually doesn’t bother him. He seems to be down on big girls because of what they might represent, because of the chubby-chaser tag: dating big girls doesn’t make him a chubby chaser, but I’m guessing he doesn’t want other people to think he is (because all the other girls were big, so…) To me chubby chasers are guys who are attracted to only one thing in a woman, and again, as a big girl, I have no interest in dating guys who aren’t into me, but just into the size of my behind. He’s had a modicum of success dating bigger girls, so maybe he should continue to look further than their dress size and they could look further than his pant size too.
I don’t think overweight women need validation from smaller men about their weight. But people are attracted to what he wants and for the LW, online dating focuses extremely on what your picture is. Online dating extorts physical appearance a lot more, than what people would do running into the same person face to face.
*people should be he
I like your response, though I take exception with “encouraging them to lose weight”. It just doesn’t work that way. I especially like “I’ll give you points for discovering that you don’t want to be a ‘chubby chaser’ anymore, but I’m going to take away points for not wanting to be a ‘chubby chaser’ anymore. ”
How about the LW focus on what he fell in love with in his first relationships. Whatever it was clearly was more important than weight. It’s so easy in online dating to focus on physical features – think about all the other virtues that you want, and look for those!
There’s a difference between encouraging to lose weight by saying you look fat, and saying I want to get in better shape, would you like to go to the gym with me. You aren’t saying she is or isn’t overweight, you just want her to share the bonding experience with you. It doesn’t even have to be the gym, it can be walking around the neighborhood, dog park, or city park. I’ve had past relationships where my SO wanted me to lose weight and they would say one or the other of what I posted above. It never bothered me, because I knew I had gotten softer than what I was comfortable with, but was too lazy to motivate myself to change my physical appearance.
I wish my SO said those things rather than deliver me chocolate pudding pie on an almost nightly basis. Ughhh.
Yeah, I know this is very tricky ground. Hey, just ask my boyfriend. He’s required to “ooh and ahh” if I’ve lost a pound (and tell me how great I look) BUT he can’t get TOO excited or else I’ll think he didn’t like me before. haha.
But, that said, Will has a good point. Something that works in my relationship is setting a mutual goal of a healthy lifestyle. Weight doesn’t even have to enter the conversation. He might buy a new healthy cookbook. I might buy us a yoga mat. When we commit TOGETHER to healthier choices, we are supporting each other and its equal. Even a skinny guy benefits from better food choices (he can just eat MORE of them or shift the ratio of carbs, protiens, etc on his plate). Other ways we do this? We started a weekly morning yoga routine to do together. Otherwise, alone, we’d never do it. We also both ride our bikes (I commute to work) and he supports that by tuning up my bike for me, adding lights/fenders, and making the occasional “recovery” shake when I get home. I help him out too, of course, like mending all his cycling clothes which he is constantly ripping up.
My point is…
1. Focus on good health and the weigh will follow.
2. Make a MUTUAL commitment to a healthy lifestyle and then you avoid risking hard feelings of one person feeling they have to lose weight for the other.
I think Wendy’s answer is spot on. I’d also say you have to consider that some types of people (online dating) need to “market” themselves a little more (than say, a super hot rich woman). Being short…you’re going to have to make the first move more often. Being a man, you’re going to probably have to write first more often. And (some) heavy-set women might feel they need to write the first message more often too. So this could also be why you get more messages/interest from women who are bigger.
“but now I feel I have earned the right to be a little bit more picky.”
I trying to figure out where this sense of entitlement came from?
From a h.p.w. average looking woman, who is married to a 5’8 150 pound puny average guy. He wasn’t puny, when I met him. The years of slaving in a cubicle with no sunlight did him in. Oh, you should see me right after I give birth, I gain like 50 pounds of non-baby last time around and it takes me a full year to completely lose it.
People say we’re still cute together, which means a lot.
I think that the women who approach you online are totally unconnected to the heavier women you date in real life. Online dating is a whole different animal. Some people send out messages like there is no tomorrow on online dating sites. The short week that I was on one, I was bombarded by messages from guys who probably would never like me in real life (nor would I have liked them), but I was there and they were online, so I got a message. So, I wouldn’t affix any sort of importance to who you’re hearing from (though other people are right in that maybe your profile needs some fixing). Not to mention that a lot of girls I know expect the guy to contact them, so if you’re just sitting back and waiting for the messages to roll in, I imagine that you’re missing out on other women that you might want to meet.
As for most of the women you’ve dated being heavier, to be honest, I think you might just be overreacting. Most Americans are overweight. And depending on where you live, this could be ever more true. So, your chances are fairly high. Most of the guys I’ve dated have been sort of chubby, but I wouldn’t make a big deal about it. I don’t think that it says anything about me or predicts who I’m going to end up with in the future (not that it matters, really).
I think that your letter included a lot of thoughts that are better left unsaid, and I hope you don’t run around telling people about your “problems” because it’s not really going to make you sound good. Just go about your life and hope that you meet a great woman. If someone online contacts you and you don’t want to talk to her (for whatever reason), then don’t. But don’t think that there’s a switch you can flip that will bring you a supermodel.
I’m glad that Wendy had the guts to say what we were all probably thinking!
In an ideal world, things like height and weight wouldn’t matter, but this is real life and they do.
Hrm, am I the only one who read the letter and saw a clear distinction between being ‘heavier’ and being ‘obese?’ I really don’t think this guy is being that over-inflated in his letter. To me, he just sounded naive to some realities of online dating. Wendy definitely lays them out correctly.
The simple fact is that people are more willing to try to ‘reach’ in online dating and less willing to ‘settle.’ In general, you are going to need to play a numbers game a lot more in online dating. Even some good-looking guys, with decently-written profiles won’t get the highest of response rates. And frankly, most ‘highly-desirable’ women get enough emails that they will never need to make a ‘first move.’ What you are left with is that you will be contacted and see much more interest from people who are ‘reaching.’
Not to put to fine a point on it, but I am 6’5″, 210, and while I’m sure I have plenty of negative qualities [ask my brother or sister, and they’ll be happy to write you a thesis on them], I tend to think that my height and wit help me out. But I also still get far more interest from obese women.
I tend to agree with EricaSwagger in terms of people taking care of their bodies. Being ‘heavy’ is different from ‘obese,’ and I see no reason why someone should have to adjust their mindset for someone who is unwilling to take care of themselves. Not being interested in larger women is fine, but you will have to play a much larger numbers game.
That all said, you probably can improve your profile to attract the type of person you are looking for. Have a friend read over your profile and point out places where you sound bad. Show your pictures to female friends and ask what they think.
Laughed at the line about your siblings. You sound like my brother!
Sounds like a fun guy, so I’ll take that as a compliment 🙂
Everyone in my family actually ribs on each other a lot. When someone brings home an SO, that person generally has to be forewarned that they are entering the lion’s den.
Yep, same with me. The ribbing is great though, brings us all back down to earth.
Exactly!
I am so thankfully everyday for the hell my brother gave me growing up. I think it helped me learn to take criticism well and stop being such an arrogant jerk. I shudder to think of what a giant SoB I would be if not for my family.
My friend was telling me about some actor/comedian that makes fun of his kids and teases them and when they asked him why he said he did it to toughen them up a little so when they go out into the real world and if anyone started bullying them they wouldn’t be fragile – they could just say “whatever – my momma is tougher than you” It’s got to be mixed in with some serious love but I think there is something to it. Then again that type of teasing relationship is natural for me so maybe that is why it made good sense to me.
I just dont see how being bigger is mutually exclusive from taking care of your body. I’m thin, and always have been, but I’ve only just started going to the gym, and I eat rubbish as well as vegetables. I therefore resent when men say they dont want to be offensive, but they want a thin girl with whom they (assume they) can enjoy an active lifestyle. I’m very lazy, as are most of my thin friends.
If you want someone to go on hundred k hikes with you, say that. Don’t specify the body type, because that is horrible.
Being bigger is NOT mutually exclusive from taking care of your body, but being obese IS. [Yes, I know there are medical issues aside from just ‘being lazy,’ but it doesn’t change the fact that being obese is very unhealthy.]
I don’t think I said anything about thin equalling an active lifestyle. And I agree that it’s pretty stupid for anyone to say exactly what body-type they are looking for. I don’t think it’s unreasonable to assume that someone who is obese is unable to run a marathon with you. However, it is kinda silly to assume that someone thin necessarily will want to, but it makes sense that guys would think someone who is physically in shape is more likely to be active.
I do agree, though. If you want someone to go no 100k hikes with you, just say that.
Its just that the Lw changes from saying “heavy” to “obese” to prove a point rather than be accurate which makes me feel he is trying to word his letter to his advantage (as “obese” is health linked, while “heavy” may not be).
I might agree with you, except that I do online dating, and I get messages from legitimately obese women all the time. And I have a RL friend who has the LW’s height and weight who has very similar complaints.
I know saying looks aren’t everything is simplifying life too much…. but doesn’t it horrify you that this admittedly not conventionally perfect looking man is upset because he is only getting attention from conventionally unattractive women?
First, a man being 5’7″ 150 lbs is hardly the equivalent of obesity, so I don’t think it’s that unreasonable that this guy would want to find a non-obese mate. Their are definitely more than two leagues in the dating world. This guy isn’t a 10, but it doesn’t sound like he’s looking for 10s either.
But even if they were equivalent, no, it wouldn’t horrify me. It might bemuse me. And I’d certainly be willing to tell the guy he needs to lower his standards or improve himself. I think horrify is a bit strong here. At worst he’s just a shallow ass. Most likely, he’s just naive.
Oh my lord.. I can’t believe I made that typo… ‘Their’ = ‘There’
I’m going to go hang my head in shame.
Typos happen 🙂
But thats the thing, you’re saying heavy is “bad”, and his body is not as “bad” as that. Its this subjective discussion of body types being mistaken as objective which horrifies me.
I guess we can agree to disagree on this, but I do hope this guy stays single until he realises that the world does not owe him a conventionally attractive high status woman.
I think the place we are really disagreeing is that I think he means ‘obese’ as ‘obese.’
I think that you think that he means ‘obese’ as ‘a bit extra.’
Okay, that’s a lot of thinking. I hope I’m not putting words into your mouth. You are right that everything is subjective, however, and it is perhaps inappropriate to make objective sounding statements about what is better or worse.
I really don’t believe this guy thinks that the ‘words owes him a conventionally attractive high status woman.’
I think you’re going to have a hard time getting Matthew to see your point because it seems to me that his body viewpoint is pretty stringent, and so to him, he can’t see that you might actually mean obese when you say that heavy isn’t always assumed to be bad. To him, and to many other people, that image is so ingrained in our judgment and opinions, so you must really be talking about just a little bit extra weight, because thats the only thing he can imagine would be ok. Its a fairly prevalent mindset so I’m not surprised its being expressed here on a forum about body preferences.
Yeah i get that, and I’m not arguing very well anyway. This letter just rubbed me the wrong way. I get that he wants a date, but I really hate the attitude that its ok to automatically discount big women, and that to do so is a personal preference/sexual attraction thing. How can you judge sexual attraction online anyway? For me, its always been a such an intangible thing. Seems to me it would make more sense to go with a type that you have enjoyed in the past, unless of course you have decided your “status” has gone “up”, and you want to aim “higher”.
I dont know why I just seemed to argue further with you when it seems we agree on this. Sorry! I need a drink.
ignore them? that what I do with men who say ‘No Fat Chicks!’
I don’t say ‘No Fat Chicks!’ And quite often, I simply ignore the message. Just like I’m sure the plenty of women who have ignored messages from me for any number of reasons.
My point wasn’t to say ‘OMG! Look at all these obese people messaging me! WTF.’
I was simply trying to use my own experience to explain why I disagree with Nadine’s assertion that he is simply trying to word the letter to his advantage.
Not to twist this entire thread into something else entirely…but some men actually have a fetish for obese women. I know somebody on the periphery of my social group who is very vocal on FB about his preference & the people who comment like “right on!” seem to all be dudes on the small side. (Short, skinny) I’m OBVIOUSLY generalizing, but maybe the obese women messaging the LW & your friend are generalizing also? Like, thinking, “Oh, this guy looks like he could be into me. Let’s try!”
Also, my experience is that fat and/or ugly people aim high & are generally more assertive. Maybe they assume they have nothing to lose? (And yes, I realize I’m using un-PC language and generalizing everywhere)
You are certainly correct, Fabelle.
It really isn’t fair to complain about getting messages from fat/ugly/old/short/whatever people. There is someone out there interested in everything, and there is nothing wrong with a “let’s try!” attitude.
Well, I wasn’t necessarily saying it’s not fair to complain. I guess, in a roundabout way, I’m saying that the LW & your friend (who you said has a similiar build) might be getting stereotyped by obese women as dudes who are into that sort of thing.
The LW’s question was basically “why me?” so I’m just throwing that possibility out there. If I was dating online & getting messages from a slew of obese men, I might wonder the same thing.
Ah, okay. I get it now.
>> am I the only one who read the letter and saw a clear distinction between being ‘heavier’ and being ‘obese?
I got that too, and I think that he means properly obese. People do throw around ‘overweight’ too much, especially regarding women. But something tells me that he’s referring to very heavy women.
‘Properly obese’ is even pretty subjective though. I think people think it means really really overweight when in fact medically speaking the threshold is much lower and I think it would surprise a lot of people to look at images of people who are deemed medically obese. In part because the snap judgment we make about other peoples bodies (and our own) often are not accurate to their heath level, weight or bmi stats.
Corpulent then. I’m try to be polite.
Matthew – you are right about the pretty girls not reaching out thing. My friend is gorgeous and a former NFL Cheerleader. She had 1000 messages on Match in 48 hours. She posted a few pictures and none that were slutty or anything. It was the craziest thing. Then she started getting hate messages about being stuck up when she didn’t respond to all of them. I would be curious why this guy thinks he should be the one that is pursued.
Hah, Wow! That’s intense! If I ever opened an email box (online dating or otherwise) to a 1000 messages, I’d just close it and walk away.
Anyone who is actually upset when you don’t get a response on an online dating site has no business being there. If you want someone to reject you politely by responding, “I’m sorry, I’m not interested,” then go hit on people in the real world.
As a side note, what does someone have to do to get set-up with your gorgeous, former NFL Cheerleader friend? 😉 I’m kidding, of course, because unless she was a Dallas Cowboys cheerleader, it would never work out.
Unless she’s a member of the rare exceptions list, I would not want a cheerleader no matter how hott she is. Way too damn high maintenance for me. Just the thought of it gives me chills.
(no offense intended to any current/former cheerleaders, but ya’ll are way too social/outgoing for me).
It’s not that the women are overweight but maybe that they have low standards. You don’t have a lot to offer physically, and it sounds like you feel like you did these women a favor by condescending to go out with them. I can’t imagine that didn’t come across.
A friend of mine summed it up nicely a few years ago – granted, this was with regard to a guy we knew who only dated women at least ten years younger than him: “It says a lot about a guy when he only goes after women who don’t know any better.”
This letter gave me whiplash. I was following along during the first paragraph, on board with how the LW isn’t shallow and falls in love with the person, and then BAM! All of a sudden he is “totally turned off” by the fact that obese women are responding to him online, because he has now decided that he has “earned the right to be a little bit more picky”. LW, I don’t even understand how you have logically arrived at this conclusion. You don’t earn the “right” to date more attractive women by dating less attractive ones. That idea is so illogical I’m not even sure how to address it.
You say “I have been open-minded all my life and now I want to make a change” but it’s clear from your letter that you were never very open-minded. Sure, I believe you did care for your ex’s, but you evidently always held on to resentment about them not being attractive enough for you because you see the fact that you dated them at all as some type of dues you have paid. You made an adult decision to be in a serious relationship with three women- and they chose you too. Being in a relationship is not about paying dues. I’m sure you also have less than perfect traits, whether physical or personality-wise, that your ex’s looked past while they were with you.
