Why are men more attracted to women who arent so loyal and nice?

[LAYAAN]

So we've gone from the general public to "some men and women" to a reality tv show as well as some Internet sites for gold diggers. I'm glad you clarified how narrow your "survey" is. And I wasn't just talkng about myself - in my experience healthy marriages are not made up of gold diggers or clingy/needy women who only have their looks as their selling point.

 

Right, I'm sorry Batya. I come from a culture where things are more straight forward, business like. Since I grew up seeing how people got together in arranged marriages, all I can refer back to is beauty and money. Not saying this in sarcastic manner, I don't know of people who care for personality and character in arranged marriage. Decisions are made quickly and based on aspects of a person that you can see/ask evidence for, so really it is money and looks.

I'm raised in a country where women are tortured in marriage so they can bring more money from their father's family. I'm raised in a culture where fair skin is considered beautiful, where skin bleaching is a multi-million dollar industry, where dowry prices for a woman go up as skin color gets darker. I remember my mom telling me how my looks didn't match up to the standard set by cinema industry in the country. I remember the sibling rivalry between my same-age cousin sister and me. My mom told me, "Don't compare yourself with her, she has a fair skin. She can get any man she wants."

You talk about self-respect. If you read my posts and my journal, you will see that I'm struggling with that myself. I won't be overgeneralizing if I said that no Indian woman has ever been told to respect herself, to go after what she wants. Women with self-respect are considered "She is arrogant. Forget her. Look for someone else who is more submissive." My mom stayed in an unhappy marriage for convenience. I stayed in my parents' home for convenience. Getting married at the right age and staying married is emphasized too much in my culture and for understandable reasons. Now as our women are getting educated and have jobs and careers, our marriages are facing challenges with more opinionated and independent women and men with traditional expectations.

I was arguing with my mom recently about a man whose mom wants me to give this man a 3rd chance. My mom said to me "Well, noone has said yes to you either, I think you should forget about what he did in the past and give him a chance now since he has come back."

[Hermes]

Well, Tinu, this is all very unfortunate and lamentable.

 

I'm raised in a country where women are tortured in marriage so they can bring more money from their father's family. I'm raised in a culture where fair skin is considered beautiful, where skin bleaching is a multi-million dollar industry, where dowry prices for a woman go up as skin color gets darker. I remember my mom telling me how my looks didn't match up to the standard set by cinema industry in the country

 

But, perhaps it would have been fairer to give us this outline at the outset of your thread(s), so that we realise you are generalizing about India (Asia?), and not the "whole world". If you see my point.

 

Women with self-respect are considered "She is arrogant. Forget her. Look for someone else who is more submissive." My mom stayed in an unhappy marriage for convenience

 

It makes very sad reading, Tinu.

 

And what you say about bleaching the skin. Strange world isn't it? While us fair-skinned people throng to the beach/poolside to get "the tan". L.

 

Hermes

[LAYAAN]

Sure, may be I should have mentioned all this earlier.

Well, we do live in a strange world. I said that before also. Again, to each their own.

[Batya33]

Sure, may be I should have mentioned all this earlier.

Well, we do live in a strange world. I said that before also. Again, to each their own.

 

Seems like you're backpedaling from what you wrote (since you wrote that you applied it to the U.S. too not just your culture and millionaire matchmaker) and I'm glad to see the backpedaling for your sake as much as for anyone else's. I have women friends who are Indian who were not raised the way you describe and are certainly not submissive today so yes I think it is an overgeneralization - and thank goodness for that.

[LAYAAN]

good to hear that some of my Indian sisters are not raised the way I was. I was raised in what I call very unhealthy way. I would not wish that on anyone.

[Batya33]

good to hear that some of my Indian sisters are not raised the way I was. I was raised in what I call very unhealthy way. I would not wish that on anyone.

 

Me too, to an extent. Good news for me -and for all of us - is once we are adults we can make our own choices on how to behave, what our goals are, the kinds of relationships we want, including choosing not to be stuck on the past or blaming our parents.

[Jake Sully]

You're title conflicts with your assertions. In any case there is a natural power dynamic which in our repressive western factory educations we never learn about formally and find ourselves on either side of. It's a power trip and an ego game. I'm a guy so I don't really know what goes through women's heads but I find it remarkable how so many are all agog at the bad boy stereotype. They want to be chased and that gives them an ego boost and dose of bravado that they can take down the renegade and make him their slave. They often grow out of it after maturity finally catches up with them and then regret the whole theater of this natural but unstudied dynamic. Why? Because they find themselves stuck with a jailbird or some other kind of perpetual a-hole.

 

Your text seems to turn that around and you want to be the bad as_s. Surely there are men who are smitten with that but they aren't acting with their noodle. They are acting on their gut and emotion handed down through evolution. The same result eventually happens. One or both get sick of the act and start thinking with their heart and head.

[Hermes]

Sorry about that, Tinu.

 

I was raised in what I call very unhealthy way

 

However, as Batya says, not all Indian women are raised that way. There is a huge Indian population in the U.K. and many Indian women I have met seem to be very independent strong characters.

 

H

[LAYAAN]

Me too, to an extent. Good news for me -and for all of us - is once we are adults we can make our own choices on how to behave, what our goals are, the kinds of relationships we want, including choosing not to be stuck on the past or blaming our parents.

Sure, I'm not blaming my parents. I would love to, but its not going to achieve me anything. I'm trying to break free from the bondage. It has not been easy, but the good news is that I'm taking baby steps.

Today only I was thinking about writing something about it in my journal.

[Batya33]

Sure, I'm not blaming my parents. I would love to, but its not going to achieve me anything. I'm trying to break free from the bondage. It has not been easy, but the good news is that I'm taking baby steps.

Today only I was thinking about writing something about it in my journal.

 

How about instead of "trying to break free from the bondage" seeing it as "freeing myself from the perception that this past bondage is holding me back from doing what I want to do today?" There's doing and not doing - "trying" often becomes an excuse for inaction - and "break free" lets you perpetuate the belief that you are still somehow a dependent child. Now, that could be true to some extent - I don't know - but the mindset is counterproductive in my opnion.