Reply #27: I think women and men have been judged on different grounds...

[NorthernSpy]

... but it seems to be far more acceptable -- at least here and now -- to openly judge women for the way they look, than it is to judge men on the basis of -- say -- income level and worldly success.

A man who proclaims his preference for women with certain physical characteristics is merely exercising his God-given prerogative; a woman who proclaims her liking for men with a certain level of affluence is a shallow, materialistic gold-digger. We can argue without restraint about what degree of adiposity makes a woman unacceptable and generally out-of-bounds; a similar discussion of just what level of yearly income might consign a man to loserdom would be "un-progressive" in the extreme.

To me, both looks and riches seem seriously flawed as measures of human worth. But I'm not sure why we should automatically accept that the latter basis for judgement is "worse" than the former. Having done so, we may have wound up with a "progressivism" that preferentially serves men's needs on the issue of mate-seeking, and defends men's priorities while ignoring or condemning those more characteristic of women.



(fixed: typo)