Why does it seem that white men are least attracted to women with African features. Is it because of the legacy of racism? Is it because these women look different from their mothers? What?
Speak for yourself, Robbie.
Perhaps you could try to puzzle out the reasons why you are not attracted to women of colour. Don’t generalize overmuch from your own preferences.
At the risk of feeding trolls, let’s take a poll:
Hey white men, who are you more attracted to, a woman who looks like Halle Berry, or one who looks like your mother?
I am a white man and I love my mother dearly, but based solely on looks, I’ll take a woman who looks like Halle Berry over one who looks like my mother any day.
I’ve also noticed that women of African descent come in many varieties, ie gorgeous, plain and ugly, to name just three, just like women of other descents, and just like men, for that matter.
Before we all jump on the “That’s an impertinent question” bandwagon, please note that the question was not why black women were not as good looking. The question involved the impression or observation that one paired group of people do not demonstrate the same attraction as different paired groups of people.
Run through the list of people you know who are dating or married in which one partner had obviously European ancestors and the other partner had obviously African ancestors. I know quite a few white women dating or married to black men. I only know two couples in which a white man is in a relationship with a black woman. I would expect the numbers to be more equal on a college campus, but I don’t think that my observations are unrepresentative of society at large.
Of course, the question I would counter to the OP is whether “attraction” is the appropriate activity being observed. A fairly large number of successful black women in the entertainment industry are married to white guys. Is it possible that various class distinctions, irrespective of race, drive the selection process?
I don’t know. I have heard, for example, black women really chewing out other black women who had dated a white guy for not maintaining some sort of solidarity. I have only seen this on a couple of occasions, but if it were a somewhat frequent occurrence among black women to ostracize their friends who date whites, then maybe guys who do ask black women for dates just get turned down more often. There also could be a fear among some white guys that they will be challenged buy a black woman’s family and so they simply avoid the situation. I really don’t know, one way or the other. These are wild speculations on my part. I offer no proof or even evidence of what is going on.
Had the OP asked why black women don’t look as good as white women, I’d stand back and let everyone rip him a new bodily orifice. That was not the question asked, however, and we might find some interesting sociological points if we consider the actual question.
Hmm…good question.
I’ll go ask my Girlfriend, who has “African features” galore.
I’ll report back with my findings.
I do not offer the following as anything other than one person’s perspective:
Black Women’s Perspective
And from another perspective (including some graphs that are claimed to represent U.S. Census data):
Is Love Colorblind?
Well, heck. I don’t know what to do with this thread. tomndebb is right; the question does not offend me as posed. But Dr. Fidelius is also right; the OP has not demonstrated that the assumption underlying the question has sufficient factual basis to explore the question itself (as phrased).
Fortunately, I have a solution for such occasions. It’s known as a “punt.” Oh, slythe….
This thread is off to our new forum, In My Humble Opinion.
To put it mildly, my wife’s features are most attractive.
However, if I were not married, as an Australia bloke, there are many women who are attractive, and they come from lots of ethnic groups. “African” is a pretty broad term. There are lots of different “looks” amongst African women. Personally I find Eritrean women (a major immigrant group to Aust in the 1980s) rather striking. My guess is that this is so because (i) they weren’t here before; (ii) some of them are very attractive; and (iii) the number of bigots in my social circle is not sufficient to bias my evaluation.
I suspect varients in (iii) are an important feature (going both ways) in who ends up with who.
picmr
Robbespiere asked:
Wow!
If I had the answer to that, I could graduate early with a whole boatload of grant money and international fame.
Well not the Hollywood fame where I’d be a sex symbol to teenage girls and enough money to open the Planet SterlingNorth. More like the “I got my name published in the collection of Magazines with Long Acronyms and Abbreviations published by the pointy heads” fame. I’d get to hang with the Socialogist, Historians, Psycologists, Physiologists, Biologists. I’d get to be ridiculed by Limbaugh and Dr. Laura.
If you ask 1000 white men why they find who they find attractive and they told the truth, you’d probably get 1000 answers. If they lied, you’d probably get 1000 answers, too.