My advice to you, LW, is to ditch the entitlement, and fast. That is going to be your best bet for dating the most desirable woman who will realistically consider dating you. A sense of entitlement is not attractive on anyone. It’s up to you if you’ve suddenly decided you want a woman who doesn’t have “physical issues” with her weight, and I do believe you can’t force yourself to be attracted to someone you are not. But you have all kinds of illogical and unfair ideas about what you are entitled to that seem to be more about your ego than what you are attracted to (after all, you’ve dated several heavy set women in the past). I fear these ideas will stand in the way of connections that would have otherwise been a good match for you.
Why exactly do you want a thinner woman? It sounds like you were happy with the women you dated before, at least to some degree. Did you enjoy sex? Did you have fun with them?
Do you feel as though you deserve an attractive woman? (You don’t.) Do you feel like you’d get more props from your male friends and other dudes with a hotter woman on your arm? (That’s not cool. She’s not a trophy.)
I think you need to take a good hard look at your motivations here, LW.
Excellent point.
And he cant say “Oh, I’m not attracted to large ladies” because he has been in the past, enough to be in relationships with some.
I’ve dated all “types” – fat, skinny, muscular, tattooed, short, tall, bald, short hair, curly hair, loooong hair, light skin, dark skin, etc. Many of them were not what I would call “conventionally attractive,” but I was attracted to them nonetheless. I knew this because we met in person. Online, you just can’t tell.
That said, if there is a particular physical characteristic that you KNOW you are not attracted to, then I think it’s OK to go ahead and avoid those profiles, even if they seem like a decent match in other ways.
And LW, don’t feel bad about being short! There are plenty of women who will dismiss you just because of that, but many many more who will love you for who you are. I don’t have a problem with short guys at all, BUT! I went on a date with a guy who was, like, an inch shorter than me and it bothered him SO MUCH. And then it bothered me that it bothered him. So don’t get Short Man Syndrome.
You raise a really good point about attraction to the not conventially attractive. I’m a pretty average looking girl, never an issue with dates or whatever, but my 2 long term SOs-polar opposites. One was covered in tattoos, muscular, very tall but not everyone’s cup of tea. I could stare at him for hours though. My SO now, still tall, no tattoos or piercings, on the slimmer side, very boyish as opposed to man-ish. More of what the average girl finds attractive (clean cut). Could and do stare at him thinking damn you are cute. Its funny how you can be totally attracted to opposites or even to someone a lot of people wouldn’t take a second look at yet I’ve found myself immensly attracted to.
I’m the opposite – you can line my exes up and see the similarities amongst them – even down to their eye shape.
Yeah, mine have OTHER similarities. I think a disproportionate amount of them are musicians.
Mine were all entrepreneurs – it’s amazing how attraction works…
ALL of mine except for one were musicians too. I’m done with it.
I agree, FireStar, you can see the similarities in my ex-SO’s. They look similar, have the same talents and humor… Well, at least, the very first one and my current one are exceptionally similar. In fact, they love each other and regularly gang up on me when we’re double dating (my ex and his current, and my boyfriend and I)!
There is something to be said for consistency! Especially if it involves good men.
I’m all over the map as well. I mean, my two biggest celebrity crushes? Ryan Reynolds and Lenny Kravitz. Mr. All-American and then ethnically ambiguous rocker/bad boy.
I had never heard the expression “ethnically ambiguous”. I like it very much.
Thanks – I tend to be attracted to men who don’t look like any particular ethnicity, or rather all of them (Wentworth Miller, Ben Harper, that guy that played the superhot designer in Devil Wears Prada) so I started using that.
Lenny…yum. He is one damn attractive man.
And apparently tiny, like 5’5″ tiny. Like I care. My six foot tall ass would be all over that.
We’re not prepared to give you Ryan Reynolds…he’s Canadian. 🙂
You’re totally right. I meant his look rather than his roots, but I completely forgot he’s Canadian when I made the comment – you guys have some beautiful men up there!
Sorry but I’m going to disagree with you on the “many many more” part. Yes there are women out there who don’t care about height, but I think they’re the exception and not the rule. I have a friend that’s an absolutely AMAZING guy that happens to be about 5’6” that rarely ever goes on dates/gets laid/has a gf/whathaveyou so far as I can tell. Super charismatic, very outgoing, friendly to everyone, knows how to have a good time/party, plans fun stuff to do all the time, dressed up as a leprechaun on Patty’s day, etc. I know for a fact he get’s rejected ALL the time because of his height. Both genders are picky about certain things, just the way the world is.
One of the hottest guys I went to high school, like SUPER hot, was constantly talked about by the girls because it was ‘such a shame’ he was only 5’5.
What Wendy said times 100!
p.s., For what it’s worth, LW, I wish I were 5’7″ and 150 lbs – perfect combo for me!
I mostly agree with the response, the only thing I want to talk about is the “physical issues” thing.
Okay. So yes, some people are overweight. But to me it IS an issue. Truthfully, way too many people in the US are overweight. Aside from medical stuff like thyroid problems or diabetes, most of the overweight people in our society have the ability to change their appearance, but choose not to. Lack of willpower be damned, get a trainer. Lack of money be damned, Planet Fitness is incredibly affordable. Won’t go to the gym by yourself? I can’t imagine an overweight person doesn’t have a friend who would also like to tone up or slim down. Go together, motivate each other. If someone WANTS to lose weight (aside from medical issues) then they can. It’s really as simple as that.
My point is that, while the LW claims to be open minded and that’s great if he is, who says he has to be? He may not be a 10 himself, but there are plenty of women who are not overweight, who would also be in his league. It’s perfectly alright for him to not want to date a person who clearly doesn’t care about their physical appearance or health. I could never date someone who’s overweight. Despite out of this world kindness, amazing personality, what have you… I’m just not attracted to them so that’s that.
Was they LW kind of rude in how he stated his problem to the DW community? Yeah, it was a little self important and kinda fast and loose with the term “open minded.” But if this LW wants to aim for women who aren’t overweight, then he can try all he wants. And, LW, if nothing else works, put “No Fat Chicks” somewhere in your dating profile.
I agree with you there. The thing is, I think everyone jumped on him, so to speak, because he let on that he thinks he deserves a hotter girlfriend this time, which is a far worse trait that simply not liking fat women.
Everyone wants a ‘hot’ girlfriend, but I thought he was being careful to say that he didn’t need or want a 10 model, he just didn’t want someone who is actually fat.
I think he phrased it weird by saying ‘he has the right to be more picky,’ but honestly, everyone has the right to be as picky as they want. They simply have to live with the fact that a large portion of our society is getting overweight, and that will adversely affect the number of people out their for them.
It’s that he said he has EARNED the right, insinuating that by dating bigger girls in the past, he’s paid his dues, now hot women need to be banging down his door.
You have misunderstood what is going through this guy’s head, entirely.
He said he ‘earned the right to be a bit more picky.’ He never at all insinuated that he wanted hot women banging down his door. In fact, it’s pretty clear that he didn’t intend for the statement to be ‘I’ve paid my dues, now give me hot women.’
Rather, he is begging for permission to be allowed to use physical attraction as one of his criterion for dating someone. His letter comes across almost as saying:
“Look, I’m not one of those guys who only cares about looks! Here’s proof; I’ve dated overweight women! But can I please please please care a little bit about looks!?”
This is made plainly obvious when he follows up his statement with, “Am I wrong for feeling this?” If he actually felt any ‘mantitlement,’ he wouldn’t sound so guilty for simply wanting to have some level of physical attraction.
If he actually meant that he had earned hot women through his sweat-and-blood effort of dating fat women, then your moral outrage is justified. I highly doubt that is the case.
im really hoping that this is what is going on in this guys head… im gonna give him the benefit of the doubt and go with this.
“Look, I’m not one of those guys who only cares about looks! Here’s proof; I’ve dated overweight women!” reminds me entirely too much of “I’m not racist, I have black friends”.
That was one line, and I didn’t take it quite a literally as other seem to be.
The thing to keep in mind – which for some reason he can’t recognize – is that he’s attracting ‘obese’ women because he’s so small. They recognize that he’s basically invisible to most women, and assume that he’ll be more receptive. So no one’s motives are entirely pure in this situation.
This guy’s best bet is to move to SE Asia or some other place where his height isn’t such a liability.
Ha definitely. He should have just come out and said it from the beginning.
But in defense of his dislike for overweight people, I understand, and I can’t say he’s wrong for wanting better. Whether he can get better or not (which most readers seem to doubt, understandably), is on him.
I’d like to say that its not just physical issues that stop a person from losing weight (diabetes or thyroid) but also psychological issues. Some people are messed up in the head (to put it bluntly, and yes I myself was one of them)… some people are messed up in the head and turn to drugs, some people become obsessive-compulsive, some people turn to food to cope, and no matter how goddamn hard you try, if you don’t fix what’s wrong in your head you can’t lose the weight. I did weight watchers, I did nutri-slim, I tried getting a personal trainer, I tried walking, I tried Atkins, I tried starving, I tried everything. For YEARS. But nothing works because in your mind, you’re a slave to food. You eat it to cope, then you loathe yourself for doing it, repeat.
It wasn’t until I spent a good long year in therapy dealing with other issues that the food issue just kind of went away on it’s own. So, I just wanted to get this out because there are some people who genuinely can’t do it until they get some emotional help, and I can’t even tell you how bad it hurts to hear someone say “I don’t understand why you can’t lose weight, just CHOOSE to do it”. Because no matter how many diets or workout plans you try, some people just can’t choose to lose the weight until they address the underlying issue.
I just thank God I got help when I did and I empathize 100% with the people who feel powerless. Now with that being said, you have every right to not be attracted to someone who is overweight and I am in no way putting you down for that. I’m not attracted to overweight guys either.
Sorry for my rant. I just wanted to stand up for the people like me out there.
I agree with you MissDre. I was lean and athletic in high school – distance runner, gymnast, baseball, etc… when I got into a car accident that ruined my knee, I not only couldn’t exercise as much as I had been, but I started to HATE exercise of any kind. In my mind, it was worthless because previously I had never exercised to be healthy – I exercised because I loved what I was doing and being told “you can’t do that” messed something up inside my little brain. I gained some weight and no matter what I did, I couldn’t lose it. Eventually I started seeing a counselor and was able to work through the issues that came about because of the accident and lost a lot of the weight.
But now, I’m on a medication that makes it hard to lose weight so its a struggle and I’m not as thin as I was in high school, but I’m not unhealthy either so I happy with it. I exercise to the best of my ability now (my knee is still screwed up) and I still get sad when I get the urge to go out for a run and realize I can’t do it. Before my accident and surgeries, I ran a minimum of 4 miles a day (2 before school and at the very least 2 miles after school) and it was how I relaxed. When it was taken away, it was hard and it still can be even 10 years later. So yes, sometimes it is a psychological block and not necessarily physical. Also, not everyone is designed to be shaped like the typical “skinny” shape. No matter what I do, I could never look like a model. My body shape and bone structure prevent that no matter what my weight is.
You make excellent points here – it’s so difficult to break a cycle that’s so ingrained in us. We eat at family gatherings, birthdays, bring food when someone dies, take people out for nice dinners when they graduate, first dates usually involve food, and so on. I can’t think of more than a couple major occasions in North American society where food isn’t expected at some point.
Obviously it’s not as simple as “just lose weight” the same way as “just cheer up” isn’t going to work for someone who’s depressed. Evidently therapy is helpful – or for some people, just the counselors at some of the weight loss centers – but it’s a much more difficult cycle to break than just making sure you go for more walks and eat more veggies. I’m trying to drop about thirty pounds myself – my amazing metabolism finally slowed down to normal when I was 25 – and going from “eating whatever I want as long as I hop on a treadmill or a yoga mat twice a week” to “work out at least four days a week and completely change my diet” has been such an adjustment!
Oh man… when I was going through a severe depression (crying, panic attacks, couldn’t get out of bed) my dad would say to me “Just CHOOSE to be happy. I don’t understand why you can’t just choose” and I wanted to punch him.
God, I went through a pretty severe depression a few years ago, and my mom did pretty much the exact same thing (“Maybe if you quit feeling sorry for yourself…”). Of course, and this just occurred to me, this was while she was on antidepressants (which her doctor practically had to force feed her). Oh, my mom.
@MissDre: Anyone that says “happiness is a choice” deserves to be punched.
…or just never experienced depression before.
I’ll be honest, I am a big believer in mind over matter and until reading things on here, I did think it was a choice. Like 100% a choice. I guess I am fortunate to have never been truly depressed. Don’t get me wrong, I’ve been heartbroken and terribly sad before, but I could pull myself out of it. So its easy to assume everyone can when you can. But you what they say about assuming…
We got into a good discussion on here once (think the deleted thread) about choice. It seemed to me people were pretty evenly split into thinking a lot of addictions are not actual addictions (I’m remembering sex addicts, specifically, but others were mentioned including food addicts). I remember someone saying if you couldn’t die from not having it, its not an addiction. (paraphrasing). Anyway, interesting topic to me.
Those were to good old days though, when Sampson was still ForeverYoung…
Haha funny you mention that… I think I was the dick that thought most addictions aren’t real and were just about choice – like “sex addicts” and “food addiction”. I’m a jerk.
This is so true. People who have never experienced it just don’t always “get it.” It’s something I’ve struggled with my whole life. And it’s usually not situational for me – I’ll just get severely depressed for periods of time. Now once I’m depressed, the problem is that I do things that make it worse – like, I’ll alienate people or be moody and no-fun to be around, call in to work or show up and not do anything, lock myself in my apartment and shut off communication with the outside world, stop cleaning and live in filth, drink excessively, etc. And all of those things ultimately make me feel worse. It’s a vicious cycle and it’s hard to get out of once you get too deep. I’ve learned to notice my warning signs so I can take proactive measures before it gets that bad.
Do you think you would not be or at least be less depressed if you stopped yourself from doing the things you say happen when you’re depressed? Is it even possible to stop yourself from doing them?
I think its hard to tell between symptoms, indicators and exacerbators in this instance.
Yeah, like I said, now I try to pick up on it before it gets to that point. I absolutely would be LESS depressed without those behaviors (I think), but not NOT depressed. Because once it’s bad enough, I think I really just need meds. I’ve seen therapists on and off too.
But I agree with what savannah said too about symptoms vs. exacerbators.
I can’t ever come off my medication 🙁 If I do, I fall into deep dark crippling depression as I’ve now learned twice. Even when I’m doing really well, my doctor will reduce my dosage but I can’t come off the meds altogether. It kinda sucks but my doctor said to me, “If you were diabetic, you’d have to take your insulin, right? This is no different.”
@MissDre – I’m afraid to come off mine again too. I feel normal, but I know from past experience that my depression can come back at any time.
It’s also one of those things, at least in my experience, where you’re just trying so hard to slog through one more day, one more day. We don’t really view our lives with regard to the big picture very often even if we’re not depressed, and when you are depressed it’s even harder. Everyone has those days when you deviate from the normal routine, where you drink more or sleep more or eat more junk or watch more tv or whatever, and then sometimes it’ll last for a few days or will be spread out over the course of a month. Last month, for example, I ate out a lot, drank a lot, and slept later on the weekends – I wasn’t depressed, I just didn’t have time to go to the store, and my favorite local hamburger joint is also a bar, and I was super-stressed, so I crashed hard – and it’s stuff that all seems reasonable in the moment, but then you’re already in full-on depressed mode when you go, “Aw, I was doing that because of THIS, not just because I was having a weird moment.” And by then it’s a little late to change, because all the motivation to pull yourself out of it has been sucked away because of the funk you’re now mired in.
