On the concept of ”trophy wives” - is it all about status among other men?

With trophy wives I don’t mean a young tall blonde with silicone breasts and glittery clothes and nothing else, but just that a woman fullfills a role as a trophy or an accomplishment due to looks.

I’m thinking of a conversation I had with my ex. (We parted ways on good terms and it was due to outer circumstances).

I do not think I am super super pretty, but I guess I don’t look bad. He was of a different opinion in the sense that he thought me prettier than I thought myself and me higher than him. He said in particular these things which made it seem like he saw the looks of a woman, in this case me, a bit like a trophy. He liked taking a lot of photos of me and post on his instagram too…

• Ten percent of women looked good enough for him to be dateworthy. Yet, it wasn’t like he had ED or that other women couldn’t ”do it” for him, less looks was ok for other things than relarionships. In his defense he said personality is the most important but that it’s a false dichotomy.
• There was a discussion in his friend group about Tinder and he said imagine how terrible it is if you would not get any matches. I asked why this mattered but I said I understand because even if you get a partner that likes you and looks you don’t want to discover that you are objectively ugly. He said ”it’s not only that, imagine being proud and feel like you achieved something and then it shows that your partner just has shitty taste”.
• Quote ”you want a beautiful partner that you can show off”.

Women care about things similarly but it is more preselection I think. In the end it’s maybe more what she thinks but she is more influenced by the masses. I never cared about other womens opinion but more my own parameters for being a good partner.

But this attitude I wonder about status among other men. A trophy that they don’t have increasing their position. Because it’s not like someone below that threshold doesn’t do it for them and that he doesn’t find her attractive and the personality can be great as the quality of the relationship, but women being rejected simply of how they look relative to other women.

My hypothesis is that it’s a matter of status, ergo trophy. What do you think this mentality is about? Because men are attracted to many women and most women shouldn’t worry about being to ugly for a man to be attracted to, but some are not attractive enough to date despite making their dicks rock hard and in sheer physical attraction it doesn’t make much difference. To me this doesn’t make sense.