Is beauty in the tie of the beholder?

It's a strange phenomenon, especially in the face of people who say things like "opposites attract", but it generally seems to hold true: we are attracted to people who dress like us.

Why is this? There are a number of possibilities. Being too lazy to research any relevant studies, I am going to use the one example available to myself - me - while exploring them. So I apologise in advance if this well-meant article meanders off into the realm of self-indulgence.

Anyway: some kind of physical profile is probably in order. At time of writing, I have long hair and a short beard (hence my pretensions of Vikingosity), and tend to dress fairly casually if given the option. Insofar as people are attracted to me at all, they tend to be similarly casual. Occasionally their attire will lean slightly towards the gothic, or toe the line of being preppy, but they never seem to occupy a completely different sartorial slot to myself (and no, this is not a polite way of saying I am only attractive to ugly women; I suspect it's rare for me to be the looker in any romantic or sexual coupling). Similarly, while I can find celebrities - who are to all intents and purposes fictional from my point of view - to be attractive regardless of the niche their clothing represents, I tend to dismiss real-life women who don't share similarities of style with myself.

There are some interesting points that come out of this. One is that we - or, at least, I - don't always fancy people that we might be expected to. I'm thinking about a certain type of woman at the moment; a type that we would all recognise immediately, but that seems to lack a label. Nobody should be without a brand in this day and age, so I shall invent one for them. I dub them Picture Perfects.

Everyone knows a few Picture Perfects. They tend to be blonde, slim without being skinny, extremely pretty and possessors of a tan that is at least not obviously fake. Their dress sense can perhaps best be described as well-appointed, and their make-up is expertly applied to accentuate their features. This isn't sarcasm, by the way. These women are almost objectively gorgeous.

They don't fancy me, of course. That's hardly surprising; compared to them, I'm a slob. But here's the thing: I don't fancy them either. And that's bizarre: in the hierarchy of attractiveness, they are obviously a class or two above me. Their company and acceptance is something I should logically strive towards. I should at the very least fulfil the old stereotype of desiring what I cannot have. But I don't. And if I feel this way, I'm willing to assume that other people do, to.

So: why not? Why am I not attracted to undeniably beautiful girls? I'm inclined to think that our old friend tribalism comes into play here. In love, as in everything else, we are attracted to people similar to ourselves. Freud, were he alive and whiling away his inexplicably lengthy existence by reading this blog, would not doubt agree with me.

I also suspect that a form of sartorial fishing is going on here. It's a lot easier to decide what to wear than who to be attracted to. Resultingly, were are surely likely to adjust our personal look to suit those that we wish to woo. Prejudice undoubtedly plays a part: we tend to make assumptions about people we consider to be unlike us, generally negative ones. In honesty, this all seems to go back to tribalism again...

Of course, I could be confusing cause with symptom. If I assume that Picture Perfects won't be attracted to me, I'm unlikely to ever find out if they are - especially as they are almost certainly the kind of women who prefer men to make the first move. And such an assumption might also prevent me from finding them attractive in the first place - believing them to be unobtainable, I might write them off automatically. This could be the same logic that prevents me, apparently uniquely in the world of straight men, from nurturing a pointless attraction to lesbians.

To those who don't know me, and a fair few who do, this might all sound like whinging; an attempt to rationalise my non-Alpha position in the pecking order. But that would miss the point. Why should I care? I don't want Picture Perfects, or townies, or vamps, to want me, because I don't want them. I fancy girls who wear dreadlocks or comfortable jeans or those weird gypsy hairband things that look cool for some reason. And, wonderfully, from time to time one of those girls will reciprocate.

See? I warned you this would get self indulgent. Best to quit while I'm behind, so I'll end the most superficial of my blogs yet with these equally superficial words: I may not know much about women, but I know what I like.