I used to think this too, until I hit the hormonal shift caused by my bc pills. Then no matter what I tried, I couldn’t ‘shake’ the unhappy feelings and I felt like my ability to cheer myself up wasn’t in my control. Only after I stopped taking them (after I broke up with the bf) did I see how different I feel when I’m all ‘natural’ I also noticed certain mood shifts/depressive moments during certain times of my cycle. Oddly enough I still don’t see it coming. Like, I feel sad and unable to shake a negative thought, which often times leads to a few more glasses of wine than norm, I feel sad. Then a day or two later Aunt flow comes and I’m all like DUH. Then back to my optimistic self. Its weird, but its how I work. So at least I know, and I think this for a newfound sympathy for all those who battle depression on a daily basis.
Ughhh, I put on a ton of weight over the last year (20 lbs or so). My eating and exercise habits haven’t changed; I’m just 30 now and my metabolism is changing. It sucks! I was always one of those skinny-without-trying people. I should have made more of an effort to develop healthy habits back then so it would be easier now.
I hate the metabolism change. I could eat whatever I wanted until about 2 years ago. Even though I’m still thin I’m not comfortable in a bathing suit because i’m not AS thin as I used to be. Now I’m constantly eating healthy/looking for ways to be active, but it’s still hard.
Oh i would smack you right now if i could. I met you like 2 months ago and you’re no where close to being fat. You have a nice body so put your bikini on and relax! And if you want to text me pictures of it well i wouldn’t talk you out of it…
Agree with MissDre too.
To add to it, being overweight is VISIBLE to everyone else, and the fat person usually feels that acutely. Think about it – most of our flaws and biggest failures in life are not paraded around all day every day for the world to see. Once you start gaining weight, then start feeling shame about it, you probably try to comfort yourself by… eating. Shame soup.
Very well said MissDre. I think a lot of people say/think “why don’t you just…” but if they have never been where the other person is it is hard to step back and realise that sometimes it is not a question of just doing x – that likely there is far more to it.
I mostly agree with you. I’m studying to be a nutritionist, so I know it’s not as simple as working out. You don’t just go to the gym and magically lose weight. In fact, people who start exercising often gain weight because they reward themselves with food by thinking they can eat more. Weight loss starts in the kitchen and trust me, people’s food issues are definitely not simple.
“Aside from medical stuff like thyroid problems or diabetes, most of the overweight people in our society have the ability to change their appearance, but choose not to.”
While this might be true for a percentage of overweight people, its an extremely simplistic viewpoint on the issue as a whole. There are numerous factors beyond a simple “overweight people are lazy’ mindset that add to people struggle with weight. Genetics plays an absolutely huge role in this as well as issues of spacial discrimination via food access.
Another issue which is covered pretty well is the damage weight loss does to metabolism as outlined in in this nytimes article:
You can have preferences for sure, I’m not saying people should accept anyone at any weight or not take care of themselves. But the attitude of all fat people are simply thin people who are lazy and eat too much is hardly the whole picture, and does a disservice to your other points.
Also like to link this article on eating disorders and overweight people as I think it might be helpful to think about: http://www.xojane.com/issues/cookies-arent-eating-food-hoarding-eating-disorders-and-me
I would like to agree on the food access point. Until you’ve lived in a low-income area you don’t realize that grocery stores are stocked differently in different areas. Less fruit/veggies, poor quality produce, more processed food. Plus the healthy stuff is more expensive. Thankfully WIC encourages people to buy healthy food, but it’s hard for for low-income residents to find healthy food.
Actually, none of that is really true. People in low income areas still spend enormous amounts of money on fast food and alcohol. True, fresh produce is harder to find, but frozen/canned vegetables are still much cheaper than junk food like potato chips or ice cream, but most Americans (whether rich or poor) prefer the latter.
John, this spatial discrimination is widely studied:
http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1449238/
Yes, and now widely debunked:
http://dcentric.wamu.org/2011/11/seven-food-desert-myths/
http://blackgirlsguidetoweightloss.com/the-op-eds/the-myth-of-the-food-desert-where-the-root-went-wrong/
And for an amusing angle on it:
http://articles.latimes.com/2011/dec/17/local/la-me-food-lausd-20111218
Incidentally, I did my own study at my local supermarket and found this:
Fresh apples: $.99 per pound
Fresh carrots: $1.49 per pound
Frozen peas: $2.50 per pound
BUT – Potato Chips: $3.00 per pound!
Which do you think you will find more of in any typical American home, rich or poor?
Erica- you had me right up to “It’s perfectly alright for him to not want to date a person who clearly doesn’t care about their physical appearance or health.” I find that to be exactly what’s wrong with the way society views people who don’t conform to the Hollywood standard of beauty. There is this perception that people who are overweight are somehow lazy or careless. I know women who are smart, beautiful, athletic and kind who are overweight. They go to the gym daily. They take care in their appearance by wearing nice fitting, attractive clothing. They have their hair professionally styled. They also happen to have some meat on their bones. The belief that all people who are overweight don’t care about their appearance or their health is a disgusting stereotype.
And although I don’t like to make my comments on this site personal, I’m about to. Erica, I looked at your webpage linked through your picture. On the first page alone there are three references to “unhealthy” foods that you seem to enjoy enough to blog about. Be grateful that you appear to be someone who can eat those things without becoming one of the overweight people you have such distaste for. To be fair, you may workout like a madwoman which would offest those calories. But that doesn’t take away from the sodium and fat that you ingest evertime you eat an icecream sandwich or put taco sauce on something. Perhaps a little more compassion and a little less stereotyping about what overweight people are is in order. Because someone could see your page and think that you “clearly” don’t care about your health.
I think it is just like the depression conversation above. People who don’t have food issues can’t understand people who do.
I’m not a “fat chick”, but I wouldn’t go near a man who said that or put it in his profile. It’s always dudes who are short, or fat themselves, or just not attractive who act so self-important.
I think everyone is allowed their preferences…as long as they can achieve them. I can say I only date billionaires that are 6 feet with green eyes – and that is fine – but if none show up at my door I’m going to need to rethink my strategy. So LW rethink your strategy. If you are only appealing to a type of girl that you don’t want to date anymore then you need to change. Where are you deficient? Are people dismissing you solely because of your appearance? There might be a kind of karma in that but you certainly can’t complain about it. Is it your income? your wit? Invest the time and money you may need to invest and improve the attributes you have that are limiting your opportunities. You said the only women who show interest in you have been obese…who have you shown interest in? Or do you wait for women to clamour around you? You can’t sit back and expect what you want to magically appear in your inbox. You have to work for it – probably harder than the next guy but those are the cards you are dealt. There is no “right” to be picky – there is typically like attracting like. If you want to date in a new league essentially you have to bring something to the table that the type of girl you want to date is interested in. Be warned though. If your primary criteria is looks you are not in for an easy time of it. You may well rue the day you picked superficial over substance.
If more than one of those 6 ft billionaires with green eyes (I’d even take blue eyes), feel free to send me the ones you don’t want. I’ll take them off your hands for you.
Oh honey, you are so openminded being all willing to settle for blue eyes 😉
So much that you’ve motivated me to be openminded as well. I’ll take Viggo Mortensen OR Nick Cave when he was 30.
Oh god, Nick Cave when he was 30. YES.
Sorry ladies, I have brown eyes so I guess I’m not the one for yall. Also, I guess I didn’t win the lottery last week, so I doubt my portfolio is up to scratch.
Seriously though, FireStar, I think you are pretty spot on about this.
The one thing I would point out is that when it comes to online dating, the perceived options created generally makes everyone more picky and less willing to settle. This is why our LW is getting so much interest from what he perceives to be below his league. For one, he has probably raised his standards a bit. And additionally, the women are probably ‘reaching’ more.
My friend used to say nothing beats a try but a failure. Everyone is someone else’s favourite flavour. Maybe the girls he gets are casting a wide net and he gets caught in it – maybe he is someone’s favourite flavour – whichever is true, he should take a page out of their books and go after what he wants and equip himself to get it. It’s the entitlement piece that is most offensive. Whatever happened to hustle?
“…when it comes to online dating, the perceived options created generally makes everyone more picky and less willing to settle.” This is so true. I’ve never tried online dating, but I can see how somebody would breeze through profiles dismissing people for increasingly shallow reasons. That’s what happens when presented with an overload of details and choices.
😀
Anyone who defines exactly the body type they require in a partner, curvy here, thin there, no bigger than this but not this thin – online dating is not for you. Maybe real life is not for you either.
I’m sure it must be hard for you to have been single for an ENTIRE month, enough to drive you to online dating, but as is illustrated on this and many other sites, online dating takes time. So give it time. Time for the obese women to realise they don’t deserve you, and time for the women who do meet your physical requirements to realise what a stand up personality you have (since you accept your body is not perfect.)
Ugh. Double standards much?
Oh, that stings. But it is so true. If you want to attract an “upper league” woman, become an “upper league” man. Go out and get a professional degree, better yourself and better your earning prospects. I was endlessly frustrated by a male ex-friend who was looking and looking for Miss Perfect. He was always complaining about how lonely he was, yet was SUPER fussy about amazing and beautiful women ( one time he rejected a girl I introduced him to because her hands were too squarish! Really! And this woman had been a professional model in Europe, a real knockout gorgeous person, was an Ivy League graduate, etc! Too good for him actually) And him? He smoked, he was overweight, depressed, etc. I finally told him that if he wanted the perfect catch, HE had to become the perfect catch! That is the only way to “earn” a better partner, to become better yourself!
Postscript: BTW He is still single, and she is now married with 2 beautiful children.
Absolutely! You have to deliver what you want to get.
like that movie shallow hal!
I don’t think he has a tail though! lol
OK just what the hell exactly are squarish looking hands and why does that matter??!?
Beats me, but it mattered to him!
It’s ok for you to be honest about what you’re attracted to. It’s ok to only date women that you’re attracted to. It’s not ok to be an entitled jackass. (As a side note, there is no word in the english language that I hate more than “deserve”, and “earned the right” is just another way to say it.)
Like Wendy said, you need to offer something if you want something in return. With your body type (really scrawny) you had better be incredibly intelligent and charming or have a personality/sense of humor that can light a room on fire, maybe both. Based on the incredibly small sample size of the letter you wrote, you don’t have that. That means it’s time to hit the gym. You need some nice muscles to hide your sub-par personality. Also, be prepared for a partner who is the same (nice body hiding a boring and/or annoying person); because if she had both that nice body and a stunning personality, she would be able to do better than you.
I would suggest you work on both. If you really aren’t a bad guy, think about the way you present yourself. It doesn’t matter (in a practical sense) who you really are, the people around you are only exposed to what you give them. As Wendy always says, and as so many have said here already today, you have to BE a great partner to attract a great partner. You don’t find ways to attract better partners, you just work on yourself until your desired partners come to you.
Maybe I’m missing something, but I’m not sure I agree with the majority of comments. I mean, maybe he could have said it better, but what’s wrong with deciding your “type” is no longer working for you? I previously dated men who were quite a bit older than me (10-15 years), and then decided I didn’t want that anymore. I decided I wanted to be with someone closer to my age. Is that ageist? I had an online profile up for a little while, and was bombarded with emails from men in their 50s (I’m 31). I just didn’t respond. Because, yes, I’m sure they’re lovely people, but I’m just not attracted. You can’t force attraction, no matter how “open-minded” you might be.
I remember at least a couple letters from women asking if they should stay with the man who’s super nice, but that they’re not attracted to. And I think I remember the responses were overwhelmingly along the lines of if you’re not feeling it, move on. I’m paraphrasing, of course.
So, LW, I guess what I’m saying is, you’re going to attract who you’re going to attract. That doesn’t mean you have to date all of them. Maybe send some emails to women you are attracted to and see how you get along. Don’t rely solely on physical stuff, but let’s not pretend it’s not important to a certain extent.
Bingo.
It’s not about deciding to change who you date or try a new type with this bro, though. It’s about him thinking that he has “earned” the right to a hot, thin woman just because he dated some big girls in the past. Men seem to think that they deserve the hottest women, even when they are frankly lacking in the looks department themselves (see: any self-described “nice guy”).
Definitely. I guess I don’t really understand what he’s asking and what advice he wants. If he’s not interested in the ladies who contact him, then he should just not respond, and wait to find someone he is interested in.
It’s biology trying to normalize the species, LW. Thin + Fat = Average. Short + Tall = Average, etc.
I’m glad my husband likes fat chicks. Everyone is entitled to want the kind of person they want but that doesn’t guarantee you’ll find them. Looks fade, people gain weight, lose hair, etc. so in the end make sure that you love the person and not just what they look like.
Wow, you girls are harsh. Why not come straight out and tell him that he should improve the gene pool by not reproducing and be happy he manages to attract anything at all!
So there is some sense that he might not be the ideal mate according to woman’s magasines.
5’8″ and 150lbs is well within normal BMI and it be on the shorter end of dreamboats but it’s not someone who has some form of deformity. He might not be a model but I expect that he’s at least not repulsive.
First of all LW, don’t fret the height. Woman who want 3 inches above their height aren’t worth the hassle especially seeing you won’t meet that requirement anyways. That will take Barbie wannabees out of the running but there should be plenty of reasonably attractive woman who will qualify.
Secondly you’ve had 3 long term relationships so you don’t suck too bad at those either so that’s another good plus.
Obviously we all want to have the best. The Ferrari is out of reach for most and so the supermodel is probably out of your reach as it is for most of us. That said, you should be able to get someone that doesn’t need to buy two seat to fly even if they aren’t the ideal thin woman.
As some have mentioned, your problem is probably in part in presentation. Recent study showed that women attractiveness vary quite a bit but that makeup actually equalities a lot the attractiveness in the eye of the male subjects. Good news for so-so girls and odds are that the same also applies to man. I don’t know what change in your presentation or profile you need to make but it might not be much. Hopefully you will work this out either with trial and error or with the help of friends.
Good luck
Wow, don’t take it personally. It’s his attitude that is the issue, not his preferences.
I get the feeling responses to his letter were taken personally. There is nothing wrong with his ”attitude” because one cannot decipher to a high degree, attitude based off a single letter or use of ”deserve” versus any other word.
There is absolutely something wrong with his attitude! He feels that by dating big girls, he’s earned the right to date hot girls. He’s paid his dues, now he gets to move up a few steps on the hotness ladder.
There is nothing wrong with having preferences and being shallow. Nothing! There is a whole lot wrong with thinking that you are owed a hot chick just because you dated bigger women.
No, it’s more along the line that he’s date enough big girls already and now he wants a change.
He used the word “earn”. To me, and to the majority of women commenting here, it signals that he has a case of nice guy syndrome.
Yeah shouldn’t he know by now that I am the one that’s owed all the hot women? I mean sheesh … get a clue already. I called dibs back in like 4th grade after all for a reason.
Yes he does have an attitude because he is placing the owness on the women instead of on himself. He is the only constant factor in this equation. Somehow it’s their fault that they are interested in him. If he isn’t interested in overweight women then he should make it abundantly clear in his profile so that they will know that he isn’t what they are looking for and vice versa.
Men are very aware of women’s issues with weight and they frequently use it as a weapon against us, so yes, that probably colors our viewpoint. This man is ever so subtley mysoginistic towards the type of women who he is attracting. You see things differently when you’re on the receiving end of it.
To be honest, a lot of women prefer taller men, and I think online dating sites are a place where this particularly becomes an issue. Just as he can rule out overweight women, a lot of women will discount a man solely because his profile shows him being fairly short.
I think Wendy’s advice is good but there is one thing she is forgetting and is something I struggle with myself. You have to have some physical attraction to your partner or it won’t work. I know because I was in a relationship were there was none once and I ended up resenting him everytime he wanted sex.
