Women Are Getting More Beautiful (より美しく)

Haha, wow, I've never thought about it that way before ^^. You're right, in nature it's usually the male animals that are brightly colored, etc, to attract females. I wonder why humans are different, haha.

It's a very interesting way of thinking !
I agree with you.
I'm looking forward to reading your blog.
You are not only cute but also clever.
How I envy you!（笑）

It's interesting and a good observation, I think :D
I think it's really unfair that in the human world, women are so much more beautiful than men...
that's also why I have really high standards for men... i think they should try a little harder to be beautiful ^^;

I totally agree with what you've said!

I wish men would start dolling themselves up more and stop all that apathy towards their appearances. I doubt they've changed much at all in the last 10000 years. ^_^

Pretty boys are attractive, but they're few and far between. =D

I agree! ^0^ It's all quite strange! That is why I am like melinchki, I think; I have high standards for the beauty of men ^0^ Maybe if women everywhere start expecting more, men will have no choice but to work harder!

Wow! I just happen to be learning about behavioral ecology right now. Like you said, female choice drives males to become as beautiful as possible in the peacock species, but it's male choice that drives females to become beautiful in our society. It's such a shame. Everyone should work hard to be beautiful, not just females! >___<

Quite an interesting topic!

Personally, I don't think it is that evolution has caused women to use make-up, because that would imply a physical, or genetic change, instead I believe it is social pressure that pressures women into using make-up. I believe it mainly about self-image ( how one views oneself versus prominent images in society, such as models) and it is about wanting to look the same as other people in their social network.

While I agree that is generally seems unnecessary, I don't believe there is a effective way to change the social norms.

I'm ashamed to hear that. NO p(>口<)q DO NOT mentions more! ,haha.

Well I think monogamy make male lazy. Since observing wild lives, polygamy seems to be popular. At that case, only the strongest or most attractive male can create the next generation as you mentioned what peacocks and lions do. But humans prefer monogamy. That means even though men who are near by the bottom, they have a chance to get their partner, haha. Which would you like? To share the attractive man with many other women, or bet all your money on a SINGLE man. ;-p

Honestly speaking, I'm so sorry for my wife that I am not being attractive... m(__)mgomen

I agree. Men don't try hard enough! I think men should try to please their partner even after they get married! Hey men, don't you know, women can lose sexual interest too?!

I want to stay attractive for my boyfriend, and I want him to do the same for me. I keep pestering him to do so, haha! I say "If you don't do it, I'll stop exercising or wearing makeup!" lol. So he has started working out a bit, yay.

However, I don't think it is an evolutionary thing. Maybe that was the original reason behind the behavior and that trend has just continued, but a lot of couples these days don't want to have kids. I know I don't!

私は男の人だけど、穴居人みたいじゃないできれいです。wwww

In the natural world, attractive qualities such as rich and beautifully coloured plumage, fur, etc. are often directly related to fitness. Believe it or not, producing these colours takes more energy. Similarly, an elaborate mating dance or an impressive cry/chirp/call etc. is a way of proving to the female that the male has a lot of strength, dexterity, intelligence and energy. Females select the most fit partner to reproduce with so that their offspring are going to have more 'fitness' and be the best that they can be. The brain of female animals are hardwired to this end and as a result, through the generations, stronger and fitter versions of the animal appear. This is the basic theory of sexual selection which is one of the keystone theories in Darwinian evolution theory.

For humans, sexual selection is thrown out the window. It's not to say that the desire for stronger looking mates doesn't happen, it certainly does, afterall are you attracted to a 'fit' looking person or a slob? We survive in a much more sophisticated way with availability of medicines, lack of natural enemies (top of the food chain), heightened ability to deal with extremes in weather etc. The survival advantage that physically fitter humans have are greatly diluted. We do not need to rely on physical prowess to survive. Humans prosper based on intellectual smarts and people with bad genes/health etc. do not die out due to the harsh natural world, rather they can survive with smart medicine, remedies etcetera and have just as much chance to reproduce and prosper in our world.

