I suspect you’re right about the core premise, but I’m not sure about the conclusions. What are the parameters and tradeoffs?
How strikingly hot are the men these women are holding eye contact with? Top 5%? Top 1%? How hot do you suppose you’ve got to be before you’re meeting women without spending much time on any of the other routes?
One obvious elephant: how much time should you spend becoming physically attractive if you’re not above average height?
One response is that becoming attractive sucks at least as much as any of the other time-sink approaches. The only difference is that being physically fit benefits you somewhat. I’m not sure carrying an amount of muscle mass that makes you top tier in physique is actually particularly helpful for health or energy, and it takes a lot of time.
Having the level of grooming and fashion to put you in top tier is less time consuming, but may carry a downside: you are now physically presenting as a bit of a ladies’ man, and that may have costs as men correctly recognize that you are out to take the women they’re interested in.
And I’m not sure any level of grooming makes you hot enough without being tall, jacked, or some combination of the other types of attractive.
Being moderately physically fit and well groomed benefits you in other ways and is probably worth the time; but it seems these won’t get you to top tier, perhaps unless you happen to be very tall.
So in all, I’m not sure you’re right that this is a time saver.
Two other routes seem equally efficient. One is being a positive pickup artist/skilled social butterfly. If you apply it equally to people you’re not wanting something from, it does not carry downsides, just upsides.
The second is one you don’t mention. That is being nice. Being exceptionally pleasant or helpful also has benefits in getting both sexual interest from women, though more as partnership, and friendship/goodwill from everyone.
And it probably bears mentioning that women are going to have different criteria for what they find attractive; particularly analytical women who’ve put some thought into what they actually want from a romantic or sexual encounter. And I think this extends to the physical domain; people have types that are probably imprints from past experiences.
Edit: another critical factor is population composition. If you’re in the bay area, you’re playing on hard mode.
So I would think that a variety of combinations of strategies could be maximally efficient for men with different preferences on how to spend their time.
One obvious elephant: how much time should you spend becoming physically attractive if you’re not above average height?
I’m between 5′3“ and 5′4”, so this is a very pertinent question for me. (For context, that’s around second percentile for male height in the US. Most women prefer men who are taller than them, and the average woman in the US is 5′5″. This is a pretty brutal constraint on top of my otherwise pretty solid dating fundamentals.)
That said, at least some women definitely find me physically attractive. I can tell because they’ve either told me so, or told me that they would have sex / are interested in having sex with me.
Those women have ever commented approvingly of my muscles (I’m notably muscular, with a lean build, when my shirt is off), my hairstyle, and my manner of dress. I think that all of those are secondary to my demeanor—socially confident and self-assured, emotionally attuned, fun / funny etc. But I think my appearance is totally a relevant factor, even despite being very short for a man.
I think that wearing clothes that fit you well, and finding a hairstyle that women think looks good on you, are cheap up front costs that often makes a big difference. If you have acne, I think solving that is also a big boost (though I didn’t have that problem and so don’t speak from personal experience). YMMV.
I’m not sure carrying an amount of muscle mass that makes you top tier in physique is actually particularly helpful for health or energy, and it takes a lot of time.
The amount of muscle that a very attractive male actors is not the amount of muscle that someone participating in a body building competition has. Those things that actually translate that actually make you physically more attractive to women probably do translate into more health and energy.
It’s just that getting more muscles than what you need to maximize physical attractiveness doesn’t give you more health and energy.
I don’t think this is right. Male actors sometimes report extreme amounts of exercise and dietary discomfort the achieve their “ideal” physiques. It’s not as bad as body builders, but it’s bad. They may have energy, but they spend a lot of time and emotional energy to get it. And they’re frequently reportedly taking steroids or similar muscle boosting substances.
There are male actors that want to play a role for which they need a lot of visible muscle and take steroids to achieve that. When they do that they aren’t optimizing for attractiveness to women. The question isn’t whether there are actors that report extreme amounts but whether there are actors that are seen as beauty ideals that aren’t.
I’m not sure carrying an amount of muscle mass that makes you top tier in physique is actually particularly helpful for health or energy, and it takes a lot of time.
