Are black women generally less attractive then white women?

In My Humble Opinion
201

I don’t think it is all that simple.

ISTM that, at least in the US, white women are more attractive than black women, not because of anything inherent in blacks or whites, but for a variety of other reasons. White women are more prominent in the mass media, which is consumed by blacks and whites alike. Black women tend to be overweight more often than white women (it shouldn’t be necessary, but to forestall the inevitable), and obesity is not generally as sexually attractive as normal weight).

Another factor is that white women are higher status social partners than black women. In some circles, it is a mark of distinction for a black man to date a white woman in a way that dating a black woman is not.

Claude Brown wrote an autobiography back in the 60s called Manchild in the Promised Land, in which he describes his growing up in Harlem. As he grows up, he begins to withdraw from ‘gang culture’ of the period and begins to identify with a sort of beatnik, Bohemian, jazz subculture. He begins to play jazz piano and gets an apartment in Greenwich Village and so on, and also begins to date a white woman. And one of his friends comments that Brown is now fully part of this new subculture, because he has a white girlfriend. And Brown is taken aback by the realization that the new subculture that are just as stereotyped as the culture he is trying to leave.

Dating white women can also be a way of reacting against white prejudice by living up to the “Bad N*gger” stereotype - the sort of Cleavon Brown “Where da white women at?” thing that can be played for laughs now. Jack Johnson, the first black heavyweight champion, did this a lot, marrying white women, and eventually getting busted for transporting white women across state lines.

De gustibus non disputatndum est, but there are social factors that come into play even in matters of personal taste.

Regards,
Shodan

202

So, someone in the 1960s experienced stereotyping, and a lot of people are racists. Yes, not news. Doesn’t change the fact that black women are not inherently less attractive than white women.

203

Your post does not contain much evidence of your actually having read what I wrote.

Oh well.

Regards,
Shodan

204

This thread really belongs in IMHO. I mean, it’s a matter of personal taste, isn’t it?

For my part I can find black women beautiful without finding them attractive. And I don’t, be they never such beauties, not even if they clearly have more white blood than black; I don’t think I could get it up for Halle Berry. It’s not the color, I can find myself attracted to, say, very dark-skinned East Indian women; but not African-derived negroes. I’m just turned off by the physiognomy or something, I don’t know. I can still appreciate their beauty in esthetic terms – it’s like, I’m a straight guy, Matt Damon is beautiful but I don’t want to fuck him. St. Peter’s Basilica is beautiful, etc.

Actually I would do the Basilica . . . and have . . . :o

205

“Black women tend to be overweight more often than white women (it shouldn’t be necessary, but to forestall the inevitable), and obesity is not generally as sexually attractive as normal weight).”

And this is why every brother loves a white girl with a big, fat ass?

I see plenty of black guy/white girl couples that look like the number 10 standing next to each other.

c’mon SHODAN.

206

???

cafe au lait has an accent in it but we nitpickers usually ignore ommissions of accent marks.

207

I think you might be overlooking some factors here.

One factor is that black women are more likely to be obese. Therefore, to the extent that exposure affects what a given person finds attractive, it is going to be somewhat more likely that a black person surrounded by obese women since childhood is going to be attracted more to a larger woman than someone without that experience.

There may be another factor in play here. Overweight women are, as mentioned, less in demand as social partners. However, obese white women have an advantage over obese black women in that they retain the social advantage of being white. The pool of potential partners for obese white women may be decreased by those men who don’t want overweight, but it retains black men who want the social prestige of dating a white woman, and who are willing to overlook obesity.

A crude overstatement of the factor would be that perhaps a black man will settle for a fat girl, providing she’s white, and a fat girl will settle for a man, even if he is black.

No cites or hard data on any of this, but I would not be surprised if it happens this way sometimes.

Regards,
Shodan

208

So black guys are choosing partners on the basis of status?
This seems odd given that we rarely consider status to be a significant factor in a man’s choice of partner.

I think all these ad hoc explanations of why group A does or does not go for group B are on shaky ground.

But I will say that attraction is about more than just raw looks. I like T&A as much as the next man, yet I’ll completely overlook women that are dressed too “street” or are outside my age range, say.

209

Don’t know why I said T&A here; I actually just meant physical beauty in general.