I think like others have said you’re more than in the right to have specific things you look for in a significant other. However, to say you’ve earned that right is an odd phrase to use when talking about dating. Like Wendy said dating isn’t like a job where you move up a ladder of some sort. You don’t start dating unattractive people and rack up points to trade in for a slightly more attractive person. And like RR and others above said if you’ve used that tone at all in your profile you’re going to lose a lot of dates right away. There must be something about the way you’ve chosen to portray yourself online that leads to only certain people responding to you. I would revisit your profile and if you feel comfortable show it to someone and get some feedback. It might be that some simple changes will make people more responsive to you.
Wow is it me or are y’all being harsh to Dude?
To Dude letter writer – no you do not need permission to be a picky dater.
In fact, BE a picky dater. Its neither a crime nor shallow.
However, be wary of focussing on qualities & attributes (outside of the constants/non negotiables) that won’t bring any value to the relationship you seek. If attraction is what you’re worried about and you have an idea of what physical attributes you want – POWER TO YOU!
Physical attraction to your partner IS important in every relationship.
Again, I’d caution against being too married to the idea of a non obese/heavy set/fat/whatever/skinny/whatever (those can be variable) that you lost sight of what’s important for a healthy relationship.
Now get out there and have some fun!
I agree with this – there’s nothing wrong with knowing what you want. But don’t act all “woe is me” and “I deserve better” because only heavy women are responding to your profile.
The reason of why that is a terrible thing is lost on me.
Dude wants to make a move on his dating type. Big deal.
there’s nothing wrong with a move. There’s something wrong with thinking that you are better than a group of people and have earned the right to move on to a “higher class” because you fished around in the “lower pool”
If he wants to date better looking women then try and date better looking women! But you certainly don’t deserve to date people who are physically attractive.
On that note: don’t discount women who are “skinny or Barbie like” either – they might also be really nice. You never know.
I’m guessing that you are a man, which is why you glossed over every single comment about how frankly disturbing it is that the LW seems to think that he’s “owed” a much hotter girl than his past partners. There is a disturbing attitude in society that men are owed attractive women for some reason. It’s nice guy syndrome.
“I feel that I have earned the right to be a little more picky”
This comment really bothered me. You do not earn attractive people. They are not a reward for a job well done. There’s a reason why only the women who are often overlooked in society go for you and that’s because you have an attitude problem. Frankly I’m surprised they put up with the “I’m better than you because I’m not overweight” attitude.
Work on your attitude and you might attract a larger dating pool.
Right on, Wendy.
This letter smacks not of size-ist discrimination, but of a subtle misogyny that men can “level-up” to better women. Men do not “earn” or “deserve” women – that is an attitude that would have been used to justify slavery or servitude or arranged marriages. Men and women do earn respect, and I think most people deserve love, but it has to come from a place of mutualism, not of ownership. LW, I hope you can separate your preferences for a certain physicality, which isn’t inherently wrong, from this attitude of misogynistic entitlement. It will serve you and any future partners well.
Actually men do have to earn women. That’s what makes the world go round.
And it’s not ethical to try to shame someone into having sex with people that they don’t find attractive. That’s kind of sick.
I’m not trying to shame anyone – in fact, I state outright that having physical preferences is totally acceptable.
or at least ‘not inherently wrong’.
Be careful leroy, with statements like “Actually men do have to earn women. That’s what makes the world go round.” you’re treading pretty close to MRA territory.
oh, come on.
Objectively most women prefer men w/ earnings and status. Not everyone, but most. And that’s largely why men put so much effort into acquiring money and status, hence the world going round. It”s not an insult. And I’m not saying that women don’t contribute equally to society. But realistically your average mid level sales manager, or whatever, is only doing that job to earn the affection of some woman. If it weren’t for women I’d be running around jumping on bears and raid villages and stuff. So it’s actually a good thing.
Well don’t let us stop you from jumping on bears Leroy.
Eh, I am so sick of fat people whining about how fucking hard they’ve got it.
B.O.O. H.O.O.
If fat people want my respect, they’ll get it when they fucking stop eating. Frankly, I am sick and tired of my insurance going up because apparently nobody can fucking say no to a god damn bag of Cheetos.
Meanwhile, if women didn’t equate their own beauty with money, you wouldn’t see so many Hot Chicks with ugly rich dudes.
End.
Of.
Story.
What the hell does LA do to people?
seriously. I knew it was a soulless place but that is some intense rage/damage. and he’s not even dating women there.
You sound like my dad. That’s means your OK.
I don’t get this comment – at least as a reply to Samantha’s comment.
She didn’t really say anything about how tough or how much discrimination obese people face. She was talking about the guy’s misogynist (or perceived misogynist) attitude. Namely, he’s dated less hot chicks, now he “deserves” a hotter one.
I’m not disagreeing with you, but your response in this instance was…random.
No, actually, you are right, ele4phant. I was skimming, so I somehow misread Samantha’s post, meaning I added a word in my head. Where she says “this letter smacks not of size-est discrimination” I somehow saw: “this letter smacks not ONLY of size-est…” My brain inserted the only… Anyway, just wanted to clarify.
But yes. My patience with the obese is at an end.
I swear, back in the 1980s all the talk show idiots like Oprah foolishly did all they could to de-stigmatize being fat… It was such a tragedy. It was genetic. There was simply nothing “they” could do and we should all feel bad for them and wahhhhhhhhh. We were lectured to lighten up. If we even mentioned it, they’d all go the way of Karen Carpenter… Better to simply embrace it instead and accept the fact that for some…fat was simply “their normal.”
Brilliant move that was. Two decades later and everybody is going the way of the bloated cow. According to http://www.healthyamericans.org/obesity, the Adult obesity level went from being 15% in 1980 to 30% today. Meanwhile, childhood obesity rates have MORE THAN TRIPLED!!!! Okay, so… by telling people it’s OKAY to the be fat, we apparently paved the way from more and more of the masses to become just that. Brilliant move that was.
I still don’t understand the personal and profound outrage and tone you (and others here) are taking with somebody else’s life choices. I really want to know what they as a group have don’t to you to personally take such a tone and have your “patience with the obese is at an end”. Is it simply that they offend you? the mere sight of human imperfection is too much? Or have they really done some egregious things to you, BGM, to make you hate a collective group of people like this?
I just don’t understand how you can think like this and have absolutely no empathy for people who get so much unwarranted hate spewed at them on a daily basis. While being gay is not comparable to being overweight, the societal backlashes, the stigmatization, the isolation can be. Plus being gay is not nearly as visible as being overweight.
In defense of mark,
My parents are older then mark, but they are dealing with health issues related to genetics/age. Most of our health care issues are related to being overweight and being sedentary.
Back in my day twenty years, there would only be a few girls in high school that were significantly overweight, and today it seems more then half.
There are a lot of factors involved. For instance I let my kids ‘play in the street’ and I live in what many would deem an unsafe city. But the fact my kids are outside, and the homes are close to the curb, and there is always an adult somewhere near by, yeah I would freak out the average suburban parent as being neglectful. The only exercise young kids get is only through organized activity.
I rather hate it when the pediatrician complains my kids aren’t in organized sports, rather asking if my children are active or not. I’m not dropping hundreds of dollars a month so my children can be active.
yes, that affects your life Renee, but is no justification for the personal insult ‘normal’ people take when talking about overweight people. it’s a societal concern for sure. But that does not make it an opportunity to hate on a large group of people. No other group is openly and with such acceptance by society at large detested and hated upon, for reasons that I have yet to understand. The weight of someone else, strangers no less, is not a personal affront to you or anyone else.
Wow. This is an incredibly hateful thing to say.
Yeah. I had to stop reading this thread.
I love how fat people are so disgusting and its all their own fault la la la but UNEMPLOYED people, well thats the economy isnt it?
Point, Nadine!
And I’ll add that I’m tired of people not being able to see beyond their own selfs. You know, people who think just because they are thin, then everyone else should be able to just “stop eating.” Or because they have jobs, everyone else should be able to just find a job. Or because they don’t drink or smoke, everyone else should be able to quit. Or because they never needed food stamps or other social welfare programs, then everyone else should be able to get by on their own.
BGM, if your’e worried about your insurance going up, your worries will be better spent on the insurance companies jacking up prices or certain groups of people trying to prevent national health care from happening. Focus on that over overweight people. And please keep Cheetos out of this discussion – they are a gift from God, blessed by angels, and … the only thing I look forward to from gas station to gas station.
Please! All most of the so called FAT would ever to do is simply STOP PIGGING OUT. That is really quite simple. That requires no outside circumstances. One can do that at absolutely any possible moment if they really wanted to.
If you truly can’t see the difference between that and finding a decent job when you’ve experienced the sheer insanity of having no less than six places of employment failing on you (and I don’t mean firing you or laying you off, I mean all six literally went belly up–shuttered) in less than two years… Well, wow. I simply don’t know what to say. But it’s no wonder you are so sensitive about this issue.
“Please! All most of the so called FAT would ever to do is simply STOP PIGGING OUT.”
Well, by that logic, all anorexics have to do is start eating again. All heroin addicts have to do is stop shooting up. All women who end up with abusers should just start dating nice guys. Easy – problem solved.
I don’t disagree that for the overwhelming majority of people who are obese, they are there as a direct result of their eating and exercise habits. But its not like its an easy-peezy fix to get back to a healthy weight. There are a lot of stumbling blocks for people with weight issues, whether they have underlying mental health issues that need to be worked out, that they lack of a support system that will help keep them on track, or just the fact that its easy to fall out of shape but hard as heck to get back into shape.
We can, and should, hold people with obesity (or eating disorders, or drug addictions, or a tendency to date abusive a-holes) accountable for the their decisions and actions (or inactions as it were), but a little compassion goes a long way. You can hold people accountable, but still recognize there’s a big hill to climb to reverse the consequences of their situation. And truth be told, to a greater or lesser extent we all make decisions that aren’t in our best interests, or in the best interests of others.
The problem with your argument is that… uh, YES it really is that simple to relieve the immediate problems. The very first course of treatment for severe anorexics is to put them on a caloric drip. The very first course of treatment for heroin addicts is to detox them and not let them touch heroin again. The very first course of “treatment” for abused women is to get them away from their abusers. Thus, by your logic, the very first course of action for over-eaters is to make them stop overeating. THEN comes the mental therapy to make sure that they (all the above afflicted) don’t get back into bad habits. I will preface my following argument about the “put the fork down approach” by saying that I think that chronic over-eaters (who know all about nutrition and exercise but refuse to change their habits) are on par with alcoholics and drug addicts. It’s a mental disease, an indication that something is not right with their internal selves.
As both a former anorexic and drug addict, I can say with confidence that it is a rocky road to recovery in ANY regard, but you won’t even get started on that road to health if you don’t stop.doing.the.bad.habit. Making excuses, no matter what they are, doesn’t do you any good. Compassion is all too often the gateway to enabling, which is why, I think, BGM is taking the tough love approach. Addicts (and yes, I’m talking about over-eaters as being a type of addict) don’t need the soft love approach; they need tough love. Saying that they shouldn’t stop stuffing their faces until they face their mental issues leaves the door open for them to continue stuffing their faces until kingdom come because mental issues never really go away, and never feel 100% manageable. Addicts absolutely must stop actively engaging in their habits of choice in order to start getting better.
Compassion isn’t the same thing as coddling.
People with addictions of any kind should be told “You are the only one responsible for this. You are killing yourself. Stop.”, but pretending that just stopping is sufficient to make life manageable is ridiculous.
The sense I was getting from BGM was that he felt all obese people had to do is just stop pigging out and then it’d be all better. Its not that simple. You can have compassion for people without making excuses for them.
“But it’s no wonder you are so sensitive about this issue.”
wow mark, for all of your convictions about how people shouldn’t be prejudice against gays, you’ve really got blinders on here to your own bigotry and hatred about this issue.
LW, you have the right to set whatever standards you want for the girls you date in the future. However, if all you’re attracting is obese women, that’s your fault, since you are the only consistent factor in that set of results.
Maybe online dating is not the best forum for you – try going to the gym or taking part in charity walks, where the dating pool will be a little more likely to include the type of people (women who engage in healthy lifestyle choices) that you’re looking for. Also, don’t wait for the women to come to you – go and talk to the women you want. You can’t hit the ball if you don’t swing! If you have trouble with introductions, really, just say, “Hello, my name is LW. How are you today? What brings you here?”
Hey LW, how much work are you putting into online dating? Honestly, if you are only looking at women who reach out to you, then you are not utilizing it to your full potential. My friends who are attractive, never reach out to anyone because they get pursued. Just like real life. If you want to find fit girls, go join a running club. I have two friends that do triathalons and met thier husbands that way. If you want an ideal girl, you are going to have to pursue her. I know alot has changed in dating, but if you watch gone with the wind or sense and sensability, most women are used to being chased
that’s a great answer. Join a fitness group if you are looking for fitter women! join a gym and go to some classes – try yoga too – lots of ladies there.
It is true, you have to work for it. It is like posting your resume on monster and calling that looking for a job.
I find it very telling that all the men here are falling all over themselves to say just how fine it is that his dude has preferences, while completely ignoring the fact that LW thinks he “earned” dates with hot women because he dated some bigger girls. The glaring mantitlement complex in that letter was telling.
Having preferences is absolutely fine! I am 5’2 and I only date tall (preferably very tall) men because I find short men to be unattractive, generally. My fiance is 6’0, but I’ve dated men that were 6’3 and up, and that’s what I really prefer. The men I’ve dated have all preferred very short women, too, so it works.
Easy with the generalizations. There are men and women on both sides of that. There’s no need to try to steer this down the “men are evil” path. Calling it “entitlement” without changing it to “mantitlement” will work just fine.
Yeah I tend to disregard the opinion of anyone that changes a normal word to make it sound like mansomething or womansomething. The intent may be to make it sound cuter, clever, or pro-feminist or something but it just comes across as juvenile to me. Instant eye roll reaction.
Of course you do, because they are often women and members of minority groups. I eyeroll at any dude who feels the need to say words like “mansplaining” are juvenile.
lol assuming I dislike it simply because I’m a guy, how very “enlightened” of you.
Or maybe he is like me and simply hates that kind of thing because it makes you seem like you have the intellect of a junior high teeny bopper?
I agree here.
But…can we please keep “manscaping”? 🙂
Manscaping is a-okay in my book because it seems to have both a very legitimate AND necessary meaning!!!
Womanscaping too…though I’ve never actually heard that term. Haha.
Okay, but what about a woman who rolls her eyes at words like “mansplaining”? It doesn’t help your argument when you butcher words for the sake of talking down to an entire gender.
It’s a very specific thing where men have been taught that they deserve hot women for one reason or another, even if they aren’t super gorgeous themselves.
I can’t even Google it, let alone find so much information about it that I can discern an intelligent idea behind it. Google literally says, “Did you mean: entitlement?” This leads me to believe that it isn’t something for which there is common usage. Where did you hear this word? I wouldn’t expect Google to validate something, but Google is such a wide net that it’s a pretty good indicator that something is truly obscure when you can’t Google it.
Will you please explain to me why we need this word instead of just saying that the LW feels entitled to an attractive partner? I honestly don’t see how it’s useful outside of attacking the other side in a gender argument.
The idea that you’re entitled to an attractive partner in spite of your own unattractiveness isn’t a gender specific thing. I highly doubt it even has a higher prevalence in one gender.
Do we really need a word for this specifically when it’s a man?
I don’t know if you’re a regular reader,but its often a double-standard on this site.Women demand to be treated with respect(as well we should)but frequently there’s an anti-male vibe with some of the letters.Apparently saying things like “of course you think that,you’re a man” or “that’s such a male thing to say” is okay. But saying “you’re a woman,that’s why you feel that way” is WRONG. I’m not saying nor denying that’s the vibe for this particular letter but for some of them,that’s the way it is.
