# Do all men find the sight of pubescent girls tantalising? **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [October 21, 2016, 11:46am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232 "2016-10-21T11:46:18Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![Lola181](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/3be4f8/32.png) [@Lola181](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lola181)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 1:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/21 "2016-10-21T13:18:15Z")
Thanks for sharing! ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/22 "2016-10-21T14:04:51Z")
The context makes the guy’s comment a bit creepy, as they seem to imply that males universally view prepubescent girls as the most sexually desirable (despite differences in how cultures respond to aging in general). What is it about a prepubescent girl that screams hot? Most of them in my experience are pretty damn awkward and goofy looking, and are given to ridiculous clothing choices and ill-advised makeup techniques. But then again, I’m thinking of 13 year olds. Perhaps not what the guy in the OP was really thinking of? Which in that case I would need him to clarify what group of girls he’s referring to. I’ve never heard a 17, 18, or 19 year-old called “pubescent”, and yet it’s only older “girls” that I could see being collectively more attractive than the huge cohort that is “women”… and even that is too much of a stretch to take seriously. ---
**Author:** ![Peremensoe](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ce7236/32.png) [@Peremensoe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Peremensoe)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:17pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/23 "2016-10-21T14:17:23Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > … it’s only older “girls” that I could see being collectively more attractive than the huge cohort that is “women”… and even that is too much of a stretch to take seriously. And you notice he didn’t say that. To me it sounds like he was first acknowledging the OP’s impression that, yes, the French appreciate older women more–then adding that, you know, men still notice fresh young things, too. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/24 "2016-10-21T14:22:40Z")
> [@Two\_Many\_Cats](#): > > I wonder if male Dopers will come rushing into this thread to deny that they or their friends would EVER think this way. You know, like how they stampeded to their own defense in the “Women’s Groping Stories” thread. If not, I wonder why not? One thread was about personal observations, i.e. what we have witnessed our friends talking about. One thread is about what is in other people’s heads. See the difference? ---
**Author:** ![P-man](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/p-man/32/3606_2.png) [@P-man](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/P-man)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:26pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/25 "2016-10-21T14:26:51Z")
At some point in my early twenties something switched in my brain. A sixteen year old suddenly looked really young, but a late thirties or early forties woman looked really hot. It’s not that I wouldn’t notice a teenage girl in a skimpy swimsuit at the beach, but I find myself thinking “wow, I’m glad we have boys instead of girls.” I also hope the eyes of my teenage sons don’t bug so far out of their heads that they can’t be put back in. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:30pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/26 "2016-10-21T14:30:35Z")
> [@Peremensoe](#): > > And you notice he didn’t say that. To me it sounds like he was first acknowledging the OP’s impression that, yes, the French appreciate older women more–then adding that, you know, men still notice fresh young things, too. Yes, \*very fresh \* young things. And not just noticing them but finding them _tantalizing_. Because when boobs sprout on the kiddies, it does something to grown men. Ding goes their boners or something. I can practically hear the saliva lathering in the dude’s mouth. ::shudder:: Look, I don’t think it arguable that many men find youth attractive. That’s all he needed to say. But going on about being turned by girls just when they start developing breasts is taking things into dirty old man territory. I suggest any man reading this not take their conversations in this direction if they honestly want to be trusted about anyone’s pre-teens, because it’s reasonable to see red flags in it. ---
**Author:** ![gytalf2000](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/ac91a4/32.png) [@gytalf2000](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/gytalf2000)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/27 "2016-10-21T14:31:27Z")
> [@Machine\_Elf](#): > > And “think” is the wrong word to use here. It’s not a think, it’s a biological response. If a man is physically attracted to adult women, and a minor-age female exhibits all the visual features of an adult woman, then it stands to reason that he would find her physically attractive, even if years of good upbringing have conditioned him to cognitively label her off-limits (because she’s legally a minor and mentally still a child) and steer clear of her. Excellent point! ---
