Can straight men recognise a good looking guy?

I think I judge how good looking another lad is by the amount of women they get

They can and do, they just don't admit it for the most part.

If a guy was a 7> or a 4<, I'd get it. The middle of the scale is where I come a cropper. I'd regularly think a guy is not so good looking but the consensus would be that he would pretty decent looking and vice versa.

I imagine that most men are able to tell if another man is ugly or not, so it would make sense that the corollary should be true.

Human beings are pretty good at sizing up the competition in other matters which have influenced human evolution. It would also make sense that a man should be able to analyse what kind of competition is against him, when looking for women.

It is accepted that facial symmetry is indicative of attractiveness. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Facial_symmetry . My understanding is that the human brain is very good at identifying symmetry/asymmetry. Therefore,I think that one could reasonably assume that your average male should be capable of objectively evaluating the same when it comes to another man.

Perhaps men are reluctant to admit that they are capable of telling the difference, for one reason or another. Perhaps they are have not bothered to test their powers of observation in this way, for one reason or another. I don't know. What I do know is that women seem to have no such hesitations. My opinion is that if anything, many women tend to over-estimate the attractiveness of other women.

That friend of theirs that looks just like Jessica Biel - probably doesn't.

Brian Cowen looks like someone fused a bouncy castle to his face and burst it.
I can tell if a guy is particularly good looking and if a guy is particularly ugly, but there's definitely a large grey area inbetween.

You just have to look at the men a lot of women drool over; Ryan Gosling, Depp, Pitt, Damon etc. and you can clearly see a pattern. But I've been surprised on occasion when I learnt that certain others were deemed to be good looking/ugly also when I originally assumed the opposite.

I also agree that many women overestimate the looks of other women.
My gf and some of her female friends reckon Angelina Jolie is (or at least, was) the best looking (famous) woman in the world.

I think she's great looking myself but the best? Far, far from it. But then, personal opinion and all that.

I can recognise what I think is a good-looking man, but I'm not sure I'm using the same metric as the women I know are. I don't see much in Jonathan Rhys Meyers or Rob Kearney, but most women I know would crawl over broken glass to get their hands on either of them. I suspect most of what I notice is actually envy over physique - I don't know if Stephen Ferris has a better-looking face than me, but I'm dead certain his body is about a hundred times more attractive than mine.

That said, there are some men I can definitely see the attraction of. If Ryan Gosling decided he was gay and asked me out on to dinner, I'd be at the restaurant before he finished speaking.

RDM_83 again wrote: »

I think you can obviously tell if a guy is that sort of stereotypically classically handsome look or a really obvious pretty boy but thats more because you know X is meant to be handsome cos he's the male lead etc look at some of the men that are considered really attractive by a lot of woman

Yes, a number of people mentioned that at the more extreme ends of the attractiveness scale, they would be able to tell, but around the middle ground, they would not. I find it hard to disagree.

RDM_83 again wrote: »

I'd argue (pseudo-scientifically) that the reason for this is that recognizing good looking guys doesn;t bring the same evolutionary/reproductive advantage to men as recognising good looking woman does to females, men can be attractive prospects without being attractive (look at Mick Jagger)

Interesting proposition. If we assume that what you write is correct, could a reasonable explanation be that women are considerably more forgiving of men in the looks department, than men are of women? If that is the case, wouldn't there be less reason for capability of assessing attractiveness in the competition? Obvious extremes would stand out, leaving a certain grey area in between.

And Mick Jagger is peculiar looking.

I read somewhere that the basis of the power of attraction comes from a particular region of the brain and depending on its size you are either more attracted to men or more attracted to women. In general 14% of people are at either extreme, with preference in the middle tending towards the opposite sex while being capable of judging attractiveness of the same sex to varying degrees. Some guys are really good at telling whether another guy is attractive or not, some guys just simply can't and some guys only see other guys as attractive.

I don't know how true that all is but it seems to make sense to me.

I don't think that guys in general have any problem with admitting another guy has got good looks as much as some people may imagine. But where guys and girls do tend to differ due to a psychological factor other than attraction is actually acting upon the mild attraction. A girl doesn't need to worry so much about stigma when kissing another girl but the guy may worry about being emasculated and frowned upon by other guys.

Personally I have never been able to tell if a guy is good looking or not and honestly it bugged the hell out of me when I was in my teens. I had a row with a gay guy and his female friend once because they refused to believe that I couldn't tell the difference between a good looking guy and an average looking guy and they assumed that I was just trying to hide it on account of my "image". This of course was very insulting to the gay guy and even more so for me because I had no desire to pretend anything or cause any insult. But they simply couldn't accept that I had no idea what made a guy attractive. I might as well be comparing cats was my analogy I think.

So my view is that guys having a certain understanding of what makes guys attractive is perfectly normal. Being absolutely attracted to one or the other sex is the minority either way to equal extent there or thereabouts.

At least thats how I now justify my complete lack of understanding of male attractiveness nowadays!

Of course, what (heterosexual) women find attractive in men is a bit complicated:

A woman prefers a more masculine man when she is fertile and looking for a fling rather than a mate for life, according to a new study.

The finding suggests the value that women place on masculinity changes with context and with women’s reproductive cycles and immediate goals. A woman's preference for manly men also was found to vary based on how attractive she rated herself.

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18077810/wid/11915773?GT1=9303#.UIwUmG-HKxU

Of course straight men can recognise a generally good looking man. Everyone has their own view on what is good looking, but generally speaking I think any person can recognise an aesthetically good looking person.

Considering the amount of blokes I'd consider troll-like in aspect who women seem to fall all over I think it's safe to say I fail at this.:o

I think lads that claim they can never tell if another man is good-looking are generally just a bit homophobic tbh.

Since attraction isn't based purely on looks (for either sex) however, we can often be wrong about which men many women would find attractive. Would Patrick Swayze have been considered anywhere near as attractive as he was if he hadn't played the dancer in Dirty Dancing? I really don't think so. If that moron on X Factor at the moment, Rylan wasn't such a simpering twit would women find him attractive? I think they would tbh.

Reversing the roles: I can see that Rosanna Davison is good looking but I wouldn't be attracted to her in the least and know plenty of guys that would think the same. So why should it surprise me if a man that I can see is good looking wouldn't be considered attractive by many women?

I would say most straight men can recognise whether a man is good looking or not. i know i certainly can. i would think most men that say they cant are just uncomfortable saying it. but then i know of lads who wouldnt have a clue, the same kind of lads that dont know how to dress themselves.

I think I would be able to tell the difference between a good looking guy and someone who isn't.

--Kaiser-- wrote: »

I don't think heterosexual men are particularly good at telling whether another man is attractive. Similarly. I don't think women are much good in the corresponding situation.

For example, I've heard loads of women say that Angelina Jolie is hot. I don't, I think she has very masculine features (ignoring the whole skeletor thing) but I think this is why females tend to think she is so good looking, as they find masculine features attractive.

So aesthetically, can we tell if someone is objectively good-looking? Probably, but can we tell whether another man will be a attractive? Maybe not. I've been mystified by some of the men woman have told me are attractive. This guy is a prime example , I would never in a million years think he would be attractive (maybe there's hope for us all....)

But that is all down to taste. I know women who really find Ryan Tubridy attractive. Me: I wouldn't say he was. He's not a minger, but he's not what I would call a good looking fellow.

Sometimes they can, but I don't think they have very good taste. They often miss nuances that can make someone attractive if they aren't traditionally 'hot'.