Same with black women. I can’t answer for either since I don’t belong to either group, nor am I their patron saint.
You’re looking for a simple answer and quite frankly there isn’t one. When there isn’t a simple answer, always blame the parents. :rolleyes:
Of course the initial premise may be flawed. I live in an area where there is a good amount of interracial dating. My good friend is the product of a white father and black mother.
Some related questions that just popped into my head just now:
[ul]
Would the white men of which Robbie ask of be attracted to white women if they had some “African features”? Would they be attracted to black women if they had a lot of “white features”. What about the Japanese? Why do I find that Irish gal with the red hair and green eyes at the bookstore extremely cute? Why do we base who we marry on this strange thing called attraction?
[/ul]
[sub]a useless post from SterlingNorth[/sub]
[Dr Ruth] Zo, Robby, how long have you felt zexual attraction for your mother? [/ Dr Ruth]
Not to say that it is unusual for white men to be attracted to Robbie’s mother, just that it seems a tad, well, odd that Robbie feels so.
DrFidelius, you are just plain rude. It so happens that I am white and my wife is a beautiful African-American woman whom I am very fortunate to be married to. Please read my post carefully. It asks a serious question. I’ve talked to enough white men over a lifetime to know their preferences.I am interested in serious opinion, not crude remarks about my relationship with my mother, rest her soul.
Wow, the “Is Love Colorblind” was a great link. I was recently called a racist for making the simple statement (in these exact words) which was based on all my years of door-to-door pizza delivery to several thousand houses:
“Doesn’t it seem like there are more Black man - White women couples than Black women - White man couples?”
From which, a typical response was:
“I dont know what your trying to suggest here but you certainly seem to have some racist views.”
Sigh.
I really don’t notice skin color when I check out other women. And Hale Berry is hot, and so is Sade, and so is Tyra Banks, and…
galen
Whoa, whoa, wait a sec.
Did I is a joke in there somewhere?
I thought Robbespiere asked the question about relationships.
I thought DrFidelius was mocking Robbie.
You’re not allowed to make substitutions in the cast in the middle of a play; it makes me think I’m going senile.
Sterling, I was just wondering the same thing.
Odd. *galen’s first post in this thread is the one where he replies to my second post to robbespeirre.
Yes, it was a damn rude post from me, but we do have rules against multiple Usernames here. I am almost sorry that it was my post which caused you to expose yourself.
Okay, not really.
humm. I don’t know. let my white male self go ask my black girlfriend…
really I dont know any white women with black men, but I know many white men with black women. Maybe its a regional thing.
michael
I just had a thought. Maybe white-man+black-woman combos are more common among colledge educated persons. And black-man+white-woman are more common among non-colledge educated persons.
My girlfriend is a colledge educated black woman and her friends are also colledge educated black women. They all have white boyfriends or husbands. This might be because of the lack of colledge educated black men in america.
michael
My boyfriend is white. I am a mix. An extreme mix. I’ve been compared to different famous black women since puberty and have been given some very interesting nicknames because of my unusual skin color/features. The interesting thing to me is that white guys seem to like me more than black guys do. Perhaps I have Asian features, too, because I have had people ask about an Asian background (that’s the one I don’t have and the one I would most like to, irony, no?). Have you ever seen Eve’s Bayou? The girl in the movie looks almost exactly like I did at that age. She is on the new Cosby Show as well, if you’ve seen that. Anyway, the point is, I look nothing like my boyfriend’s mother, and I can’t think of one of my boyfriends’ mothers over time that I have looked anything like. And they run the gamut in different races. So, I’m not really certain your question makes much sense to me. Perhaps it doesn’t relate, because I am American, not African. I’ve never even been to Africa.
I dont find either black women nor women that look like my mom(she’s korean BTW) the least bit attractive.
Hey, be original!
You’re ripping off Lenny Bruce, who summed up this question by saying: “Choose between two women: Lena Horne or Kate Smith.”
(For those of you that were born yesterday, Lena Horne was a gorgeous black woman and Kate Smith was white and big as a house.)
your humble TubaDiva