This smacks of so much hubris. What you are doing is attempting to simplify and reduce a set of interactions that are so incredibly complex that you have no hope of understanding them in their entirety. Can you point out specific differences between the sexes? Of course. The problem lies in attempting to draw conclusions about complex systems (human behavior / interaction) that map neatly to simple concepts (how big are boobs?).
But, you asked me to define terms, so let's do just that.
Truth(1): Something that is verifiable, and by it's nature, falsifiable. If you cannot ever hope to disprove something, then you also cannot prove it.
Toxic: A pattern, substance, or behavior that has a deleterious effect on an organism. In this case, society as a whole.
and to define a term or two I think you might have gotten lost on:
Generalization: A set of conclusions obtained by inference from specific cases (e.g. I am not strong, and she doesn't like me, thus all women want strong men)
Average: A statistical measure equal to the sum of a set of scalar quantities divided by the number of said quantities (e.g. the average height of a male human is 5.7', whereas the average height of a female human is 5.2')
Nobody has all the answers when it comes to systems as complex as human cognition. If they did, there would be no point in things like markets, commerce, advertising, etc. Complex systems often display unintuitive behaviors. If you have women figured out so well, why don't you make a product they'll all buy? You'd be the richest man on earth! But, there's a problem - preferences are not a scalar quantity like height; they are far more complicated.
Something we can observe about people is that expectations can shape perception (2). Given this knowledge, one can quite easily infer that making unverified claims about the motivations of literally half of humanity is probably fairly dangerous - it has a high likelihood of shaping bad patterns out of thin air. Put more bluntly, it makes us all collectively dumber.
I do not have my head in the clouds, nor am I looking at the world with rose tinted glasses. I am merely pointing out that it is harmful to impose your (negative, uninformed, sexist, reductive) worldview on others, as we are all struggling enough to make the most of this difficult and confounding life we have without it.
What these studies show, is that given a set of pictures with faces removed, college age women will point to the pictures of guys who go to the gym when asked to say which one is more attractive to them.
Sure, I can get behind that. As a bisexual male, I also kind of get it. People who are in shape are sexier, duh.
Without even digging into the pitiful sample sizes (n=61, n=131) or the fact that these studies were conducted on an incredibly limited and not at all random subset of the population (college age, at one particular college). The conclusions this article comes to and the ones that you have come to are fundamentally different.
This paper is drawing conclusions about specific, visual sexual attractiveness, fixed for all other concerns - ceterus parabus, if you will. It assumes that all other things are equal.
The conclusions you have so quickly come to, are based on the assertion that all other things are equal. They are not. There is a complex system of other sociological cues and interpersonal relationships that signal whether you do or don't want to be with someone.
Think of all the other things you, as a male, might find sexy about someone. Are they into video games? Do they like the same music as you? Are they successful in business / art / a particular 'scene'? Are they smart? Are they bold? Are they funny?
What you have done, in essence, is to assume that women are simple, and easily understood. I would argue that this is patently ludicrous.
To add to that, even the preference identified in those studies is influenced by the specific societal context. Generalizing that to “women prefer fit men” is incorrect, because we know sexual preferences are heavily influenced by the societal context.
Wrong. A generalization can be correct in certain contexts. Take the below sentence:
In general, in the United States, women tend to prefer men who are fit.
The scientific papers I provided establish the generalization within that context.
When someone makes a general statement like saying men tend to be taller than women, that someone does so with the awareness that exceptions and alternative contexts exist because such exceptions and contexts are obvious. Obviously some women are really tall and obviously the context isn't some preselected population of women who are over 6 foot.
Another way to look at my point is that broad generalizations must originate from somewhere. They are often indicative of a population where the majority or major component posseses several or a single identical trait. It is absolutely insane to ignore generalities just as it is insane to declare them as absolute truths. That is my point.
That is the unfortunate reality of the world. Generalities, like stereotypes, illustrate an aspect of a truth. Social justice is important but one cannot change the world by eliminating a truth to mold the universe into a delusion that fits the perception of a social justice ideal.
I find your post delusional. Your conclusion is nowhere near anything I asserted.
I asserted a generalization that women tend to like men who are more fit and I asserted that generalizations apply to the universe. Something along the lines of: Not all women are shorter than men, but in general they are.
Then I used science to establish that generality. That's it. The conclusion of those papers never claimed women are easily understood and I never claimed it either.
The crazy thing is, you claimed to agree with me as "bisexual" man then proceeded to debate a point with an imaginary claim that was never made.
Perhaps you're not delusional and your arguments are tactics and lies used to manipulate a conversation in a direction of your choosing. If that is the case my conclusion is that you're a liar.
Tldr: You are arguing against claims that were never made.
But, you asked me to define terms, so let's do just that.
Truth(1): Something that is verifiable, and by it's nature, falsifiable. If you cannot ever hope to disprove something, then you also cannot prove it.
Toxic: A pattern, substance, or behavior that has a deleterious effect on an organism. In this case, society as a whole.
and to define a term or two I think you might have gotten lost on:
Generalization: A set of conclusions obtained by inference from specific cases (e.g. I am not strong, and she doesn't like me, thus all women want strong men)
Average: A statistical measure equal to the sum of a set of scalar quantities divided by the number of said quantities (e.g. the average height of a male human is 5.7', whereas the average height of a female human is 5.2')
Nobody has all the answers when it comes to systems as complex as human cognition. If they did, there would be no point in things like markets, commerce, advertising, etc. Complex systems often display unintuitive behaviors. If you have women figured out so well, why don't you make a product they'll all buy? You'd be the richest man on earth! But, there's a problem - preferences are not a scalar quantity like height; they are far more complicated.
Something we can observe about people is that expectations can shape perception (2). Given this knowledge, one can quite easily infer that making unverified claims about the motivations of literally half of humanity is probably fairly dangerous - it has a high likelihood of shaping bad patterns out of thin air. Put more bluntly, it makes us all collectively dumber.
I do not have my head in the clouds, nor am I looking at the world with rose tinted glasses. I am merely pointing out that it is harmful to impose your (negative, uninformed, sexist, reductive) worldview on others, as we are all struggling enough to make the most of this difficult and confounding life we have without it.
(1)https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:The_Truth
(2)https://news.mit.edu/2019/how-expectation-influences-percept...