Saturday, August 4, 2007

O Beauteous Desire

Spanish male with beautiful eyesStudies show people have an innate sense of what is a beautiful face. This has been shown with babies (before they may be culturally programmed) and also adults across the globe. There are some faces that people naturally and near universally regard as fitting the definition of "beauty".

Although a face may be described as beautiful, it is not a measurement of the characteristics of the face. While its symmetry can be determined, its length and width measured, the relative proportion of its features calculated, these facts do not equate directly to a level of beauty. The measurement of beauty is the measurement of the reaction of the observer to the subject. Beauty is not a physical characteristic. It is the pleasant feeling that it evokes in the observer.

Swedish man at Stockholm gay prideIf you are out man hunting, you would of course like to cause all kinds of pleasant feelings to occur in the men that see you go by. Now, assuming you don't work the runway as a professional model, you should consider a more important concept that comes into play. The idea is attractiveness, and I mean literally the desire of someone to draw a lot closer to you.

Being attractive to someone is being "their type". While beauty may be a constant, attractiveness is variable. Humans are wonderfully diverse and for almost everyone there's a set of people that get hot and bothered (or at least nicely tepid) when they see them. Of course for some people their set of potential admirers is quite large and for them going cruising is like shooting fish in a barrel. For everybody else it can feel like a crap shoot to find your match. It's akin to finding another gay guy in a sea of straights.

Brazilian manYou may have heard about electronic devices that are programmed to know your traits and the traits you are looking for and alerts you when someone with a similar device that matches your criteria is nearby. I would like to see a sensor that sticks to your groin and causes a signal device around your neck to flash when you have a reaction to someone you're watching. It would make it easier for people to find others whose type they really are.

No matter what difficulties you may have found, remember that once you get below the level of beautiful, it's all about people matching on types, not meeting certain standards on looks. For me, I always tell my friends that someone who I am not attracted to is "not my type." I don't like to use the term "ugly" when referring to people, especially if it concerns traits that are not within their control. I think it would be better to say a person is "beautifully-challenged".

People who are not in the upper echelons of perceived beauty have the great balancer, which is never having to fear or experience losing it. The aged ex-pretty boys disappear or now sit at the far corner of the bar glumly reminiscing about their moment of glory. Everyone else carries on with little impact on their prowling prowess. I think a great shirt for people to wear as they get older would boast "I haven't lost it. I Never Had It!"

photo "Impasse" by Lisandro Moises. Some rights reserved.
photo by Charles Roffey. Some rights reserved.
photo "Giorgio in São Paulo" by Thomas Hobbs. Some rights reserved.


shirtless Gabe from Corbin Fisher
P.S. What's up with all the interest in Gabe from Corbin Fisher? When he's cleaned up in publicity preview shots he looks pretty good, but his nude performance in sex video scenes is not so hot.

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