Path: utzoo!attcan!uunet!decwrl!wuarchive!usc!orion.oac.uci.edu!ucivax!gateway
From: uunet!mailrus!sharkey!hela!iti.org!dhw@ncar.ucar.EDU ("David H. West")
Newsgroups: soc.feminism
Subject: Re: Diversity
Message-ID: <1990Oct26.204736.17577@iti.org>
Date: 26 Oct 90 23:34:53 GMT
References: <1990Oct26.170150.9341@nntp-server.caltech.edu>
Organization: The Forgotten Legions of ... um ... er ...
Lines: 23
Approved: tittle@ics.uci.edu
Nntp-Posting-Host: zola.ics.uci.edu

In article <1990Oct26.170150.9341@nntp-server.caltech.edu> morphy@truebalt.cco.caltech.EDU (Jones Maxime Murphy) writes:
>[...] In my native Caribbean and in Latin America, I
>find men much more open-minded about what's "attractive" in female
>bodies. [...]

This idea (that perceived attractiveness should respond to voluntary
effort of the perceiver, who should find this straightforward to do)
seems very tenacious amongst women who particpate in gender-issues
discussion.

I (and I expect many if not most men) find it baffling because the
perceived attractiveness of a MOTAS seems an immediate, almost "given"
reaction, opaque to rational thought in the short or medium term as
does, for example the perceived "pleasant-tastingness" of a food.  I
can decide that I don't really want the consequences of eating
something that may taste good, or that I do want the consequences of
eating something that may taste bad, but that doesn't change the
perceived taste itself.

Of course, both these kinds of perception are known to change in the
long term, but scarcely voluntarily.

-David West          dhw@iti.org