Letters to the Editor
JackSparx
Published Letters: 421 Editor's Choice: 16
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Yes, but.
[Read the article: Are women biologically drawn to older men?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Older men-younger women pairing doesn't just exist among suburban finches. Just the opposite, actually. I'm not sure if there are many cultures where it is not the case.
In much of the world, women don't choose their marriage partners. But, neither do men. But let's qualify that a bit--even in a culture with arranged marriages, like India, there are often elements of negotiated choice within the structure. Ask your Indian friends. Also watch some Bollywood--love choice is both celebrated and seen as destructive, but certainly isn't denied.
And even in America with individualistic choice, we constrain ourselves in many ways to cultural expectations. My only exception to what you write is that you seem to argue that it is ONLY men who constrain themselves to "pathological" behaviors. My point is that with women looking for older men, and men looking for younger women, there is a mutually supportive dynamic (pathological or not).
But, I also notice, as you do, that men may look for much younger women (50 year old man looking for 20 year olds) while most 20 year old women would likely draw the age line lower. On the other-other hand, I see lower class women who desire upper class men (a lawyer or a doctor), while successful women will openly disdain going out with less successful men. There are dozens of "where are the good men" opinion pieces where the writer means "where are the men more successful than I am."
I do think there is a biological basis, but I think culture exaggerates and simplifies people's desires. It's like your example of big boobs. Yes heterosexual men love boobs. Bigger objects get noticed more than smaller ones in a crowded marketplace (ugh, sorry for that in advance) but if you really talk frankly with men about their desires, you'll find them more nuanced than you, or at least Playboy, credits them with having.
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Yes, but.
[Read the article: Are women biologically drawn to older men?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]Older men-younger women pairing doesn't just exist among suburban finches. Just the opposite, actually. I'm not sure if there are many cultures where it is not the case.
In much of the world, women don't choose their marriage partners. But, neither do men. But let's qualify that a bit--even in a culture with arranged marriages, like India, there are often elements of negotiated choice within the structure. Ask your Indian friends. Also watch some Bollywood--love choice is both celebrated and seen as destructive, but certainly isn't denied.
And even in America with individualistic choice, we constrain ourselves in many ways to cultural expectations. My only exception to what you write is that you seem to argue that it is ONLY men who constrain themselves to "pathological" behaviors. My point is that with women looking for older men, and men looking for younger women, there is a mutually supportive dynamic (pathological or not).
But, I also notice, as you do, that men may look for much younger women (50 year old man looking for 20 year olds) while most 20 year old women would likely draw the age line lower. On the other-other hand, I see lower class women who desire upper class men (a lawyer or a doctor), while successful women will openly disdain going out with less successful men. There are dozens of "where are the good men" opinion pieces where the writer means "where are the men more successful than I am."
I do think there is a biological basis, but I think culture exaggerates and simplifies people's desires. It's like your example of big boobs. Yes heterosexual men love boobs. Bigger objects get noticed more than smaller ones in a crowded marketplace (ugh, sorry for that in advance) but if you really talk frankly with men about their desires, you'll find them more nuanced than you, or at least Playboy, credits them with having.
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Sorry for the duplicate post
[Read the article: Are women biologically drawn to older men?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]And that was @Tina
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How do older men get in younger women's genes?
[Read the article: Are women biologically drawn to older men?]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]If it's not a biological urge, than how come it works out so often (almost exclusively) that men are older than their marriage partners across cultures? Why do the same patterns evolve over and over?
If the pattern is simply a matter of culture, for example patriarchal cultural traditions, why do individuals and subcultures self-consciously opposed to patriarchy continue the pattern? Why does the pattern continue, even when women are free to choose?
I don't think those questions are reductionist, just obvious. If it's not biology then what? If it's cultural, how so?
I don't think there's an "old man" gene. But there do seem to be traits that have the same sort of catnip allure for women that Jessica Alba in snorkeling attire has for men.
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I know it's wrong
[Read the article: Femininity vs. hipster coolness]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]But for once I agree with W.E.S. Tomboys are hot. Though, I'd prefer my women in patched carhardts than $200 jeans.
I also find the video talking heads distracting. Clark-Flory looks kinda like one of my ex g/f's so I'm wondering if I should give the ex a call rather than about what C-F is saying.
But that's always true about people on video. I can't look at Tim Russert and not think "Mr. Potato Head!"
If Salon is going to use videos, it would make sense to me to use them the way Greenwald uses them, to show other people. Or show what you're talking about. Like, show some of those urbane tomboy women.
They're hot!
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Moving beyond Hillary Clinton
[Read the article: Moving beyond Obama and race]
[Read more letters about this article: Here]The nomination train is finally leaving the station and Walsh is obviously, and rather pathetically, starting to jog down the platform after it. Her search for a white female victim in Obama's words is of course an absurd retelling of the story of racism with white women as victims. But for someone as self-deluding as Walsh, that story will be her ticket on the Obama Express to Denver.
"But Hillary try to understand, Obama needs white feminists like me to close the racial divide."