It may be worth mentioning that short timelines gives most of the audience a comparative advantage in using steroids, i.e. the shorter your timelines, the less you care about long term health issues so that’s one way in which this audience should be more open to steroids than the general population that this sort of looksmaxxing advice is usually aimed at.
I suspect you’re right about the core premise, but I’m not sure about the conclusions. What are the parameters and tradeoffs?
How strikingly hot are the men these women are holding eye contact with? Top 5%? Top 1%? How hot do you suppose you’ve got to be before you’re meeting women without spending much time on any of the other routes?
One obvious elephant: how much time should you spend becoming physically attractive if you’re not above average height?
One response is that becoming attractive sucks at least as much as any of the other time-sink approaches. The only difference is that being physically fit benefits you somewhat. I’m not sure carrying an amount of muscle mass that makes you top tier in physique is actually particularly helpful for health or energy, and it takes a lot of time.
Having the level of grooming and fashion to put you in top tier is less time consuming, but may carry a downside: you are now physically presenting as a bit of a ladies’ man, and that may have costs as men correctly recognize that you are out to take the women they’re interested in.
And I’m not sure any level of grooming makes you hot enough without being tall, jacked, or some combination of the other types of attractive.
Being moderately physically fit and well groomed benefits you in other ways and is probably worth the time; but it seems these won’t get you to top tier, perhaps unless you happen to be very tall.
So in all, I’m not sure you’re right that this is a time saver.
Two other routes seem equally efficient. One is being a positive pickup artist/skilled social butterfly. If you apply it equally to people you’re not wanting something from, it does not carry downsides, just upsides.
The second is one you don’t mention. That is being nice. Being exceptionally pleasant or helpful also has benefits in getting both sexual interest from women, though more as partnership, and friendship/goodwill from everyone.
And it probably bears mentioning that women are going to have different criteria for what they find attractive; particularly analytical women who’ve put some thought into what they actually want from a romantic or sexual encounter. And I think this extends to the physical domain; people have types that are probably imprints from past experiences.
Edit: another critical factor is population composition. If you’re in the bay area, you’re playing on hard mode.
So I would think that a variety of combinations of strategies could be maximally efficient for men with different preferences on how to spend their time.
I’m between 5′3“ and 5′4”, so this is a very pertinent question for me. (For context, that’s around second percentile for male height in the US. Most women prefer men who are taller than them, and the average woman in the US is 5′5″. This is a pretty brutal constraint on top of my otherwise pretty solid dating fundamentals.)
That said, at least some women definitely find me physically attractive. I can tell because they’ve either told me so, or told me that they would have sex / are interested in having sex with me.
Those women have ever commented approvingly of my muscles (I’m notably muscular, with a lean build, when my shirt is off), my hairstyle, and my manner of dress. I think that all of those are secondary to my demeanor—socially confident and self-assured, emotionally attuned, fun / funny etc. But I think my appearance is totally a relevant factor, even despite being very short for a man.
I think that wearing clothes that fit you well, and finding a hairstyle that women think looks good on you, are cheap up front costs that often makes a big difference. If you have acne, I think solving that is also a big boost (though I didn’t have that problem and so don’t speak from personal experience). YMMV.
The amount of muscle that a very attractive male actors is not the amount of muscle that someone participating in a body building competition has. Those things that actually translate that actually make you physically more attractive to women probably do translate into more health and energy.
It’s just that getting more muscles than what you need to maximize physical attractiveness doesn’t give you more health and energy.
I don’t think this is right. Male actors sometimes report extreme amounts of exercise and dietary discomfort the achieve their “ideal” physiques. It’s not as bad as body builders, but it’s bad. They may have energy, but they spend a lot of time and emotional energy to get it. And they’re frequently reportedly taking steroids or similar muscle boosting substances.
The bar has been raised.
There are male actors that want to play a role for which they need a lot of visible muscle and take steroids to achieve that. When they do that they aren’t optimizing for attractiveness to women. The question isn’t whether there are actors that report extreme amounts but whether there are actors that are seen as beauty ideals that aren’t.
It may be worth mentioning that short timelines gives most of the audience a comparative advantage in using steroids, i.e. the shorter your timelines, the less you care about long term health issues so that’s one way in which this audience should be more open to steroids than the general population that this sort of looksmaxxing advice is usually aimed at.