That was exactly her attitude with my comment above. Rather amusing really. It gave me a good laugh.
Haha I actually didn’t read her comment before posting my above comment.But now that I read it,yeah…just more evidence supporting my claim of double-standards for the men.
Especially with the “I’m guessing you are a man,which is why…” (which wasn’t directed at you,I don’t think). So I guess if that is ok to use,it’s just fine for you guys to start saying “You’re a woman,which is why you think xyz”.
But hey.As long as it’s equal.
Well this is largely a women’s site, so you’re going to get some element of that. But the other 90% of the commenters are pretty good about avoiding that sort of attack.
Though I do get a kick out of the Freshman Feminist diatribes where the most innocuous things are MISOGYNISTIC!! It’s like that line by Andre the Giant from The Princess Bride – ” You keep using that word. I do not think it means what you think it means “.
Thumbs up for Princess Bride reference!
Oh,I’m not saying I’m surprised.But it still irritates me.We should extend the same courtesies to the men on this site as we do the women.And yes,I agree,most of us on here are pretty good about that.But there are always those few who complain about being treated unfairly then in “retaliation” treat the men the same way.
Yes, much like women wanting a rich man when all they can bring to the table is a mountain of credit card bills for clothes they don’t even really look all that great in.
Jesus bloody Christ – did you even read his letter?
Why are you throwing fire when there’s no need? He didn’t explicitly say he deserves only “hot” girls. He laid out his trend and his insecurities. Maybe you should learn to read before harshly jumping on the “men” for backing up another “man”?
He did explicitly say that he’s earned the right to date hotter women. That’s where most people have a problem with him. The sense of entitlement evidenced by his “right”.
Yes, yes I did. I absolutely read his letter. You did not, apparently, because you categorically refuse to address that he DID say that he “earned” the right to date hotter women. Point. Blank. Period.
He said that once, and then immediately asked “am I wrong in thinking this way”?
I think you are (and Wendy) are reading waaaaaay too much into his use of that word.
And how is not having the opportunity to exercise a “choice”? I have fine-tuned my diet but the weight won’t come off w/out exercise. So what is one to do when you have a restless toddler climbing on you, tugging on you when you’re trying to exercise, refusing to sit in a stroller when you want to take a walk…what can I do? Fit in a few minutes here & there & carry her & play with her & wait for her to get older & settle down. But none of it burns enough calories.
Buy a pair of handcuffs and cuff your child to your husband and take off to a gym. Cackling manically as you drive away and ignore the cell phone are required.
You should look into a gym with free childcare. No, seriously. My sister just found one in Dallas and LOVES it! My nephew seems to dig it, too!
i have a friend who found one with child care and she says it keeps her sane. she gets me time, feels better and knows her kid is having fun.
There are tons of gyms with free childcare. LA Fitness, for one.
Also, the YMCA often has a childcare area. Something else to look into.
Hah! Great minds! That’s my sister’s gym!!
Actually, cutting your food intake will get your weight down far faster than exercise. If I run 2 miles, that burns about 200 calories. Not even enough to make up for eating one Snickers candy bar!
Very true. My mom keeps her weight down SOLELY based on what she eats.She doesn’t exercise at all. I’ve been telling her she should,for her heart(not her weight) but my point is,you can lose weight if you cut down on what you eat. Exercise speeds along the process but the primary thing to do to lose weight is change your eating habits. So many people think they can eat whatever the hell they want as long as they exercise…not true at all.
But it’s not solely the calorie reduction. Regular exercise adjusts your metabolism. Though the type of exercise that’s typically recommended doesn’t work well for weight loss. Stressing your body w/ endurance exercise, like running, can actually result in flab due to cortisol release.
If you want to reduce your weight through exercise, talk to someone familiar w/ sports medicine. They’ll likely recommend interval training and practical fitness regimes. These are much more effective for losing fat.
Starving yourself and doing gerbil exercises doesn’t work for this purpose. Eating well and training hard does.
Strength-training for sure. Just having more muscle mass will burn fat quicker than doing a cardio-session (that’s my understanding, anyway!)
Well, this letter is interesting. It certainly is a lightning rod, isn’t it? Look, LW, if you don’t want to date a chubby girl, stop asking them out. It’s really that simple.
PS — I simply don’t all the hostility about him NOT wanting to date somebody who clearly doesn’t take care of themselves. I mean, I’m sorry, but when I was in my twenties you seriously had to work at it to be fat by that age. It’s sad — really, really sad — how so many people just seem to be content to let themselves go and don’t take any responsibility for their actions…
Hah! Genetics. Whatever. Go to Europe. Nobody is fat. Go to Africa. Nobody is fat. Go to Asia. Nobody is fat. Come home to America? Everybody is fricking huge. Um, okay. Exactly where do all these fat genes come from? Please, tell me, tell me. Because seriously, I’d really like to know…
I tend to agree with you on this bgm.
I don’t find anything wrong with being overweight. If that’s how you are fine. What I do have a problem with is people who are obviously extremely overweight eating a lot of disgusting food. For example, I use to work with an obese woman. Not a little overweight mind you. Unhealthy overweight. We would go to lunch. She would get a burger and fries. Fine. But then she would dip everything in mayo – burger, fries, everything. The kicker . . . always complaining about her weight. Hi, don’t eat a ton of mayo. I’m sorry. I had to share this story because I have no sympathy for people like that. And I’ll probably get flamed, but so be it. It’s how I feel.
If you get flamed for suggesting an overweight woman should change her eating habits,you are not the one with the problem.
So, so true…
“What I do have a problem with is people who are obviously extremely overweight eating a lot of disgusting food.”
Why? How does her weight affect your life in anyway? I don’t understand the hate people have and express on a daily basis to obese or overweight people. They are affecting themselves and their bodies, but having obese people occupy a space near you should not offend you or outrage you, just like you’re depression/alcoholism/OCD/general neurosis/paranoia/bi-polorism/other publicly visible or invisible health issues should not offend them.
*Attack of the you’re/your text correction. lame.
Actually, as this country moves closer to Universal Health Care, then it suddenly becomes my business when other people are overweight, since I am one of the ones who will be paying their medical bills.
that doesn’t explain the current environment overweight people find themselves in today.
It’s because overweight people offend their eyes.
(not saying I agree with it but that’s basically what it seems like to me sometimes).
I agree with John.I do not want to pay someone’s medical bills because of what they have done to their bodies.
But do you feel the same way about paying for anorexia treatments? rehab? AA meetings? Liver transplants? half-way houses? safe needle deposits? subsidized student therapy?
When the majority of this country has a problem with anorexia,liver problems and anything else,then I will say the same thing.
But right now,the problem is obesity.There are people with legitimate medical conditions who can’t help being overweight but I am not referring to them.I am referring to the vast majority of overweight people who are overweight because of their poor diets.
hmm, I just think its so interesting about how much blame and guilt is put on people who over eat and how under eating is considered a diagnosis. overweight people have just as a distorted relationship with food as underweight people but no one would ever say overweight people have eating disorders. Just as no one would say someone could help from being anorexic or if they only put more effort into it they would get better.
I consider overweight and underweight people to have eating disorders.But our society doesn’t have an anorexia problem…we have an obesity problem.Which is why there’s a lot of focus on it.
If you do consider overweight people to have eating disorders why use language like ‘poor diets’ and statements like “I do not want to pay someone’s medical bills because of what they have done to their bodies”?
I think it’s because overeating, unlike those other disorders, makes you very unattractive (conventionally of course) in a very obvious way that triggers our animal repulsion. People feel that first, and then justify it by blaming the overweight and all of their disgusting behavior. I’m ALL for personal responsibility. And I don’t believe in this whole “gene” thing- I actually agree with Mark- look at the rest of the world! You don’t even need to diet all the time or work out all the time to maintain a reasonable weight. You just need to establish a reasonably healthy relationship with food (or get damned lucky). But- I reserve my judgment for people who do things that directly impact me, or whose actions are cruel. Overweight people are hurting themselves more than anyone, and I think it is absolutely not ok to spew hatred their way.
If you can’t tell, this issue really tans my hide…
This is a response to savannah but for some reason I can’t respond to her statement:
I say medically overweight(and medically underweight)people have poor diets because they do have poor diet. Some disorders are considered behavioral.Anorexia and obesity are two of them and they are self inflicted disorders. They are both psychological difficult to overcome.If “disorder” is the wrong word,fine.My main point is,if I were paying other people’s medical bills,it would not be for anorexia or drugs.It would be for obesity.If this country had an anorexia problem,I would be saying the exact same thing.
With respect to your ‘main point’ how does that give you less empathy/more outrage for people who fall into a more common category of disorder than another? And I’m not sure we are using disorder here in the same way as ‘self inflicted disorders’ can mean a lot of things (and can include a whole number of issues) but doesn’t mean it’s any less of a medical issue somehow, rather than say simply poor diet. I feel like your language about this issue is pretty inconsistent so its hard for me to follow your overall opinion.
That makes no sense logically. I don’t see what the fact that a lot of people are obese has to do with the underlying reasoning of whether you support supplying medical treatment for obesity vs. drug addiction vs. anorexia.
The presumed logic behind it is that the insurance company is obligated to pay for “X” amount for all of their insureds, and the unhealthier people are the higher that X amount gets, and then the insurance company averages out those costs and pushes them out to everyone in the price of the premium. Making the healthier people have to pay a higher premium than they should be.
There is some degree of truth to it but like any issue that large (pun?), it’s vastly more complicated than can be simply explained in a paragraph.
This argument would be more valid (though not the hate it inspires) if insurance companies didn’t routinely and ever more increasingly charge more for obese clients.
True enough but people still feel like their premium is higher than it “should be” because of those “evil” fat people. Is there any truth to that feeling? Yeah maybe a little but sensationalism has skewed it so far out of reality that who knows what the truth is. End of the day insurance companies are a pain in the ass and that’s about the only truth. lol
So, I’m allowed to be more judgmental and less supportive of medical treatment towards a given overweight person because of the overall number of overweight people that exist? I understand that people think that overweight people drive up insurance premiums, but I don’t think that the number of people with a problem should, from an ethical standpoint, be tied to whether it’s covered by insurance. That’s what makes no logical sense to me. If anorexia and drug addiction are covered, than so should being overweight.
And I still don’t get why you have a problem with what someone else chooses to put into their own bodies. Don’t you have enough issues to worry about that actually affect you directly?
I actually agree that the vast majority of overweight and obese people in the U.S. are not that way due to “genes” or some type of disease. But that doesn’t mean I think it’s ok to judge other people for their own person struggles. Believe me, walking around in a fat suit you can’t take off and being subjected to disgust and scorn is enough of a punishment. There are a lot of unhealthy behaviors that people engage in, and because overeating makes you physically unattractive, we feel disgusted and then attempt to justify that disgust with the flimsy argument that obese and overweight people make bad choices, that they are lazy, that they are stupid. It’s bullshit.
Have you ever had weight issues?
As a matter of a fact, yes. I actually gained fifteen unwanted pounds a while back as hit my mid thirties. Your metabolism slows way down. It was shocking, my whole life I had always eaten whatever I wanted and suddenly, it REALLY caught up with me.
That said, I took a good hard look at myself and it was pretty damn easy to see I was eating to many big dinners. (My best friend is an excellent cook and always makes too much food, too! It’s easy to have a few no-shows in LA. Especially when your invites tend to be on the fly…) Also, that’s to Mad Men, I drinking like Don Draper. (not even to excess really, but i’d mix up myself a cocktail or two every night…)
It was a bitch, losing it. But I did it. I cut down on the big dinners (especially the seconds) and set a hard and fast rule that I could only imbibe two nights a week, and even then it was only if I was out and being social…
Yeah,alcohol really does contain a lot of calories.It’s too bad… 🙁
You’re lucky you got to eat whatever you wanted until your 30s. I got to eat whatever I wanted until I was 15 years old haha. Basically I gained some weight,not too much,about 10 pounds.But my parents(who thankfully didn’t worry about about “hurting my feelings”) had the foresight to realize that if I continued to eat the way I was eating,I would eventually gain a lot more than just 10 pounds.They told me I needed to lose weight.So I just ate less. (I was already working out to begin with). I HATED eating less.But after a couple weeks,it was just fine. And since then,I’ve really had to work at maintaining my weight.I am not the type who can eat whatever she wants even with exercising.But I recognize and accept that.
I’m not even really sure why I’m commenting on your post,BGM. I guess my point is,obesity rates would plummet if people just ate healthily and less of what they’re eating and worked out more. Yes,there are other factors.Yes,some people have medical conditions that really do prevent them from losing weight(thyroid conditions,Prader-Willi Syndrome,ect).But I’m not referring to those people…I’m referring to the vast majority of overweight people who are overweight because of their lifestyle choices.
Yeah my parents did the same thing when I started getting a little soft around the edges a year ago. I probably gained 15 pounds after college while I was unemployed and not going out much. I used to scoff at people who considered walking exercise and a valid weight loss plan. That changed when it occurred to me one day that the ONLY variables in my life that were different from college that could explain those extra pounds were that I was 1-2 years older and that I wasn’t walking much anymore.
Thankfully something in October of 2011 lit a fire under my ass and I started going to the gym, and since January I’ve been going 5 days a week. I *think* based off the progress I’ve had so far that I’m about 2-3 months away from having my abs visible. Progress hasn’t been as fast as I would have hoped but oh well. The end result is more important than being able to say I did it in a week.
Congrats 🙂
Yeah,I wouldn’t try to lose the weight in a week.Usually that’s done with crash diets and you end up gaining the weight back eventually.
Haha well the week thing was me just exaggerating but you’ve seen those workouts promising a 6 pack abs in 90 days. I don’t really care if it takes me a year if I finally have a body I can be proud to have at the pool for a change. All throughout high school and college I was super skinny (135lbs in HS and like 145 in college). I’m up to about 175-180 now and most of that gain is muscle. I’m not sure because I’ve never taken the time to calculate it but I’d guess I still have like 5-7ish lbs covering my waist/abs area that I need to burn off before they really start showing.
I think two things I’ve started doing recently that’s helping is that I’m eating more light stuff for dinner (like a salad with grilled chicken slices) and running for 20-30 minutes before my weight days (didn’t do any cardio on my weight days about 3-4 weeks ago) and running for twice as long on my cardio + ab days.
6 pack abs in 90 days…now that’s impressive.Haha.
So do you have a particular weight goal in mind? (I’m not asking what it is lol). I never did,for me I just lost weight until I was happy with the way I looked.I used a scale to make sure I was actually losing weight, but I never said “okay,I want to weight 130 pounds” or whatever because I would have no idea what I’d look like at 130 pounds (I’m 5’8) until I get there.So for me it was until I looked slimmer and was happy with it.
Yes I’m trying to break 200lbs. Don’t really have anything specific in mind beyond that really. I do have certain weight lifting goals that I’m trying to reach however. For example, I put 55lbs (45+10) on each side of the bar when I bench and I’d like to be able to put 2 45s on each side by June. I do weight myself everyday before I start and it’s been varying by 5 pounds in a predictable cycle. On my weight lifting days I usually come in at 175, then the next day I weight 180 for my cardio, then I’m back to 175 again the next day lol. So annoying! Today was a weight day and I came in at 178 so I’m hoping that’s a sign of more progress.
But mostly it’s a combination of wanting to actually be strong and get as close to an airbrushed men’s fitness model as humanly possible lol. I plan to start swimming again (because it’s the one exercise that’s really good for you and REALLY kicks my ass and makes me feel like I’m a 90 year old asthmatic) once the pool opens up in the end of May and I’m trying to have as much of a 6 pack as possible by then.
