This just in: Men like to look at pretty girls. Yes, that is taking belaboring the obvious to the next level, but bear with me. I'm about to go into biologist mode.
The whole Sydney Sweeney controversy, amply covered by my buddy and colleague Brandon Morse, has been kicking up a lot of dust, and I'm not sure why. Oh, yes, the left predictably went all pearl-clutchy over her American Eagle ad campaign, and that's silly. There's nothing wrong with that campaign. The left cries out about Nazis and white supremacy, but when the left starts yelling about Nazis, we can and should take them about as seriously as we take a six-year-old crying about the booger-man hiding in their bedroom closet.
But that ad works because men like to look at pretty girls. In fact I have it on good authority that even a lot of gay men like to look at pretty girls; an old buddy of mine, who I will refer to only as "A" to preserve his privacy, is gay, is interested only in dudes, but told me once "every gay dude I know likes looking at pretty girls." And Miss Sweeney's ample charms are, candidly, worth looking at. She has an ample helping of what I like to call the feminine aesthetic.
It's all a matter of biology. Men, young and old, like to look at pretty girls. Here's why.
First, humans, as mammals, are a very visual species. Some mammals, such as bears and dogs, depend on other senses, like smell, for their primary sensory inputs. For humans, it's vision. Our eyes are quite good for mammals. We have a much greater range of color vision than most other mammals. We also, unlike most mammals, survey the world through eyes set at the top of a five-to-six-foot perambulating tower, which gives us an advantage, visually, over other, more low-slung critters. We are, then, built to take in visual cues.
Second - and this is a big one - there are these things called secondary sexual characteristics. These are aptly defined thusly:
Any of various physical characteristics that differ between the sexes but do not have a direct reproductive function, appearing in humans at puberty and in other animals at sexual maturity or during the mating season. Also called secondary sexual characteristic.
Both men and women have these. And what these characteristics, which in humans are very visible, do is essentially reproductive advertising. Biologically, men are programmed to be attracted to women with rounded hips, good facial symmetry, and, let's just say, an ample capacity for feeding infants. These are characteristics that proclaim, "Look at me, I will bear healthy children."
If that sounds like I'm reducing complex human behaviors to a few limited sexual responses, well, that's not my intention. It is more complicated than this. There are as many shades and variations to human behavior, sexual and otherwise, as there are people. We are, behaviorally, more complex than any other mammals - much more so. Unlike other mammals, we have complex cultural issues, religious issues, and various societal pressures that can influence choices, what is seen as attractive, and what is not; a clothing style that is considered attractive in one society may be seen as utterly bizarre in another.
But the basics seem to always be with us; just look at the romantic depictions of young women, from the Venus of Willendorf to Sydney Sweeney, and you'll see those common themes: Well-fed, rounded, able to produce healthy children. I'll grant you that the Venus of Willendorf is rather more well-fed than we'd find attractive today, but bear in mind the times, when only a person from a wildly successful tribe could be anything other than scrawny.
Read More: Why We're So Attracted to Sydney Sweeney
The Outrage Around Sydney Sweeney's Ad Is Unadulterated Racism
Which brings me back to Miss Sweeney.
The brouhaha about her American Eagle campaign was and is perfectly ridiculous, and to her everlasting credit, Miss Sweeney seems to be dismissing it as such. She's a pretty girl, and she's unapologetic about it; she embodies the feminine aesthetic. Good for her, and yes, she's worth looking at.
Men like to look at pretty girls. Our motivations may change over time. These days, in my mid-60s, I look at pretty girls much like I look at wildflowers or kittens; something cute that makes me smile. And if any young woman doesn't care for the male gaze of a grizzled old dude, I can reassure her that the other thing she has in common with that kitten is that I don't want either of them in my damn house, so relax. I'm comfortably and happily married to a woman who, after 33 years, I still find I love more with every passing day. Oh, and she understands that, yes, I still enjoy the feminine aesthetic. She's cool with it.
These things are coded in us. Our reproductive success is couched in them. My contributions to humanity's gene pool are complete. But biology still governs much of what I do, of what all men do. It's always about the biology - it is, after all, the study of life.
