I attended a group discussion recently about beauty and image. The session was for gay men of all ages, however the majority of attendants were between 20- 35. A series of 6 questions were asked all focusing on the concepts of inner and outer beauty. The responses were shocking to say the least. Turns out that inner beauty is no longer an attractive trait. Most of the guys preferred to date someone who was physically attractive with no inner beauty than to date someone who was ‘ordinary’ looking with a beautiful inner personality… Superficial much??

I’ll be honest. Physical attraction is important. But it’s not the only form of attraction. You can be attracted to someone’s intellect, their wit and charm or just their overall personality- whatever it may be. Touching further on the physical side of things, the participants also mentioned race as determinant of physical attraction. Of course with that came the stereo types- Asian men have small dicks, white men are loaded with cash, black men are only good for one thing etc etc.

Another item on the beauty checklist was power. This is were things got interesting. Majority of the guys said that power is attractive. Even if the person in power wasn’t. Even if the person in power went against all prior items on their checklist, they would still date him. Is it then safe to say that beauty attracts power and power attracts beauty? I don’t know.. I’m confused. Or maybe  just naive.

Beauty is in the eye of the beholder. Nothing’s wrong with what the participants said. It’s their preference. And preferences can change with maturity. My only concern is that physical beauty is temporary. It fades with time. So maybe we shouldn’t put so much weight on physical beauty and look deeper.