Emphasis on wanting to be as close to airbrushed model as possible? Lol. I agree about the swimming…that’s basically my only exercise (apart from the elliptical on occasion). I go to school in DC so the winter months are very cold but luckily the pool is heated 😀
Hey women aren’t the only ones that feel a slight social/societal pressure to look like a magazine…
Haha you should come out to the next Nova meet up then cause I and like 8ish others live in the DC area too.
Yeah,light dinners are definitely helpful.That’s basically what I eat at lunch…salad and various versions of (lean) chicken.
6 pack abs in 90 days.Now that’s impressive. Haha.
You’re lucky you remained thin in high school and college though.Freshman 15 is actually a myth but I know a lot of people who have put on weight in college.
Yeah it was just genetics and the walking to/from classes really. I can’t take credit for it. I did try to start working out but it only lasted for 1 semester. I got up to like 165? but stopped when I caught the flu and never really resumed, until a few months ago at least. I’ve been trying to work on myself this past year or 2 to make myself a better dating candidate and getting a sexier body is just one of the things on the list. Still haven’t pulled the trigger yet on trying to decorate this place…but I am about to start my masters! One step at a time right? lol 🙂
Haha well as we are always telling girls…don’t change your body for a guy! Same goes for guys…don’t change your body for a girl! Unless you want to,of course. You’re forgiven if you’re about to start your masters lol.What’s the program?
Oh I’m not ashamed to admit that like 95% of the reason I’m trying to get a better body is because of women, or more specifically, wanting to attract more of them. The fact that I’ll be in better health overall is just a happy coincidence.
The masters I’m about to start is in computer forensics.
Hey,I wonder if I’ll ever take a computer forensics class in grad school then…I’m a bio of global health major and my interest is in genetics.I’ve taken a couple biotech classes and loved them.Forensics is pretty fascinating!
That first part? Totally true. The thing that set me off – and obviously I’m not alone – was the idea that he seemed to think he “deserved” the upgrade to a hotter gf. Don’t ask people out you’re not attracted to, don’t do anyone a favor by dating them, and if you can’t get dates with women who have more options, then maybe you should improve your portfolio.
And I think the big difference in the US with obesity is several things. First, the availability of processed foods and how much easier and cheaper they are as compared to fresh foods. I’m making a concerted effort to eat healthier here lately, and it’s astounding how much crap I’ve been eating even as a relatively healthy and thin person. We walk less because our cities are so poorly set up, and as I said above, so much of our reward or comfort revolves around food. It’s not impossible to change that, but it’s difficult, and especially if you’re someone who grew up with big family dinners and food-based celebrations (I, for example, can’t think of one family celebration – graduation, birthday, a new job – that didn’t involve my parents insisting we go out to eat). I’m not saying you should just throw up your hands if it’s difficult and resign yourself to being obese, but you may have to call in professional reinforcements. Not everyone has the resources to do that, and it’s not a priority for everyone, either, but that doesn’t mean it’s impossible.
It’s been frustrating for me – I want to be 30 pounds lighter than I am, and I’m having trouble dropping more than about 7 pounds, and it always comes back. I’m in a far better place than a lot of people I know, though – I can’t imagine needing and wanting to drop twice that, or three times that, or more. It’s got to be so overwhelming.
“I’m not saying you should just throw up your hands if it’s difficult and resign yourself to being obese”
i think this is the real problem in this country. it is so freaking easy to be overweight. the food is cheap and fast, tasty if its what you used to eating, tv is easy, and a desk job is easy.
it does take effort to lead a healthy lifestyle, and most people are just unwilling to do that. i especially love the people who say that they want to eat healthier and not go out to eat, but oh, im too tired to cook after work, so no cooking. but i still want healthy meals. you cant have it both ways! you gotta cook your own food for it to be healthy, period.
I know – and being heavy is such a vicious cycle. Lugging that much weight around is exhausting, which makes the easy way out of fast food and no exercise so much more appealing, which adds to the weight. And we work SO MUCH. We work more than most other industrialized countries, so we’re always tired, always stressed, and we have no free time. The nights I work out – and I really, really love the gym, so this is something I look forward to – I’m so tired when I get home, if it weren’t for my boyfriend cooking, I’d be eating out more than I already do, undoing all the work I do at the gym.
I had an epiphany a couple of weeks ago, though, and I know it sounds stupid, but I quit eating anything cooked during the day and save my appetite for dinner. So raw veggies and fruit, maybe a tiny bit of cheese, smoothies (juice bar across the street!), and it’s great! I don’t feel deprived because I can stuff my face, and it took a little bit of doing to find raw veggies I can eat a lot of, but it’s kind of fun coming up with combos I like.
so true!
and thats good that you snack during the day- ive heard that is way healthier for you then eating 3 large-ish meals. i do that, but the other way around, because i work nights. so my boyfriend will cook us a nice lunch and then i will snack for the rest of the day. i snack because if i dont eat for like 4 hours i start getting shaky (i think i have a blood sugar issue) so thats just how i like to live my life. but, i have heard its way healthy so that is a plus to!
I feel your pain. I’m in the gym every day after work for 1.5-2 hours and by the time I get home and cook dinner and sit down it’s like 8 o clock. I miss college and all the free time I had there…
I’m in college right now so I have a set time to work out but once I start working?I can’t even imagine…lol
Enjoy it while it lasts. One thing I wish I had realized before I graduated is that college is the last time in your life that you’re likely to be surrounded by so many people your own age who don’t have a shit ton of commitments. There are just so many opportunities to meet new people, date, hook up (if that’s your thing), and just generally hang with people. There’s no where near as many opportunities after college and you have to work SO MUCH harder to get big groups together because people are so busy.
Ugh the time I wasted while I was in college………..
I don’t know why I’m wading into this conversation but here are my 2 cents anyways:
Beyond food, shelter, and safety people deserve very little in life. If you want something and you’re not getting it, work at getting it, you still may not get it, but if you hadn’t put in that extra work then you definitely wouldn’t have gotten it.
Got it?
PS: Boys wanting a hot girl is rather like a girl wanting a rich boy… And god knows plenty of those letters turn up on this site… Heck, we just had one this very week….
I truthfully don’t think this guy is blatantly being a size-ist, or thinking he has somehow earned the right to a hotter girlfriend by putting in time with larger girls, but he sure needs to learn to communicate more effectively.
Its fine to come to the realization after several relationships, that despite how wonderful the women are, you aren’t attracted to a certain body type. We all have preferences. Its fine to want to find someone you are attracted to both emotionally AND physically.
But dear LW, watch how you frame what you find attractive. Clearly some nerves have been touched.
Really, really great comment! I don’t think there’s anything wrong with dating women you are actively physically attracted to, rather than dating someone whose physical appearance you don’t mind. Having dated someone who was physically “eh” for me, there’s a huge difference with my boyfriend, who I am very attracted to physically. Because you also need the attraction to personality, that means you must be a little pickier. But yeah, the communication was definitely off – it’s hard to tell whether it was poor phrasing or whether this guy really does subconsciously feel like he paid some sort of dating dues, but choosing to be pickier and having a right to do so has nothing to do with past relationships, other than teaching you what you are and aren’t attracted to.
I agree. His lead-up to the question was odd. But I read it as apologetic, more so than him attempting to justify some entitlement. If he’d left all of that out and simply stated that he wanted to date women that he found more physically attractive than women he’d dated before, then I doubt that people would have reacted so strongly.
Honestly I’m not sure of what the purpose of his letter is – is he looking for permission to date women he finds attractive?
I agree here.I think he should’ve just said he now had changed his perception of what he found attractive(and there’s nothing wrong with that) and wanted to date a different type of girl.
Yeah,he’s not the ideal height/weight for many girls but his question is weird…why does he need “permission” to pursue certain types of girls?
Because people need approval by DW committee on when, how, and who they can date of course! Sheesh, have you been living under a rock or something?
Oh,but I thought only women needed permission from the DW community to date/break up with certain people? That goes for men too??
Yeah Wendy sent out a memo a while back. You must have missed it.
I’m a recent commenter but long time reader.I must’ve not gotten that memo.
Well your TSP reports are still due by Friday (which is tomorrow) … yeah … oh and I’m going to need you to come in Saturday.
I am curious about how the LW met his previous girlfriends. Did he pursue his ex-girlfriends, or did they pursue him? Are you always the one to be asked out? Is that why women who ask you out are heavy or obese women? I mean, to be totally honest here – attractive, thin or curvy women are not going to ask you out. If they are attractive, they’re probably asked out all the time. Why would they need to ask you out? Someone made a comment above that women like to be chased, and that is true, at least for me, it was. I like the guy to make the first move, but I am always very honest about how I feel about him. If I want more, I will tell him.
My point is, are you doing enough to attract the kind of women you want, as Wendy says? It’s not enough to just have a profile and sit back and wait for the women to come a-calling. If there are women that strike your fancy, then send them a message. Wink at them or whatever shit they have on those dating sites. Like Ghandi said, be the change you wish to make in the world. (Not an accurate quote, and maybe a bit too grandiose for this, but same principle applies.)
I’m not saying that you are entitled. You could be, or you could have just come across the wrong way in your letter. It does happen, especially if you’re trying to explain something. I don’t think it is wrong to have preferences. You can’t help who you are attracted to. Myself, I’m more attracted to tall, intelligent, and brunette men. Or those are just the type of guys that I have dated, anyways.
One last question (or statement, really) – I’m curious about your wanting to not date heavyset women anymore. I can understand it if you weren’t attracted to them in the first place, but your change of mind just seems kind of sudden. I have to wonder if it is coming from a place of pressure. Like you feel pressured to find someone “hotter.” All I can say is that it matters what you want. As long as you are sensitive and treat women with respect, I see no reason why you shouldn’t be able to date women you are attracted to. Unless, of course, you’re the biggest jerk in the world.
Wendy does have a link on her site for profile makeovers…all he has to do is click it.
I totally disagree with Wendy and about 90 percent of responses.
The problem is not that he’s not attractive enough. The problem is not that obese women are just as beautiful as thin women. Nope.
The problem is that he is letting the women do the chasing. Dude, here’s how it works.
YOU decide who you would like to be in a relationship with – or the sort of woman you want – and you go and do it. That’s what those women are doing who you don’t find attractive. They’re taking control of their future. They’re approaching you even though they know that, being overweight or obese, rejection is likely. Why aren’t you doing the same?
Why? Because you think attractive women should come to you. Nope. Unless you’re a total knockout, attractive women, even if they’re interested, like to be courted. Stop being passive. stop waiting for women to come to you. Stop letting life happen to you and go out and take some risks.
Dennis Hong had a guest column on his college friend that would just attract chicks.
Sure. Some guys are just chick magnets. Those guys tend to be good looking extroverts (as the guy in the picture of Dennis’ article appears to be); or they have other highly desirable traits. Most guys are not those guys! And here’s a reality check: If the only women hitting on you are unattractive to you – then (news flash) you’re not one of that select group of men known as “chick magnets”.
Women will approach highly desirable men, but on balance, passivity is a turnoff. And typically, men are expected to make the approach.
Same. I’m not rude to people with weight problems. I don’t think they’re sub-human. However… I’m just not attracted to obese men. That’s the word that the letter writer used. Obese. I’m thinking that’s significantly overweight. I lead an active lifestyle and I think someone who was obese probably wouldn’t share the same values I would. I like exercising with my SO.
His problem is that he feels that he should just have a woman he’s attracted to drop in his lap. I feel most of the fire that he’s feeling is from the dissonance between what he feels (“I’m not attracted to obese chicks”) and what he does (“Sure, if they ask me, I’ll date them! And I like them, but I want a skinny girl to ask me out now.”) I agree he needs to stop being passive and go after women he wants.
“They’re approaching you even though they know that, being overweight or obese, rejection is likely. Why aren’t you doing the same?” DMR
Because that method doesn’t appear to be working for the overweight or obese women approaching him? If you think rejection is likely for large women then it probably is for petite guys too. I suppose though if he approaches enough non-fat but curvy women he’ll eventually come across one who’s interested in him.
Also, it occurs to me that if this was a woman, saying that only men she didn’t find attractive hit on her, everyone would be telling her to lift her self esteem.
my dear god, there is alot of the pot calling the kettle black here..
a lot*
“although I have been open-minded all my life, now I want to make a change, and I actually would like to date someone who is not big” Not a Chubby Chaser
If you don’t mean to say that you’d now like to be narrow minded and limit your prospects to only women of a certain size then I agree with the assessment that you don’t present yourself well in writing.
I’m curious how someone who is having difficulty in the dating world comes to the conclusion that they’ve earned the right to be picky and should exercise it now. Have you considered that at your size you might appeal physically to a limited number of available women and further narrowing the pool of women available to you by eliminating some based on their size might not be in your best interest?
Oh pulleez.
He has the right to try to find a partner who he is attracted to. The amount of moralizing on this thread about how the poor guy should suck it up and enjoy big women for who they are is just ridiculous. If it was gay men hitting on him (who presumably he’s also not attracted to), would you tell him to stop being so fussy?
The problem here is two fold.
a) poor self esteem (on his part)
b) several large women have noticed his dating habits and are therefore pursuing him.
I take a day off of work and we get an awesome thread to read, haha….dammit.
LW, don’t focus on big, small, etc…focusing on physical attributes can cloud your assessment on their personality. This isn’t suggesting forego your physical preferences by any means because physical attraction is very important. If you aren’t attracted to big women that’s fine…there are plenty of guys out there that are glad to not have the competition (which is what a lot of the offended people are forgetting here)…but I think if you erase the “what” you want in the physical department you will kind of “subconciously” guide yourself to a partner that “floats your boat” without the worry of being shallow… If you truly aren’t attracted to “heavier set” women then you will find that out this way instead of saying…”you know what…I want a skinny chick this time.” All of the defending you did on your “open-mindedness” kind of suggests the opposite of your claim to not care how your gf’s match to society’s image pressure.
I would also get off the online dating if I were you. I think you will find yourself open to a wide array of people if you were to meet them in person rather than dissecting a snapshot of them (figuratively and literally) in some internet profile…and that works towards your benefit in the same way from your prospects. I’m of the belief that a lot of people’s best physical attributes can’t possibly be picked up through a few profile pictures…unless it’s a candid shot…the way someone laughs or how they talk, etc. Maybe I’m weird, haha.
As far as the arguments up above in this thread I think the main point is if you want to make a change make a change. I was hovering around 230 for three years after college. I started watching my portion sizes…STOPPED going to the gym (ironically), cut out carbs wherever possible, focus on bird meats and occasional red meats in the protein department and now I’m hovering around 195 and if I were to start being a little more physical I wouldn’t be surprised to drop 10 more (I pack on bulk easy though so I might net 0)…I also swear by greek yogurt. And this is a guy coming from an entire family (extended included) that has struggled with weight issues since I was born. As my parents and their respective families started realizing stress and the way they ate contributed to their issues they made changes and now my Mom is almost as thin as when my parents got married…she was over 200 lbs and is now close to 135.
This is horse shit. The author is comparing a man’s height (which he is in no way able to control) to a woman’s weight (which she has 100% control over…NO excuses). I am a woman for the record, one with a thin/athletic body type, and I too have had issues with men who are obese acting indignant because I’m not attracted to them. If a man is 35 years old and already 100 pounds overweight, I don’t even wanna know what’s he’s gonna look like at 50! Why should my 125 pound self be stuck with a 400 pound guy? I’d rather be alone forever. I don’t like the author’s attitude. Why is he shallow because he wants a woman who can offer him the same thing he’s offering her? Which is a thin, healthy physique. He’s not shallow! And I hope he can find a woman with a healthy body type someday that likes him back!
