male lust and love

[lemur]

Female physical attractiveness can cause men to treat women well, etc. It can also cause them to be interested in other women than their partner and cheat. The question is can women distinguish between men loving them and simply treating them well because of physical attraction? If not, does it confuse them when men seem to love/worship them yet at the same time lust after other women?

[rktpro]

Female physical attractiveness can cause men to treat women well, etc. It can also cause them to be interested in other women than their partner and cheat. The question is can women distinguish between men loving them and simply treating them well because of physical attraction? If not, does it confuse them when men seem to love/worship them yet at the same time lust after other women?

 

Girls in my school can barely make the difference. They feel, as I have noticed, to be of utmost importance when a boy is standing. They feel pride when some boy, even of bad intentions, or who already has a girlfriend, chat with them. I have noticed a tangy change in expressions.

P.S My girlfriend loves me. My girlfriend loves me. I love the one in second sentence.

[Marat]

Behind this question lurks an interesting puzzle for idealists who want to insist that there should only be a higher, 'romantic' love as the essential basis for intimate relationships between men and women. The question is: If romantic love is ideal rather than driven by sexual desire, why don't 18-year-old males ever fall madly in love with 88-year-old women with powerfully attractive personalities and fascinating intellects? The fact that this never happens has to be explained by supposing that romantic attraction has an essentially sexual component.

[lemur]

Behind this question lurks an interesting puzzle for idealists who want to insist that there should only be a higher, 'romantic' love as the essential basis for intimate relationships between men and women. The question is: If romantic love is ideal rather than driven by sexual desire, why don't 18-year-old males ever fall madly in love with 88-year-old women with powerfully attractive personalities and fascinating intellects? The fact that this never happens has to be explained by supposing that romantic attraction has an essentially sexual component.

Good point. But whether love and lust are just an artificial and idealistic distinction, the concept makes sense to people in a common-sense way. For example, I was listening to the song, "You Lost Me," by Christina Aguilera when I posted the OP. In it, CA sings about losing her relationship to lust and yet I couldn't help thinking how many men would want a relationship with CA out of lust. So is the idea that lust grows into love within a committed relationship and then that lusting toward women outside of that relationship is suddenly something different? More importantly, in reference to the OP, do women experience/perceive love and lust differently? I think that they actually may, because they may have a psychological need to deny the idea of themselves as lust objects, since the women who are seen as lust objects are regarded as temptresses and man-stealers. I think also that if women would regard all love as essentially lust-based, they would become cynical and alienated in their relationships but this is mostly just a hunch.

[Realitycheck]

There are no absolutes and there are very many factors.