Leagues.

The concept of "out of your league" in dating is one of those areas where my ideals sometimes get muddled up with my real-life experience. On the one hand, it's absolutely not true that if you're physically different or just not conventionally beautiful you need to stick with your own ugly kind. All kinds of different people can and do come together. On the other hand, people who are very different-looking but insist on a swimsuit-model partner are being, if not hypocritical, at least unrealistic.

It's a sticky situation to talk about, since of course people are attracted to traits they don't have themselves. Lots of pretty people have ugly (er, frequently-socially-considered-ugly) partners, and then again lots of pretty and ugly people aren't attracted to ugly people and I'm not about to tell them that it's their civic duty to get attracted. But at the same time, our partner preferences aren't determined entirely by random dice-roll. When an ugly person is unhappily single because they will only consider gorgeous people as partners--well, they shouldn't date someone they don't schwing for, and it's certainly not impossible... but. But. You know? But. Sticky.



God, I wish I was an asshole blogger. I wouldn't be tying myself in knows with this shit about "it's not my place to tell anyone what to do" and "everyone's preferences are different" and "we shouldn't assume younger and thinner is prettier" and all these other things--that I do actually believe--that make it so damn hard to be blunt.

If I were an asshole blogger I could just come out and tell people that you've got no goddamn business saying "I'm fat and 50 and I'm only attracted to thin 20-year-olds," and no, that's not insensitivity to fat 50-year-olds, that's just the slightest connection to Planet Fucking Earth. And you're insensitive to fat 50-year-olds if you won't date one, jerk! And then I'd stick my tongue out. And fart.



Man, the other day I read a blog post saying you shouldn't use "stupid" as an insult because that's insensitive to mentally disabled people and to people who've had fewer educational opportunities. And the horrifying part was that I found myself going along with it for a bit, nodding in agreement because of course I don't want to hurt innocent people with my words--and then I realized how... how stupid it is to be so goddamn sensitive you can't say anything more opinionated than "I like bunnies." Now, I won't use "retarded" as an insult. I'm not committing myself to insensitivity as a lifestyle. But I can't walk on eggshells around everything that isn't bunnies.