This sounds encouraging, but it’s not actionable for the LW. LW says, help I’m having trouble finding women to date me. You answer, you’re not shallow and I hope you find what you’re looking for. How is that going to help him? At the end of the day he is still going to be online turning down dates and not meeting anyone.
His choices are limited here. He can either change his profile to be more attractive (body building, job change, etc.) or he can go on dates with the women who show interest. Is that how it “should” be? I don’t know. But Wendy isn’t going to lie and say it will all work out and he’ll find someone who’s exactly as he wants. That would not be useful for his goals.
I believe this pickiness is the result of online dating. When we date online, we tend to feel like we are shopping for partners in a store. You look at height, weight, socio-economic status, style and many other superficial things. The reality is that online dating requires absolute attention to detail when creating an account and the people with the most number of responses from “desirable” matches are the best at displaying themselves to advantage (often through dishonesty or skewing facts). I know that I have been looked over by men who would be fawning over me if I met them through friends or even randomly at a club. I do believe that this guy is no more shallow than the average person when it comes to online dating, and I bet if he actually met one of these women in real life through friends, he might very well fall in love.
She’s right dude. It’s all statistics. Guess who the least approached lonliest women are ? 5″10.
I’m 5″7 and most shallow people want someone above 5″10. Doesn’t matter if they’re 5″2 or 5″8.
Shorter guys have more work to do to make their height. That’s where personality comes in and if you’re online that’s difficult to convey.
I doubt tall women are the least approached and loneliest. If they’re young and attractive they’re not having any trouble.
Funny thing. I noticed a trend on bumble. Women stating they were 5 ft 10. I started seeing it so often I googled it. A ton of articles discussing exactly that. At 5 “10 they want someone taller. The average male height is about 5 ft 8. What’s 2 inches you might ask. Allot when you add a 3 inch heel and now she’s 5 inches taller. I read so many articles in psych journals it was unbel iveable. Like the black hole for men is 5 ft 5 and under. Very limited market.
Right, but how does that translate to tall girls not getting approached? I know shorter guys struggle.
I suspect many, but not all, women who are 5’10” have that poisonous combination of taller than the average guy and being an average sized woman (as in a size 16) – aka “heavy” (which is totally not heavy). I’m short and fat – but when you’re a taller woman, sometimes you just have a bigger frame – wider in the shoulders and hips – a perfect curvy ratio for the height.
Further more everyone has something their attracted to. I can’t stand this garbage labelling someone because they don’t like a heavy girl.
If you take care of your body you will have similar expectations. It’s simple. A healthy confident person will want to be with a reflection of themselves. None of this if you met her you’d see who she/he is inside.
Now if you’re a delusional and believe you’re perfect well then you have a totally different issue to deal with.
It’s because ALL of the HOT girls WANT the “hot” guys who have swag, tons of money, are popular, flashy cars, etc. Those girls have the “princess complex” thinking their poop doesn’t stink and because they’re so “hot”, we the honest good hearted men have to already owe them something before we even go on the first date. These girls are the female equivilant of the male bad boy. Rare to find a healthy weight girl who’s humble, meek and WANT A MAN FOR HIS HEART knowing he ALREADY HAS A PERFEFT BODY!
Juat rember to not play games and be mature and don’t bend over backwards for them if they start taking advantage of you.
“Meek”?
Yeah, obviously – quiet, gentle, and easily imposed on; submissive.
synonyms: submissive, yielding, obedient, compliant, tame, biddable, tractable, acquiescent, humble, deferential, timid, unprotesting, unresisting, like a lamb to the slaughter…
Just what every honest, good-hearted man without swag, popularity, a nice car, or good looks DESERVES. Rember to not play games, you healthy weight bitches. Don’t open your mouth unless my dick is going in it. Don’t let these perfeft body guys take advantage. MY dick, you hear me?? You’re welcome.
Why shouldn’t the most desirable women pair off with the most desirable men (however they so define that )?
If you aren’t their cup of tea for whatever reason, why do you think you are entitled to their time and interest when the men they ARE most attracted to reciprocate their interest?
Why do you, someone who isn’t a “male bad boy”, think you should get to date whomever you want, but these “female equivalents” you desire should settle for you?
Wendy nails it again: “ For some reason, you’ve decided that you’ve “paid your dues” in the dating game by dating chubby gals and now you “deserve” more of a prize girlfriend for your past nobility. But that’s not the way dating works. You don’t rack up points by dating women you feel are less desirable so that you can cash them in later for a bigger prize. You have no more “earned the right to be a little picky” than, say, a woman who has dated nothing but, oh I don’t know, short men.”
Y’all are cunts! Dude honestly just workout or something and you’ll look more appealing to thin women. So many Hillary Clinton man haters in here
I got an email from a guy the other day accusing me of being a man-hater and saying that women suck and aren’t good for anything, yada, yada. I don’t usually respond to that kind of stuff but I was in a mood and so I sent a quick reply saying “sorry about your micro-penis.” And he sent a response back with a dick pic and, yeah, it was teeny. So, moral of the story: men who hate women like you seem to are probably really bitter about their teeny tiny dicks. Sorry about your micro-penis, dude.
Lolz for days. No one here hates men, but no one likes a whiny bitch working with 5 skinny inches or a stumpy chode.
I’d 100% have sex with Hillary Clinton over a tiny dick bitch like these posters.
Actually I’m looking at my HRC action figure on the shelf here in my office, and definitely if god forbid something happened to my wonderful, woke husband and I were suddenly single, I’d prefer to just use that item as a dildo rather than mess with these single, women-hating creeps with little penises.
Ha!
these updates are all kinds of awesome
For real, even in miniature, Hillary is bigger and more powerful than these guys’ little pathetic penises that no one wants. Including Donald “Ttump’s” (yes, he misspelled his own fucking name in a recent tweet) Mario-Kart mushroom dick.
Wonder whatever happened to this LW. I still think many made a lot of strange and curious assumptions about his letter… Talk about tar and feathering somebody. No wonder we never got an update… More it’s very odd to me that a skinny and average heightv guy was so vilified simply for not wanting to one date obese women one after another.
I don’t read the responses that way. If he didn’t want to date overweight women, that’s fine, he shouldn’t date overweight women. There are some extremely fine overweight women he is missing out on. I’m married to one. But… he didn’t write in for that reason. He wrote in that he was unable to attract any women who met his exacting standards. He might prefer to date thin women, but apparently they all prefered not to date him. That was his complaint. He felt entitled to the affections of the women to whom he was attracted.
Kate’s jokes about mini-penises aside, that doesn’t seem to be his problem, although it may be a secondary problem, who knows. In any case, he seems not to be able to get anywhere close to the clothes off stage with the women he is attracted to. Shooting way out of his league? Awful personality? Personal hygiene? An incel misogynist? Obviously very mentally ill? Totally messed up on drugs? There is something about this guy which a ton of women view as a huge turnoff.
It’s that he’s short.
Being short or having a certain skin color or eye color and so on on, is totally different to being overweight.Being overweight is a health hazard, and should not be accepted.There is an obesity epidemic in our society, resulting in illness such as diabetes, cancer, heart disease and many other things.We should focus on finding a cure for obesity, not accepting it.I would never compare a short person who is athletic or a healthy weight,and looks good and takes care of themselves with obeisty.To compare short stature with being overweight is very unfair, and deeply offensive.
Hey Jim, from a dating perspective you’re wrong, women look at short / small-dick men the same way men look at bigger women.
I don’t accept short men as dating partners. I consider it a health hazard. To me. I’d much rather date an overweight guy who looks good and takes care of himself.
From a science perspective, you’re also wrong. Some people have genetic conditions that cause weight gain and/or make weight loss difficult (e.g., PCOS). You cannot tell how well someone takes care of themselves by their size. Nor can you tell whether they are healthy. Or how they eat, or whether they exercise. Just because YOU falsely equate thinness with heath, doesn’t mean it’s true. Because it’s not. I’d encourage you to pick up a book like Body Respect or The Obesity Myth.
Anyway, sorry you’re so short and unattractive!
And small-dicked. Sorry.
I mean let’s say got 100 percent right and being overweight is always 100 percent the fault of the person.
Even if we accept this premise, we know from decades of practical experience shaming people doesn’t work. In fact, cutting people’s self confidence and making them feel like crap can make it worse for people.
Also – they’re still people. We should treat people with a base level of respect and humanity, even if they are engaged in self destructive behavior. If you’re not attracted to and don’t want to date larger women, that’s fine, but that doesn’t give you license to be a jerk to them.
I get this was just a legitimate response to Jim Miranda’s outrageous nastiness, but can I just say, nowt wrong with a short guy. Short men, like short women, are just as likely to be lovely people, and I for one don’t see it as a downside, mainly because it is just an irrelevant physical attribute, like being bigger or supertall or having a smashing big roman nose. If you like the person, whatever they are becomes your new favourite thing. You don’t get much shorter than Pete Dinklage and he’s a total heartthrob.
Totally, a lot of guys like women with more weight on, and a lot of women like / are fine with shorter guys. But these are two physical characteristics I would say are comparable in terms of also being undesirable traits when choosing dating partners. His argument that you can’t compare the two is bullshit. They’re the same thing.
Height for men and youth for women are the only two attractiveness traits that are found in virtually every culture.
My fella is just a little taller than me at 5’7″. Honestly, I would not want him taller. He’s the perfect height for hugs.
Allornone, my lovely partner is about the same, and I’ve often been saddened by the casual way people use it as an insult. There is literally nothing he can do about being short, and the people who use it to be dismissive or insulting would never dream of commenting on a woman’s age or weight. Agree re the perfect height for hugs thing :).
I would also add that online dating as probably exacerbated the challenges for shorter guys. Since it’s an easily quantifiable and filterable feature it probably takes on a bit of additional weight when people are quickly sorting through lots of candidates.
I think this is true. You meet a short guy at a party and you hit it off then the height thing kinda fades in importance. But if you use it as a filter criteria you’d never get to see the guy’s profile.
It’s why I was actually doing women a favor by lying about my height on my online dating profile.
Agreed! In college I loved short guys – I called them “compact” if they were short and slightly built. Funnily enough my fiance is a foot taller than me, but I actually preferred short guys for a long time.
I didn’t really have a height preference but my husband is short (although still a few inches taller than me) and it is so much easier on logistics. My dad is a big guy (up and out) and in retrospect we spent a lot of time accommodating that when i was a kid. Sitting at the end of the movie theater so he could have the aisle for extra space, sitting in the exit row of airplanes which I never liked, rides he didn’t go on at Disney, booths he couldn’t sit in at restaurants, etc.
My very “compact” husband will even take his turn in the middle seat of an airplane and doesn’t need extra leg room. Imagine!
I’m Jim Miranda and my penis is not small it’s six inches erect, which is average. No lack of height is not like being overweight. I for example would never compare Kylie Minogue, she’s 5 ft with being overweight. Also a short man could be handsome and athletic, a tall man could be fat,ugly, and have a tiny penis. Height has nothing to do with looks or personality.I’m not nasty, I’m actually a good man that compares overweight women with overweight men.Being obese is sometimes a person’s fault and sometimes it isn’t, but it’s still a disease. To say obesity is ok, your basically ignoring all the scientific evidence that says being overweight is a health hazard. This is overweight people living in denial. Women should treat short men the way men treat short women. The book your a talking about has actually been refuted. In your estimation most doctors must be jerks since most doctors agree with me that obesity in general is a health hazard.Try comparing short women who are slim, with obesity because of their lack of height, and I guarantee you they will be insulted and offended.
Damn. Jim obviously has a micro-dick. And he’s probably also short, too. Go away, Jim. No one cares what you think. Not here and, obviously, not in real life. Hence, why you won’t go away.
“Women should treat short men the way men treat short women.”
Yeah, no. Maybe there’s a planet where that’s a thing, but here on earth, short men are at a disadvantage. Short women are not.
I’m sorry you’re short and that you feel the need to measure your penis. Guys who are actually working with something don’t do that.
Do all men know the actual length of their erect penis, or only ones with a size complex?
LOL! You took out a ruler, Jim?
There’s a phone app that does it I think, designed for insecure men.
Are you the same loser who emailed me a dick pic last week and said it was “actually above average” even though it was clearly a micro penis? Or are you a different loser with a size complex who feels entitled to date whatever hot woman he wants?
“Try comparing short women who are slim, with obesity because of their lack of height, and I guarantee you they will be insulted and offended.”
I’m not even sure what you’re saying, but I’m a shorter-than-average woman who is slim and I am not insulted or offended by the comparison that I cannot help my height in the same way that not everyone can help their size.
And not that it really matters, but: I don’t think most doctors are jerks, but I do think doctors need to rely on something that isn’t BMI for determining what is and is not a healthy weight. By BMI standards, many athletes are obese due to muscle mass.
This is what Jim’s affirmative statements about his erect penis sound like.
https://mobile.twitter.com/shutupmikeginn/status/403359911481839617?lang=en
“Also a short man could be handsome and athletic”
Possibly, but a lot of women still wouldn’t want to date him / probably would never even see his profile, because they’d filter him out, just like you, Jim Miranda, would filter out women above a certain weight. And those women above whatever weight you’d filter out could definitely be beautiful and athletic.
I wouldn’t date a short guy even if he’s handsome. I just don’t date short guys. I did once and he was, guess what, a jerk with a small penis.
“a tall man could be fat,ugly, and have a tiny penis.”
Maybe, but he’d also carry his weight better/different than a short guy, would be unlikely to have a small penis, and would be more attractive just by being tall.
“Height has nothing to do with looks or personality.”
Haha, incorrect, it totally does. For men. Not so much for women.
Oh please. Every guy I have ever known has known how big their cock is. How many of you don’t know your bra size?
I think that’s different. You have to know your bra size to buy a bra. You measure your dick why?
Oh please. We are a nation (planet?) obsessed with cock size. It comes up constantly. It is the rather tired and predictable go to insult for many. Hello…. Witness this very thread.
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Pretty much every guy on the planet has grabbed a ruler at one point. But even if they haven’t ever guy knows how big an inch is and God knows they handle themselves often enough…
The reason it’s a go-to insult is because our whole culture pretty much revolves around men’s egos and their egos pretty much revolve around their dick size. We know it’s an insult that will always sting to the men whose massive insecurity over their penis size manifests as total assholishness (and, often, misogyny).
Mm, I wouldn’t know in inches, it’s just the visual.
Yeah definitely different. In order to buy a bra you need to know your bra size. Penis length is not a discrete measurement on pants as far as I know.
Also I don’t think women ever go around saying “I’m not small chested, I’ll have you know these are D cups” because everyone knows from looking at you whether they’re big or not.
Also big dicks are problematic. I like it on the smaller side.
I need to walk tomorrow.
I’m the original LW. I’m getting married on June 11 2020, to a thick/slim woman. I had vented to this site a couple years ago In the heat of the moment , i was exasperated with getting hit up by larger women all the time and i got frustrated and sent in what i sent in. I don’t believe i should have been crucified for what i said, but it is what it is, I’m not good at writing exactly what I’m feeling at the moment in time. You ( most of you ) called me a jerk, selfish, misogynist, all that you could think of…that’s fine. Bottom line is that I simply did not want to date women that were on the very heavy side anymore. Is that so bad? Heavier women are beautiful also, I wasn’t calling anyone ugly I wasn’t bashing anyone’s body size, this is a couple years old anyway, I’ve since moved out n and am happy as I’ve ever been in regards to relationships. Stop kicking the dead horse, but thank you to the few individuals that actually understood where i was coming from at the time and defended me. I’ve moved on and am doing well.
This isn’t about having preferences. I personally prefer taller, slim men. You would be too short for my preference.
