Van driven down Toronto sidewalk

They have traits that are more attractive to members of their own sex, not the opposite sex, and they can't understand that the two sexes find different qualities to be attractive.

 

I don't read it that way:

The two groups that seem to be most frustrated are not-fat men and professionally successful women, because both have traits that are more prized in the opposite sex in heterosexual dating and thus can't attract what they see as their equivalent.

 

Did I fuck it up too?

Women with career success are frustrated, because, if they were a guy, they would be seen as attractive to women. But, as a woman, it's not as important to the guys they want to date.

Non-fat men see non-fat women being desirable to other men, but their own slenderness isn't enough, on it's own, to attract the women they desire.

 

It's probably a lot more than just not being fat. I'm going to say not being fat is probably 50th on the list.

 

OK, now I get what he's saying.

 

When I was at the firm, it was very rare for any of the lawyers to have spouses who were not either: (a) also in a prestige profession; or (b) highly educated stay-at-homes.

A co-worker and I had spouses who were teachers (her husband, my wife) and felt, at times, like people looked down upon that. "Well, that sounds fun!" That kind of thing.

 

He may have been on to something. Just like they break out comfort dogs after tragedies, comfort hookers?

 

What exactly qualifies as a prestige profession? Attorney? I don’t know anyone other than an attorney who would make that mistake

 

Some attorneys, not all. (None of them were married to personal injury lawyers.) Doctors. Professors. Investment bankers or other finance jobs. Journalists, but not all journalists. I would say 90 percent, at least, of their spouses who worked also made well into six figures or, alternatively, were in a lower-paying but prestigious public interest or government job.

 

There are certain professions where everybody who does that job has achieved a certain level of success, but it seems like there aren't many of those anymore. Doctors are one. But lawyers, architects, writers, actors, professors, artists—they can be highly prestigious, but they can also be really, really not. The spectrum of possibility is wide.

 

Correct. If someone was married to a journalist, for example, it was unlikely to be the preps guy at the Daily Southtown.

 

Their traits are less prized in them than they are in the people they want to date.

A professionally successful man is more in demand than a professionally successful woman, all else being equal. A non-obese woman is more in-demand than a non-obese man, all else being equal.