**Author:** ![Fuzzy\_Dunlop](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/848f3c/32.png) [@Fuzzy\_Dunlop](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Fuzzy_Dunlop)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/28 "2016-10-21T14:33:28Z")
> [@Lola181](#): > > He said yes, but when a girl enters puberty, the male brain goes ‘ding’, because in cave man days she would be ready to be mated. I was taken aback, and later rang him to clarify. He said, "I was just saying that seeing girls, in puberty, can be a little bit tantalising.’ Why don’t you ask him what ding means? I find it very hard to tell from context. Tantalizing, on the other hand, seems like a very creepy word choice. Pubescent girls haven’t tantalized me since middle school. As far as evaluating him as a potential partner, I’d say he either enjoys making provocative statements, which sounds annoying, or has horrible social instincts, which sounds almost as bad. In other words, whether it’s normal or not, it’s pretty fucking weird to tell your potential date that pubescent girls tantalize you. ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/29 "2016-10-21T14:51:53Z")
To be clear, I’m not telling the OP to dump the guy or anything. I can’t judge a guy based on one remark. She shouldn’t completely disregard her concerns about what he said, though. Men who often appeal to “biotruths”\* as a way of explaining their preferences and biases have issues with how they relate to women, in my experience. \*I saw this term of Reddit today and will be using it henceforth to describe any evolutionary psychology just-so-story BS theory used to excuse or explain human behavior that could just as easily be the excused or explained by pointing to the environment or an individual’s idiosyncracies. ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:54pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/30 "2016-10-21T14:54:44Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > But then again, I’m thinking of 13 year olds. Perhaps not what the guy in the OP was really thinking of? Which in that case I would need him to clarify what group of girls he’s referring to. I’ve never heard a 17, 18, or 19 year-old called “pubescent” Who knows what the OP actually refers to. Who would actually use a word like ‘pubescent’ in a casual conversation about sexual attraction, as is supposedly being related in OP? It’s a case where moving into media reporter mode just obscures what’s being talked about. Adult heterosexual males often find physically sexually mature teenage girls sexually attractive. And there is no moral dividing line at a particular age, in _finding them sexually attractive but keeping it, the specific instance, to yourself_. There is a bright line in the law about acting on such attraction, and a fuzzier but extant moral line which also depends on the man’s age not just the girl’s, and can expand from acting (as in starting a relationship) to letting on in any way about feeling the attraction. But if somebody is going to try to shame men because fathers at a HS girls soccer game are going to quietly in their own minds find some of the players (other than their daughters) sexually attractive, and try to get ‘enlightened’ men to say that’s ‘creepy’, what a bunch of BS, IMO. It’s human nature. ---
**Author:** ![Gary\_T](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/g/3ec8ea/32.png) [@Gary\_T](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gary_T)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/31 "2016-10-21T14:55:00Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > The context makes the guy’s comment a bit creepy, as they seem to imply that males universally view prepubescent girls as the most sexually desirable (despite differences in how cultures respond to aging in general). > > What is it about a prepubescent girl that screams hot? Why are you talking about prepubescent girls when the comments related in the OP, as well as the rest of this discussion, is clearly about those who are pubescent (i.e., having entered into puberty)? ---
**Author:** ![Two\_Many\_Cats](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/8dc957/32.png) [@Two\_Many\_Cats](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Two_Many_Cats)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 2:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/32 "2016-10-21T14:55:56Z")
> [@Loach](#): > > One thread was about personal observations, i.e. what we have witnessed our friends talking about. > > One thread is about what is in other people’s heads. > > See the difference? Well, the guy in question in this thread said that guys are geared this way because of their caveman ancestors, so I imagine that means every male including you and your friends. Or are you and your friends descended from Adam and Eve? ---
**Author:** ![panache45](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/panache45/32/64_2.png) [@panache45](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/panache45)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 3:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/33 "2016-10-21T15:16:58Z")
I, for one, have never been even slightly interested in a pre-pubescent, pubescent or post-pubescent girl. 😉 (The OP did ask about “all men”, didn’t she?) ---