The icky part of it all, at least to me, was this “but now I feel I have earned the right to be a little bit more picky.”
You seem to be saying you put in your time dating heavy women so now you are owed slim women. As if you earn the right to get the woman you want by first dating the undesirable women. It seems as if you didn’t think women had a choice in picking you. As if you were the only one who got to pick and you would get to pick a better woman because you put in your time dating lesser women.
Moved on*
Also, for people always wanting to say “don’t name call, don’t put people down, ect” you don’t practice what you preach.
Also, I’m 5’8 ( not short ?♂️) and have never measured my penis. I’m good where im at
We name call people who blanket statement everyone as “cunts.” I haven’t read through all the comments, but I don’t think anyone ever said they thought you were small dicked.
Is he the same guy? I think that this thread has attracted a lot of commentary from unpleasant Internet people trying to put fat women in their place.
Didn’t Wendy ban you like 3x from the site for being abusive? Why do you keep coming back?
5’8” is shorter than average.
I’m 5’8” and I don’t consider myself tall for a woman.
I’m 5’8, and it’s definitely short for a guy. If you don’t think you’re short, that confirms your total lack of self-awareness., but I think you’ve proven that over and over again anyway.
Well you’re shorter than me ??♂️
(which wouldn’t matter if not for the discussion at hand)
@Fyodor, that’s right, it’s these low-market-value little white guys who keep reviving the thread to try and mainsplain why higher market value women should be attracted to them.
And I don’t know that “Unwanted Truth” was the one who called everyone cunts upthread, but he’s definitely been banned multiple times for disgusting rants, but apparently can’t help himself from continuing to read and comment.
Dating works on multiple levels. I have seen so many average Joe with hot babes and hot studs with average Jenny. It doesn’t take a great deal of observation to find many happy couple who look far from the conventional standard of beauty. Dare I admit, I had a crush on my French language instructor who was married, 35 years old, fat and bald and I was only 19 (never acted on my feelings) while getting attention from men with stunning looks and hot body at the gym and yet I was not into them.
When we come to dating and relationship, we bring our entire selves, our desires, our insecurities, our vision and our idea of peace and this could work in a surprising number of ways with results that we never see approaching. Sure, cerebrally, you may have a different idea of what you want and in this case you may want someone with a more perfect body than the ones you have dated but you just never know when the dart of love will strike you and from whom.
People with obesity should be treated with respect and dignity, the same way that people with bulimia, or anorexia should be treated with respect.The person should be respected,but the disease should not be accepted, it should be cured.Obesity like the other extreme anorexia, are diseases that disfigure and cause harm to the bodies organs, heart, and kidneys.
Being (171cm) like the man at the beginning of this article is not classified as a disease, but being obese is classified as a disease.The American Medical Association (AMA), designated obesity a disease in 2013. To successfully confront the obesity pandemic will require attacking the disease and it’s manifestations, not just the symptoms.
People compare short men (171cm it’s not even shorts it’s medium), with obesity because they are being unfair to short men.It’s unfair to compare a 171cm man who is healthy weight with obesity.People say short stature in a man is “undesirable” like obesity, this is not fair.Women that are flat chested have a trait that is “undesirable” to most men, but I would never compare a flat chested woman who is slim, with obesity. She could have other assets such as a beautiful face, good figure, sexy legs and so on.In the same way a shorter man could have a handsome face, good body, athletic, big penis and so on. A shorter man could have much better traits than a tall man. Height is only the size of a person’s skeleton. Why is the size of a person’s skeleton so important to women? It’s illogical. Women should go for good looks, athletic build, good hair, big penis and so on.Women should go for good looks, not the height.
As for overweight women, go for overweight men, since you both have the same condition, and suit each other, and would be able to relate to each other.
What you think women *should* go for is irrelevant. What women actually go for is up to them. Fact is, most of us are attracted to height. To many women, tallness is part of good looks. You might not like it, it might be shallow, but that doesn’t stop it from being true.
You can’t be with someone if you’re not attracted to them. I once canceled a second date with a man who was shorter than me, even though he was otherwise good-looking, intelligent, funny, and successful. Why? I didn’t feel sexually attracted to him, because of his height. Is that fair? No, but it’s how physical attraction works. People are turned on or off by all kinds of features we have little or no control over, like height or breast size or skin colour. Other woman probably find the guy I turned down very sexy, just as many slim men find heavier women sexy. You can’t tell people who or what features they *should* be attracted to. They just are.
“Why is the size of a person’s skeleton so important to women? It’s illogical.”
Of course not. Attraction isn’t logical, it just is. You can’t reason someone into wanting to do you. That’s not how it works.
And this whole spiel about how obesity is a disease and therefore acceptable to not find that attractive – look, if you’re not into larger women, that’s fine. You don’t have to come up with this whole long winded argument about why that’s okay so you don’t have to feel like bad person for not wanting to date a larger woman.
Decline to date them, but otherwise treat them politely and respectfully and let them live their lives without comment, without acting like you’re some public health advocate.
Blah blah blah. Whine all you want Jim, that’s the way it is. You can tell women until they’re blue in the face that they should be attracted to short men but it won’t change the reality. Plus, where even are all these short good looking men with big dicks? In your imagination, I think.
Why would height be separate from looks? Height is a physical attribute (kinda like size!) and a part of how someone looks. You can continue to be disgusted by how disfigured you find overweight people, that’s fine. But you have to accept that plenty of people will not be attracted to you as a short man. They may even think you’re so tiny you look disfigured!
Yes, Jim’s theory is silly and self-serving: he’s short, so height shouldn’t matter to women. Dirty little secret: it’s not just women. Height matters greatly to men as well. There have been many studies of the correlation between height and starting salary, income, success in business, success in politics. At a time when women had few positions of power in business and academe, the benefits of height were clearly recognized. MBA starting salaries were strongly related to height, much less related to grade point or anything else. It was pretty face equals large offer, it was tall equals large offer.
It is hard-wired into us that height, with decent build, equates to power. It is uncanny how frequently the taller candidate has won presidential elections.
Height is a far more accurate proxy for power, income, and popularity than a pretty face. Many actively distrust a man with an overly attractive face.
This has an evolutionary component. Big men were better warriors. They could do more heavy work. For most of humanity’s existence, these things mattered. Phrases like ‘somebody to look up to’ didn’t just fall from the sky. A person tall enough that you had to look up at having special merit has been around for a long time. Leader’s like to sit on a dais for a reason. The former CEO of the company I worked for, who was above average height, still adjusted the chairs in the board room to give himself an extra couple inch height advantage.
Thank you Ron, that’s all pretty true. I’m actually not interested in a really attractive face in a guy. Height is definitely more important. I’d prefer a big guy with an interesting but not super handsome/pretty face over a little guy with a gorgeous face.
While I don’t think height is AS important in terms of power for women as for men, I (5’4”) definitely feel more powerful and profesh in heels and always wear them for client meetings.
One of my law professors actually spoke about this. They’ve studied height and women in the workplace, too, and women also face height discrimination in the workplace, and petite women earn less. I no longer remember the specifics of what we were told, but I do recall we were told that women benefited from being neither “too tall” nor “too short.”
I’m a couple inches shorter than the average woman, so I’m not petite enough to stick out, but sometimes I do feel like a shrimp. I work with attorneys, who skew older and male in the environment I’m in, and I always wear heels to meetings because it makes me feel more confident.
Jim Miranda, you make no sense saying women should go for looks, not height, one physical attribute is as shallow as the other. people are entitled to their preferences, nobody owes anybody attraction. Actually, before this whole discussion I’d really not understood exactly how very much some women find shortness in a man unattractive- and if you don’t fancy it, fair enough. I think we’d all do ourselves a favour if we stopped using physical attributes, which are entirely involuntary, as a lazy insult though. If you think someone’s being an arsehole, tell them they are being an arsehole, don’t sneer at them for being short or fat or old, none of these things are something they can do anything about. We can all reduce our arseholery with effort though, so it’s fair to remark on that.
This remains a most amusing thread. Somehow women being attracted to height is normal. So them not being attracted to short guys is also normal and thus perfectly acceptable…
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And yet, any guy NOT being attracted to the obese, however, remains a mortal sin. Hilarious.
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I have said multiple times – it’s fine to not be attracted to larger bodies.
What’s not fine is belittling these women (and men) or going on and on in shaming them for being lazy and unhealthy. We know shaming doesn’t work. People are also adults and don’t need strangers weighing in about what they think is going on with their bodies and diets.
Nope. It’s fine to be attracted to shorter people or bigger / heavier people. My issue is Jim Miranda continuing to insist that women SHOULD be attracted to short guys, but that obesity is a disease, so that’s why men need not be attracted to bigger women. Newsflash: weight for women and height for men are both disadvantages in online dating, probably equally. Sorry, short men, women filter you out the same way you filter out bigger/older women.
While I think people are getting harsh, I think the general consensus is that you have every right to be attracted to (or not be attracted to) a certain body type. Shaming what you’re not into, or feeling like you are entitled to what you are is where things get problematic.
Still, I think people should be more open. My boyfriend? Short and bald. His height never bothered me at all (guys tend to be shorter where I live in general so you get used to it, but I admit I do like that he’s still a little taller than me). But I’ve ALWAYS been attracted to guys with longer hair. I never thought I’d be into a bald dude. But god damn, I love that head. I love that head all kinds of ways. If you narrow everything down to basic descriptors, you miss out on the whole. And I’m not even talking about personality (which obviously is most important). Yeah, my man is short (5’7″) and bald, but he’s still objectively attractive, more so than me certainly. I don’t think people should fully discount any feature on a person; on the right person, the feature could work really well.
I think if you’re having trouble finding a partner, definitely widen your criteria. If not, no reason to. The problem with online dating sites is people lie. So if you like tall guys but set your filter down to 5”9, you’ll get guys who are 5’6”, and I think men can attest that women do the same wrt weight. It’s just not the same as meeting someone out.
I say date whoever you’re attracted to, BUT don’t hypocritically pretend that it’s okay for you to filter out bigger women because they have a disease, but it’s not okay for women to filter out short men. A lot of women just don’t want a short man and that’s not any more wrong than men’s preferences for smaller women.
And also, if you’re not attracting who you want to attract, it’s you. You’re not entitled to something better, it’s just, this is what you can pull.
Also, not sure why people on here keep saying short men can have an attractive face. No kidding, so can overweight people. That doesn’t mean we find them attractive. You do or you don’t.
I don’t disagree with you at all, Kate. I still think people should try to be open and less harsh, but reality is reality. So yeah, people- date who you are attracted to. And don’t be a hypocrite like Jim. Also, I mentioned my bf still being attractive because I realized I was painting him in less than physically flattering light, and he deserves better.
Yeah sure, guess what everyone, it’s fine to be fat or short, you’re still gonna be dateable. If you’re fat AND short AND have poor hygiene AND have developmental disabilities or some kind of neurodiversity, you’re going to struggle (thinking of my brother, who has never dated), but most people have an audience.
Also: a third of US women (men too) were obese as of 2010. Obese, not overweight. Probably half of men are 5’9” and under. Are all these people single? No way, probably most of them are in relationships. But of course height, weight, and age are impediments online. That’s life.
At any rate — we normalized being fat and — surprise, surprise… everybody is.
Oh who cares?
If you aren’t attracted to people that are overweight, don’t date them.
If people that are overweight find they have less dating options, well such is life.
Beyond that who cares? Why such massive contempt. Not your body by your problem.
I’m see there will be the push back of “it’s a public health issue yerdie yerdie yerdie”, but a) the science on this is decidedly nuanced, and b) we all do things to ourselves that aren’t in our own best interst.
Dear “not a chubby chaser”
It is wrong to refer to these women as chubby and you should fall for someone who you feel makes you happy. Unfortunately you can’t do this via a dating app because it is for PERFECT people who have NO knocks and bruises in life. They have had everything to them on a platter and are there for beautiful.
That being said…
I have read Wendy’s reply and I am sickened, disgusted, embarrassed and deeply deeply offended. As someone who is meant to be here for positive support and guidance, all I saw we revolting body shaming and finger pointing. I am GENUINELY 5ft7 and NO I am not posing as one to hide the fact I’m smaller. I have always found it funny that people get so so upset about people saying “I’m not into fat girls” yet it is WIDELY socially acceptable to say “You’ve got to be at least 6ft to date me”. It makes me laugh because those fat girls are fat for a reason and 9 times out of 10 they can LOSE that fat by going to the gym. Someone who is 5ft5/6/7 or ever smaller are BORN that way and they cannot change the way they look no matter how many times they go to the gym. They’re stuck receiving thousands and thousands of comments of abuse and it quite OFTEN leads to suicide.
So my point is – don’t listen to “Wendy” woman because she is a raging cunt who clearly gets a thrill out of lashing out on men. Instead, learn from your mistakes and your comments surrounding women of larger proportions and go for what YOU are attracted to. Don’t settle for anything less because you are a human being and deserve what you want in life. If they don’t want you, fuck them off. Because at the end of the day, you’ve got the knowledge that you are worth something and they are missing out on that.
Dear Wendy,
Fuck off.
Not everyone does deserve everything they want in life – even a white man, which I’m sure you are, isn’t entitled to have whatever he wants just because he wants it. You can call me a raging cunt all you want, but I don’t make the rules, dude. You aren’t going to appeal to a majority of women – and it’s not just because you’re short.
Ryan. What you and these other short angry guys aren’t getting is that it’s reality that short guys are just as unappealing as heavy women on dating sites. Sorry, but as angry as you wanna get about “short people are born that way” and “fat people can lose the weight,” the reality is always going to be that short men are less desirable than tall men and will have a harder time online dating. Nothing you say is going to change that. I know what I’m talking about: I used at least 3 dating sites in 2011-2012, met my husband on Match, am happily married, and I read everything I could get my hands on about online dating at the time to do it successfully. I was at somewhat of a disadvantage as a 36, 37 y/o woman who didn’t want kids, but i figured out how to use the system and make it work for me. Instead of whining, calling names, and yelling, you need to do the same thing. DEFINITELY no one wants an angry, woman-hating short guy (yes, 5’7” is short).
I read the article, thought wendy was way out of line. In my opinion Wendy and the other women in the article attacked him for being picky. he can wait for anything that he wants. whether or not he finds that is debatable. I was married for 15yrs, to a great woman that was just really stubborn. she was thick when I met her but short and only 135lbs. we had kids and she gained weight. I never shamed her and I was attracted to her. I have since been looking for different. personal preference can change. I am not obese i’m athletic build big arms, I am actually 5’9″ and don’t lie on my profile, and I checkmark all of the above. I agree with the guy who wrote the question. I am only getting likes from heavy women. I am funny, attractive, established, and successful. I think that women have gotten picky (i.e. “if your under 6’0″ don’t even message me”), and the internet has ruined their image of men just like it has ruined mens image of women. I deserve what I am looking for and I am going to go get it. no matter what a bunch of women online think of me. I don’t deserve to settle for something that I am not attracted to, and neither does he. Keep your chin up bro, you’ll find her.
I have a feeling you’ll be looking for a long time.
Lol. Nobody “deserves” a certain type of person. Nobody.
Definition of deserve: do something or have or show qualities worthy of (reward or punishment).
A person is not a prize to be won. It’s not like oh, you’re hot so I’m rewarding you with a model.
” I don’t deserve to settle for something that I am not attracted to” Please tell me you were just typing fast and accidentally wrote’ something’ instead of ‘someone’.
Nope. I’m pretty sure he thinks women are objects considering his other word choices.
I don’t think obese is a deformity, it is a choice for most, but it is a medical problem for some. I don’t think he is a bad person for wanting someone who fits his active lifestyle. It is something that a heavy woman would be interested in someone who is very active. Seems incongruous with their lifestyle?