Do more attractive women go into "less difficult" careers?

[Anonymous]

This has the potential to be really offensive, but.....

At a dinner at our house the other night, one of the guests postulated that more attractive women go into fields requiring less "work," such as (with all due respect, I'm repeating his words) being a pharamaceutical rep or marketing type of person rather than a "hard" field (as he put it), like law, medicine, computer science. (This is exclusing the 1% truly beautiful people who go into modeling or other similar things as they should because they're freakishly attractive.)

I found this deeply sexist and insulting, and also, in real life, just very wrong. Thinking of the women in my own "hard field" to the dozens of women who I grew up with, this dichotomy of ugly goes into harder fields and pretty into easy fields just doesn't hold true on any meaningful level. Career decisions are complicated and influenced by many things - your family, upbringing, drive, wishes, DREAMS - and to boil it down to "pretty women can work a lot less" seemed not only insulting but just untrue.

Wondering, though, if I'm just being politically correct or something, or if my being a feminist is blinding me to a basic reality. Please don't go thinking back to the 10 pretty and unattractive girls you knew in high school and then say "oh yeah, he's right" (or wrong), please think about this with me, and give me some good reasons why his argument is really simplistic and stupid. Or if you're a neanderthal who agrees with him, give me good reasons why you think so.

[Anonymous]

yes

[Anonymous]

There is an element of truth to it. Women who grow up "pretty" generally are socialized not to try as hard because their good looks directly and many times, in subtle ways opens doors for them.

In your "hard field", how many drop dead gorgeous women do you know or have you seen? I don't come across a lot in the legal field, and I work in BigLaw.

[Anonymous]

actually I think there is good research out there linking attractiveness and intelligence..not that intelligence automatically means a hard-working career, but many of my most attractive female friends are doctors, lawyers, etc. Many of my less attractive friends are as well though, FWIW.

[Anonymous]

It seems like the pharmaceutical companies actively recruit and hire pretty women.

[Anonymous]

No matter how much feminists try to deny it or bury their heads in the sand, looks matter and will always matter in our society. A pretty face will get you places where an ordinary looking face won't. Pretty women experience this all the time, from the time they are little girls, which is why they don't really try all that hard to be focus on hard careers.

[Anonymous]

He was probably referring to this new study:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2129456/Do-girls-want-career-attract-man-Provocative-study-casts-high-fliers-new-light.html?ITO=1490

So apparently it's true.

In my experience, beautiful women are drawn to glamorous careers: book publishing, fashion, fashion magazines (everyone who used to work at Conde Nast was a six-foot, waiflike, gorgeous blonde), the recording industry, museums, art galleries and auction houses, interior design, etc. etc.

Maybe that's why DC isn't full of a lot of really gorgeous women?

[Anonymous]

Anonymous wrote:No matter how much feminists try to deny it or bury their heads in the sand, looks matter and will always matter in our society. A pretty face will get you places where an ordinary looking face won't. Pretty women experience this all the time, from the time they are little girls, which is why they don't really try all that hard to be focus on hard careers.

Yes.

It's also why they marry wealthy men.

[Anonymous]

PP, you misunderstood that study. They were looking at sex ratios, not attractiveness in particular. In areas where women did not have a lot of men around, they placed more emphasis on a career, which of course makes sense.

They also were not differentiating between careers.

So no, that study does not prove that it's true.

[Anonymous]

This is hilarious. Ok, I am going to say it -- I get a lot of compliments about my appearance. I am always gracious about it, but I do. That being said, I am a lawyer and am pretty smart. I have to admit though, that I know that my appearance helps me tremendously. I know that I can be coy and play to the audience. So, there you go, I went into a tough profession, but have used my looks to my advantage.

[Anonymous]

very true, in sales attractive looks get people's attention, studies have shown that people are more at-tentative and want to assist better looking people.

[Anonymous]

The bottom line: People who were rated as good-looking made more money, were better educated, and were more confident. But a person’s intelligence affected their income more than their looks did.

http://www.webmd.com/healthy-beauty/news/20090520/want-a-higher-salary-get-brains-beauty

[Anonymous]

DH works in the financial district of boston. One afternoon as I drove through the area I noted there were zero women, let alone attractive women. I asked him if there were any attractive women that worked in his building, he said "oh please no attractive women actually need to work round the clock" Yikes my husband lives in the 1950s

[Anonymous]

Yes.

[Anonymous]

Very few Law and Order hotties in the real world.