Have to agree with that. I was sooooo much sexier ten stones heavier than I am now. . .
Several years ago, I had a friend who went low-carb and was losing weight and was complaining to me about how much she had to give up in terms of food. We were in the pool working out together, and I said to her, "So. You want me to feel sorry for you?"She thought about it, and then allowed that, yes, she did, she wanted me to feel sorry for her.
"Then stay fat," I replied, and she splashed water in my face. But she also got mad and got serious about losing weight, and she did. She ended up meeting her future husband and marrying him.
I pictured people reading those twisted conclusions and thinking, can't do anything about this because if I lose weight and get healthy and strong (whoops, wait, never mind, they're skipping that part) . . . because if I give up my chicken nuggets and pie and ice cream I'll lose my magic libido. Fine, I would say to them. If you believe that, stay fat.
I overheard a conversation between a couple of women discussing men, and one said, "The problem is that when I find a man that's my age that I consider attractive, he's attracted to women half my age." She could probably drop about 50-60 pounds and not miss them a bit, have more energy, more enthusiasm for life, and feel better about the way she looks, but that wasn't part of the conversation. We don't confront people in conversations like that, just say what a pity it is.
There's a piece of the equation that we're skipping over here, and that's that our own perception of our attractiveness has an impact on how interested we are in potential partners, and how interesting we might be to them. When I don't like the way I look, I just want to be invisible; I'm beaten before I even go into the ring.
I would like to start a reality tv show for incels, along the line of biggest losers (too bad they're already using the perfect name for the program I envision).
The weekly episodes would have participants (not contestants, because they could all be winners) who live together in a nice place, and they have coaches and counselors who tell them they have to pick up their dirty socks, teach them shopping and food-prep skills, table manners, how to have a conversation with people, how to be considerate, charming, kind, who would insist that they floss and bathe and replace their shoes, lose extra weight, work out, dress appropriately, stop feeling like victims, and all the other micro- and macro-skills that are practiced by people who want to get out into the world and attract potential partners.
They could also have a camp for women who sit around saying things like, "All the good ones are taken," while stuffing themselves with pizza rolls, and shine a light into the denial and lack of effort being put forth. Each week they could have a mixer where the groups meet and mingle, and then meet later to analyze the interactions and teach them how to improve their ability to connect with others until everyone's found someone to love and they can all go off and live happily ever after.
I'd watch that show.
This may seem like I'm talking about something different here, but I think not. I see a cultural blind spot somewhere between the fat-shaming and the self-denial, and that blind spot allows us to overlook asking ourselves what kind of signals we're giving out. If I am carrying significant amounts of extra weight and don't put out the energy to dress and groom myself to look my best, it's asking a lot for someone to look past that at my inner beauty. If I don't care, why should anyone else?
Feeling good about how we look, and being in the presence of an attractive partner who also likes how we look, would be a fine start to solving libido problems. Or so it seems to me.
I know that there are exceptions, and I'm not talking about people with medical issues or the incredibly stubborn metabolisms that keep them heavy. They have my complete sympathy. But this kind of so-called research seems like a pied piper's mad march to misery, a bandwagon that gives people yet more reasons to not try to be the best that they can be.