Page:Personal Beauty and Racial Betterment.djvu/30

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page has been validated.
24
Personal Beauty

lead to this preference as a secondary manifestation. It is true that there are women today who openly state that the mates they want are those who can completely dominate them; and that such potential masters are the only men who interest them. These cases (a number have been directly reported to me) are not all to be explained on the same basis, although the primary factor in every case is the admiration for the strong man. In some cases, the preference is distinctly a pathological development; in others, it is pretended by the woman as an explanation for the fact that men are not interested in her. In many cases, however, the preference is the expression of an arbitrary standard which is manfiested usually in less egotistical ways. Where a scale of values is accepted, there is commonly a more or less explicit adoption of a minimal acceptable value; the stronger man is the more desirable; a man who measures up to a certain minimum will be acceptable. In most cases, the minimal standard adopted is the father, a brother, or some other impressive individual in real life or in fiction. In the case of a strongly egotistical woman, who sets a high value on her own potentialities, the standard is herself; the man less forceful than herself is below the minimum.

In this, I seem to be confusing physical strength with various sorts of power; perhaps I am; but,