The reason that the tables have turned to women making themselves attractive for the men to chose them may be too difficult to find an answer for (Maybe a short course in anthropolgy would get you some answers for this though!) Humans function in a more complex manner as we have acquired the ability of speech and from this we have vocalised our ideals/standards etc. From this we have constructed artificial notions of social ideology, pressures and 'norms'. These norms currently dictate (somewhat) that it is standard procedure for girls to go to more elaborate (beautifying?) measures to appeal to men. However, the really interesting question is, where does most of this pressure come from? Is it mostly from other females or from men? I think there is a lot of pressure from other females to conform to some standards, thus affecting an individual's own body image, and subsequently, the measures that one might take to beautify themselves.

There are some ideas for a much larger debate. Hopefully some are of interest.

Maybe it just varies depending on what social scene you are in. . . in general it seems that women pay more attention to looks than men, but I am not convinced that the gap is that huge. Men are plenty conscious of body image as well I think. In my circle there are plenty of men that spend a lot of time in front of the mirror. There has also been the so-called "Metrosexual" trend over the past couple of decades.

One difference, I think, is that it is socially acceptable for women to be openly concerned with body image, whereas with men, it is not. I mean - how would you feel if your boyfriend spent as much time in front of the mirror as you did? How would you like it if your boyfriend wore makeup? Its generally not seen as masculine or socially acceptable for a man to take it to this extent . . . traditionally, guys are expected to look rough and women fair . . .

This is an AWESOME entry! All the comments were great as well!

I don't know, living in Japan it seems like the men spend INCREDIBLE amounts of time getting "pretty". Half the men I see clearly spent more time/money on their hair/clothing than I do!

My corrections are pretty nit-picky, but I think you've earned that.

My thoughts are that humans have developed to the point that our ability to control and manipulate our environment has caused us to curb the effects of natural selection to the point where selective breeding (sounds pretty cold to use a term like that...) is no longer necessary in order to continue the longevity of our species. Things like mutations and birth defects are nowhere near as dangerous to the gene pool as they were in the past, and modern science makes it so that many children born with these sorts of abnormalities can go on to live mostly ordinary lives. At what point can we say that we've transcended the laws of nature?

Wow, that was pretty off-topic. Anyways, good job!

This is pretty interesting! I think it's because of course, women get attracted too. Attraction and that certain drive is present in both sexes. We're much more intelligent too, so attraction is not just based on how strong a male is.

You're entries are always interesting! They're thought-provoking too. I agree with one of the above comments there. Kyokoさんはかわいくて、頭がいい。
おそらく、ひきつけた男がいっぱいいます。

I'd say that both sexes are equally conscious of their hair, clothes and physique. Nowadays skincare products for men are big industry. Men have also gone through the pain of shaving daily for countless centuries! What else can you *naturally* do to improve your appearance?

All women have over men is the advantage of creating the illusion of beauty by wearing copious amounts of makeup. If they truly had evolved, L'Oreal and Revlon would be out of business. Let's not forget push-up bras, body shaping underwear, moustache bleach and the fact that women make up over 90% of cosmetic surgery patients either!

Men don't have the power to select women anymore. They only have the power to select a nice shade of foundation, rouge, eyeliner, eyeshadow, lipstick, mascara etc. They only find out who they've chosen in the morning!

My definition of beauty doesn't include a painted face, so I think men and women are more equal than they've ever been.

赤　：　添削
青　：　薦め

サンフランシスコへ来たら、美しいに成らせない女性を教えてあげる。（笑）

Thank you all for your convincing and provoking comments. ^^
I really appreciate all comments and I'm amazed by outstanding ideas.
I'd like to rebut or endorse them respectively, but I don't have time so much weekday.

Sorry and forgive me please. ^^

Hi,
Sorry for my latest comment, I wrote something stupid that's why I deleted my last comment.
Well I think, a man doesn't has to be 'beautiful', because he's not made for beeing beautiful. If you look at the evolution, the man had to protect the woman, he had to be strong and he had to take care of the family, things like these were atractive to a women. Today a woman can easily live without a man, so the women get other points of a man which are atractive...^^
So I think, a man should not be good looking, or try to make himself beautiful, he should be manly ( not a fat beer drinking man ).
For me personally, I prefer natural women => without makeup :-P
Natual things are great, yayy :D