the political economy of hotness
would you rather be rich, smart, or hot? you can only choose one.
too often I’m reminded that money can’t buy me love, but think of the money that hotness could buy! it could make a Bezos leave his wife… actually don’t. unwanted advances would be an undesirable side-effect. but not enough to put me off my choice!
besides, i’ve never known a nerd to have sufficient self-esteem to compensate for a lack of money or beauty, so i’ll stick with hotness, thank you. one smouldering look could make the brainy lose their senses!
in all seriousness, hotness is arguably one of the most underrated forms of social capital, partly because it is so hard to pin down its influence on others. a strange kind of magic.
although it is subjective in the individual sense (beauty in the eye of the beholder) and fairly fluid at an aggregate level, it can be manufactured to appear objective and fixed.
this is because for some reason ‘we’ set standards for beauty because of our eyes and desires and prejudices and an innate tendency to want to rank things for our satisfaction, despite the destructive effects that has on individual wellbeing. this leads us to the paradox of validated self-worth, replete with meaningless platitudes imploring us to embrace our inner beauty from the prettiest most handsomest people in skin care adverts and TED Talks. and it’s kind of true: no matter what a GQ / FHM poll may say, hotness certainly is a matter of opinion. yet, the poll has more influence over what people think is hot than you do.
what’s worse is that because you can’t stop others passing judgement on you, you find yourself in markets (or leagues) whether you want to or not. you may find that you attract a certain type. you may find that you’d absolutely lose your dignity and self-respect for another certain type. those types may not match. so how do you make sense of your place in a game you never signed up to?
research conducted by scientists who try to measure and interpret the most mysterious happenings of human life has confirmed one obvious link: you are more likely to be attracted to someone with a similar political outlook.
but what i find fascinating is to try to understand how / if your formative experiences of attraction towards another person have shaped your outlook. in short, have you changed your lifestyle habits or opinions because of someone you were attracted to?
there’s some evidence that this exists from childhood, which makes me wonder if the person on the receiving end of such attention is aware of their power. those who do have the potential to lead dangerous cults, like Charles Manson, and Elon Musk.
imagine what you can get away with telling other people to do, or doing to other people, like Cheryl Tweedy / Cole / Fernandez-Versini (delete as appropriate)?
the destinies of entire nations hinge on hotness. might the Trojans’ fortunes have fared better if their prince (Paris) did not take a shine to the married Helen of Sparta? would the history of this sceptred isle have panned out differently if Henry VIII hadn’t wanted to bend the rules of marriage for Anne Boleyn, Jane Seymour, and Catherine Howard? would Peter Mandelson (or half the apparatchiks of the New Labour Party) have ever got involved in politics if it wasn’t for the hope of love blossoming with a fellow comrade? would Barack Obama have become the last post-racial liberal Leader of the Free World®™ if he had successfully seduced the ‘long-legged socialist’ who lived in his dorm?
just imagine having the power to spurn the advances of future presidents. that long-legged socialist did not know her hotness. if she did, it might’ve saved a lot of Libyans.