Erm, and personality. :slight_smile:

210

Are black women generally less attractive then white women?
The question is similar to asking is a chocolate ice cream cone prettier than a vannila one.
It’s all personal taste.

Just to throw my opinion out there, I like to lick and taste both :slight_smile:

211

It doesn’t seem that way to me - haven’t you ever heard the term “trophy wife”?

And it is hardly just black guys - everybody chooses their partners at least in part based on their social status.

According the the US Census Bureau, of the roughly 300K inter-racial marriages in the US, about two thirds are made up of a black man and a white woman. (Cite.) I expect there is a reason why the proportion is not closer to 50-50.

Regards,
Shodan

212

But a trophy wife is about proving to yourself and others that you can bag a physically desirable woman e.g. a rich, successful woman is not a trophy wife…unless she’s also hot.
Which puts us full circle…
Because if black guys date white women as “trophy girlfriends”, the implication is that they are considered more desirable.

For men it’s quite low on the list though.
We don’t want to date someone who we’d be embarrassed to be seen with…and that’s about the limit of how much guys care.

And even then, hotness trumps that concern.

213

Yes, white women are considered more desirable, for both black and white men. In that sense,white women are more attractive than black women.

And being white tends more to cause a woman to be classed as having “hotness”. All other things being equal.

Regards,
Shodan

214

Uhm, no. While it is true that my brothers and cousins had their noses wide open as teenagers for a chance to fuck a particular, willing white girl, she was a dog by any standards and they freely admitted it. They just panting after her just because they wanted the opportunity to say they fucked a white girl, not because she was particularly hot.

215

Kanye West & Muhammed Ali both considered that black women with some mixed ancestry tended to be better looking. What does he think about Iman?

216

Moderator note
Klaatu:

I haven’t read all 200+ posts in this loose zombie thread yet. But from what I have read so far: this is nothing more or less than a conversation which, considering the potential sensitivity of the topic, has gone along in a peaceable and restrained manner. We’ve had people of at least two races, and both genders giving reasoned responses. It’s possible that if nobody has seen through the “racist bullshit” yet, then maybe it wasn’t there to begin with.

Meanwhile, it is a violation of the rules to call the OP a racist asshole in this forum. Don’t do this again.

For the Straight Dope

Spectre of Pithecanthropus

217

Get trapped on a desert island with Hallie Berry and Rosanne Barr , what are you going to do?

218

Kill and eat them both?

219

Uhm, yes.

Even though she was a dog, she was white, and therefore “attractive” in a way that a black girl who was equally a dog could not be.

The fact that she was white made her more attractive than a black woman of equal un-attractiveness.

Regards,
Shodan

220

I find the issue of proposing whether one race is more attractive than another to be a poor way of framing such an issue. Obviously, this should only be relevant if you believe in an objective standard of beauty- which obviously exists. They may be broad, but to deny any objective standard of beauty when applied to humans is basically saying that women who look like men, or people with severe deformities, or those with barely any face left, will be considered the standard of beauty by the general population somewhere.

Note I say this only in relation to denying any- I imagine most people here would admit those are extreme cases, but are you saying that standards of beauty among humans are that broad?

For starters: Beauty: Culture-Specific or Universally Defined? | Psychology Today

While a bit crude in some of its wordings, this is a pretty good summation of aspects of this issue. I should also note that the case of lip plates and neck stretching could be examples of exagerated sexual dimorphism, in that women have longer necks and fuller lips. Exagerations of sexual dimorphism are used in humans all the time- eyelash extensions, breast implants, corsets etc.

Though I’m skeptical of the idea of the WHR of 0.7 being universally preferred as well.

So a better way of framing this could also be- for whatever objective standards of beauty exist, how much of a certain population’s ethnic features would be excluded from it? How exactly should an ethnic feature be defined? Is it fair to say a population’s current general looks should be classified as out and out ethnic features?

This applies to all human populations. My answers to these questions would be complicated and lengthy, so I’ll refrain from going too much into them. I’ll leave it at this, though- I don’t really think any race is all around more attractive than another.

Also, I find it pretty stupid to implicate traits relating to body weight, muscularity, or other below the neck features in objective judgements of a population’s beauty- I mean, those traits can change very quickly in a population. The same applies for things affecting the skin.

On another note, I’m a white male who finds white women to be overrated as hell.