**Author:** ![Turpentine](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/ecd19e/32.png) [@Turpentine](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Turpentine)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/34 "2016-10-21T15:29:52Z")
> [@you\_with\_the\_face](#): > > To be clear, I’m not telling the OP to dump the guy or anything. I can’t judge a guy based on one remark. She shouldn’t completely disregard her concerns about what he said, though. Men who often appeal to “biotruths”\* as a way of explaining their preferences and biases have issues with how they relate to women, in my experience. > > \*I saw this term of Reddit today and will be using it henceforth to describe any evolutionary psychology just-so-story BS theory used to excuse or explain human behavior that could just as easily be the excused or explained by pointing to the environment or an individual’s idiosyncracies. Thank you for the new term! I’ve seen people try to use “well, we’ve evolved to behave THIS way, so you can’t blame us for being creepy and lecherous…”- way too many times. I think people are confusing “pubescent” and “prepubescent” in this post because the official definition aside, when you hear “pubescent”, most people think of a girl who has only just entered puberty. Nobody uses that word when talking about a 28-year-old woman. And whether or not men are genetically geared to find very young pubescent girls to be hot, it doesn’t matter in the case of the OP. She said that the man who said this is a “potential partner”. If a 46-year-old man says these things to a 35-year old woman, or any woman really- when he’s trying to impress a potential partner, I wouldn’t give much hope that he’ll be anything but a creep if they actually start dating. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 3:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/35 "2016-10-21T15:38:36Z")
> [@Lola181](#): > > He said yes, but when a girl enters puberty, the male brain goes ‘ding’, because in cave man days she would be ready to be mated. Dunno about that bit about cavemen but my brain certainly went _ding_ when I started really noticing the opposite sex. Not exactly sure when this was but definitely after turning 19. Yes, I did get aroused by a pubescent girl. Once. In 1990. ---
**Author:** ![Loach](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/loach/32/350_2.png) [@Loach](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Loach)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 3:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/36 "2016-10-21T15:52:55Z")
> [@Two\_Many\_Cats](#): > > Well, the guy in question in this thread said that guys are geared this way because of their caveman ancestors, so I imagine that means every male including you and your friends. > > Or are you and your friends descended from Adam and Eve? I’m descended from whoever the hell Cain married. I think her name was Cheryl. Again, in the other thread I can authoritatively state what I have personally witnessed throughout my life. I possess no psychic ability so I don’t know what other people are thinking. Since there aren’t many psychics around here you aren’t seeing too many people rushing in to tell you what everyone thinks. In the other thread people were sharing their own personal experiences. ---
**Author:** ![Shodan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9f8e36/32.png) [@Shodan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shodan)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 3:57pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/37 "2016-10-21T15:57:56Z")
> [@Turpentine](#): > > And whether or not men are genetically geared to find very young pubescent girls to be hot, it doesn’t matter in the case of the OP. She said that the man who said this is a “potential partner”. If a 46-year-old man says these things to a 35-year old woman, or any woman really- when he’s trying to impress a potential partner, I wouldn’t give much hope that he’ll be anything but a creep if they actually start dating. For \*saying \*it, or for \*thinking \*it? Because > [@Larry Miller](#): > > If women knew a tenth of what was in men’s heads, they would _never_ stop slapping us. Regards, Shodan ---
**Author:** ![you\_with\_the\_face](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/y/ecccb3/32.png) [@you\_with\_the\_face](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/you_with_the_face)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/38 "2016-10-21T16:03:36Z")
> [@Gary\_T](#): > > Why are you talking about prepubescent girls when the comments related in the OP, as well as the rest of this discussion, is clearly about those who are pubescent (i.e., having entered into puberty)? My iPad did autocorrect and I missed it. I understand that he referred to pubescent girls and that is what I’m talking about too. He made clear that he’s talking about being attracted to female kids who are freshly developed. I don’t care if they are physiologically capable of conceiving; that’s still a pretty gross age group to professing arousal for during a date, is all I’m saying. It would be just as weird if a woman told her male dating partner that she found pubescent boys tantalizing. Sure, they might have decent packages and body hair, but everything else about them screams immaturity. My mind can’t even go there like that, but even if I did find boys arousing, I have the sense not to share that bit of good news. ---
**Author:** ![TriPolar](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/tripolar/32/3008_2.png) [@TriPolar](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TriPolar)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/39 "2016-10-21T16:03:42Z")
> [@panache45](#): > > I, for one, have never been even slightly interested in a pre-pubescent, pubescent or post-pubescent girl. 😉 > > (The OP did ask about “all men”, didn’t she?) You’re gay right? Sorry, some user names don’t register with me but I think you’ve mentioned this before. ---
**Author:** ![kayaker](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kayaker/32/441_2.png) [@kayaker](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kayaker)\ **Post date:** [October 21, 2016, 4:22pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/do-all-men-find-the-sight-of-pubescent-girls-tantalising/769232/40 "2016-10-21T16:22:53Z")
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