The Typical Man Disgusts the Typical Woman
How accepting this ugly truth can make us feel better about each other
Ever seen this famous OkCupid graph? The quick summary is just: “Men rate women more highly than women rate men.”
But the quick summary is quite an understatement!
Men don’t just find women more attractive; men’s ratings closely follow a bell curve, with 6% of women getting the minimum rating and 6% getting the maximum rating.
Women don’t just find men less attractive; the median and mode rating is 2 out of 7. Even more strikingly, the second most-common rating is 1 out of 7 — and near-zero men in the sample received 7 out of 7. (Over the years, by the way, I’ve repeatedly said “exactly zero,” but if you look close at the original post archived by Gwern, that’s not quite true).
The OkCupid results are far from unique. But the graphs are stark enough to inspire mutual anger. Common angry male reactions include: “Women have absurdly unrealistic standards” as well as “Women are just cruel.” Common angry female responses include: “It’s not our fault that most men suck” and “Why should I settle?”
But the only thing less constructive than anger is mutual anger. The data reveal an ugly truth that we all need to face. While there are several ways to capture this ugly truth, my favorite is just: The typical man disgusts the typical woman. You can expand this to: The median man moderately disgusts the typical woman, and the bottom quarter of men strongly disgust the typical woman.
The good news: Once we all accept these ugly truths, we can replace fruitless anger with mutual understanding and empathy. To start:
Men should stop taking rejection so personally. When the typical women rejects you, the problem isn’t so much that she finds you unappealing. The problem is that the typical woman finds almost all men unappealing. You can’t reasonably say, “I have a job, I combed my hair, and asked nicely. What more does she want?” It really is like trying to get on a Minor League baseball team because you can throw a ball and swing a bat. Protesting, “It’s just the Minor Leagues!” is childish. While they’re not the best in the world, they’re still really good.
Women should stop taking unwanted advances so personally. When the typical man pesters you, the problem isn’t so much that he refuses to see that you’re out of his league. The problem is that almost all women think they’re out of his league. The typical suitor doesn’t want to make you uncomfortable, much less scare you. He’s just lonely and is doing his best to win you over. “His best isn’t good enough”? Fine, but you can still let him down gently. When firms reject job applicants, they usually don’t ghost them, much less send an email saying, “You’re pathetic.” They try a little tact, starting with: “Unfortunately, no suitable position is currently available.”
Men should try harder to be less disgusting. Yes, most men start with the odds stacked against them. But instead of thinking, “It’s hopeless, so why bother?,” focus on, “It will work out eventually, so why not try to make it happen sooner?” Clothes, hygiene, table manners, and diction are all places to start.
Women should try harder to be less disgusted. Most women eventually accept a guy who isn’t visibly attractive. Much of the reason is that superficially unappealing guys win them over with charm, humor, and devotion. So instead of crinkling your nose in physical disgust, it pays to be on the look-out for the winning psychological traits of charm, humor, and devotion.
Evolution can at times seem like a cruel joke. It’s not hard to use evolutionary psychology to explain why the typical man disgusts the typical woman: Since women’s maximum reproductive capacity is strictly limited, they’re evolved to be hypergamous, with a strong preference for mating with the best of the best.
Yet it’s absurd to take evolution’s joke personally. “Evolution” is not a conscious actor, but a mindless, impersonal process. Humanity’s response is to listen to the joke with an open mind and an open heart. You probably couldn’t radically change what you find attractive even if you tried. But you can nudge yourself in better directions at the margin, and train yourself to remember that the Kantian generalization of “I’m only human” is “We’re all only human.”
Update: Stefan Schubert points out that the OKCupid estimates of the male-female gap are unusually extreme. Emil Kirkegaard agrees after thoroughly reviewing a wide range of measures. True enough, but we should trust the OKCupid data more. The big advantage of the dating website rankings is that they greatly reduce Social Desirability Bias by getting both men and women in a “What do you REALLY think?” frame of mind.
"When firms reject job applicants, they usually don’t ghost them" Actually, this isn't true, I've applied to hundreds of jobs and they almost always ghost.
For my sister-in-law, her rating of men was 99% least attractive, 0.99% acceptably attractive and 0.01% most attractive. Most attractive being certain especially talented performers who don't know she exists. When my sister-in-law was in her 20s she would have dates with some of the 0.99%, but these men were never that interested in her.
The crazy thing is that the negative vibes my sister-in-law had about the 99% of men she found unattractive oozed from her persona. All the more crazier as my sister-in-law was not gifted with the looks to be in a position of being picky about men, but she absolutely was! And so it is that she has never married.
Fortunately, my wife was less picky and somehow I got her to fall for me.