Why were men Historically Married for Resources if Physical Attraction Definitely Matters Today?

Orange_Codex · 2026-02-05T16:24:09+00:00

Attraction mattered in the past. Poetry, letters, and diaries by men and women get just as inappropriately horny as they do now. It's marriage that has changed. Then it was primarily about securing provisions, counsel, and legal support; physical attraction was a bonus. Now it's a celebration of romantic love, and physical attraction is almost a necessity.

PostAvailable9966 · 2026-02-05T14:07:26+00:00

This is a RP topic, not seduction per se. It is not as you say, and definitely you only consider the "Christian" narrative, which was the narrative before the modern era. You are missing way too much historical context.

In general, I highly recommend these books.

BurnItDownSR · 2026-02-05T14:28:35+00:00

Just because something matters doesn't mean it's the most important thing.

Also, looks are not as significant as you think. Looking at social media doesn't count as research. Your perception is being skewed.

bmcapers · 2026-02-05T14:33:48+00:00

Great question. I think understanding frameworks from the past help us understand and navigate current frameworks.

Historically, marriages were arranged for wealth, status, and survival. Men were expected to marry for resource allocation, duty, and heirs, while physical attraction often played out elsewhere through mistresses, affairs, or later marriages. Attraction mattered, but it was kept separate from marriage itself. As society became more stable and women gained economic independence, marriage shifted from necessity to choice, allowing attraction to move to the center of relationships.

norwegiandoggo · 2026-02-05T14:35:26+00:00

Women can get their own resources today. So getting a man for resources becomes optional / a luxury. Not a requirement for survival.

Physical attraction and resources both always mattered. To exemplify: You're a father. You have an ugly daughter and a beautiful daughter. To marry away your ugly daughter you get one camel. To marry away your beautiful daughter, you get 10 camels. See? If you have more resources you get more beautiful wife.

A daughter that wants a certain handsome man, may persuade her father to accept 5 camels from hot guy instead of 10 camels from ugly guy. Because then the daughter will be happier. Some fathers absolutely would accommodate such requests.

Outside of this type of arranged-marriage culture. There were always many tribes and societies where arranged marriages weren't a thing at all. So in those cultures, looks probably mattered even more.

fireqwer · 2026-02-05T14:19:15+00:00

probably always played a massive role, but survival beats all! (so they'd go with men who good take care of her even if she was sick at the idea of kissing him etc. It beats starving to death!)

But now they can earn the same as men easily. Not to mention that lots of girls can make a fortune on OF etc if they are very pretty.

Back2theCouture · 2026-02-05T15:19:20+00:00

A lot of variables matter including physical attractions and material resources.

The map has shifted since feminism era that men don’t have to be the sole provider. But of course just because women (can) work doesn’t mean they don’t want more resources. if I could do nothing and still earn money, of course I’d choose that over having to work my ass off. So that mindset that women have is rational; the cost-benefit analysis.

But the problem starts when a man realizes that his woman loves him because of the resources he provides for her, not for who he is. To make matters worse, once he can’t do it even just temporarily, she starts thinking of finding other sources (re: other men)

This is where physical attraction comes into play. Your bf or husband may be out of work now. Both of you may be struggling financially. But she’s still loyal to you because she’s always physically attracted to you. There’s a bonding created not by external variables like money or resources, but the internal ones like attraction, or even love.

confused_8357 · 2026-02-05T15:21:01+00:00

long term mate selection and short term mate selection involve different strategies

younger women who are in no hurry for marriage just go for men that other young girls of her age prefer ( good looking, tall , ambitious, fun to be around )

older women ( reaching 30s) just want a trustable and reliable guy who has his life in order and doesnt seem insecure , is open to serious stuff and would make a good dad. looks are optional here more like cherry on the cake.

thedukejck · 2026-02-05T16:16:19+00:00

It’s always mattered, you can always get what you want and need regardless of marital status.

ImpossibleWaiting · 2026-02-05T16:20:12+00:00

There is replication, there is survival. A woman doesn't have to have the same person to fulfill both of those things.

MrDownhillRacer · 2026-02-05T16:22:30+00:00

What changed

Part of it is, you know, the concept of human rights and social liberties. It's not like women were choosing whom they married in the past. Their parents said, "I'll give you my daughter's hand in marriage for six goats and that plot of land over there" and the other guy said "five goats and it's a deal; that is not a six-goat woman."

Part of it is that marriages weren't even about romantic love in the first place back then. They were economic and social arrangements. "We'll marry these people off so they can have enough kids to work the farm and keep their families alive." "We'll marry these people off to create an alliance between these two kingdoms and hopefully war less with each other." It wasn't uncommon in, say, medieval times for people to express their romantic love for people outside of their official marriages because the actual marriages weren't about love. Hell, in Iran today, many people have paramours despite being married, because the marriage is not necessarily a romantic-love-type thing. It's a modern invention for people to care more about agency and autonomy and self-actualization instead of, idk, just becoming a baker because their dad was a baker and their dad's dad was a baker and their dad's dad's dad was a baker. People today are like, "what do I want in life? Who do I wanna be? How do I become that? Who am I?" The question of "who you want to be with" is part of that. In the past, much of your life was ascribed to you and you just shrugged your shoulders and went with it and didn't feel existential confusion over it because "that's just the way it is."

Also, there is less economic privation today, so women don't need to "find a man who will economically provide for them" as a strategy so much as they do in the past. Even today, we see differences between poorer/less equal societies and richer/more equal ones. Why is there the stereotype of Russian or Filipino women dolling themselves up to attract a foreign man of means, getting citizenship, and then leaving them? Because they're more likely to need to do that to survive than some woman from the Netherlands or something. It's a survival strategy borne from harsh economic conditions.

So, yeah, marriage is different today because women aren't treated as property anymore, people want to be captains of their own lives instead of taking what's handed to them, and we're more economically secure than we were when the Black Plague was going around.

Yes, women are still more attracted to men with resources than to men without them. Because recent social changes don't immediately wipe out millions of years of evolutionary pressures and sexual selection. But, like, that's just one of the factors in attraction, along with kindness, shared values, physical attractiveness, competence, etc. etc. And women are actually doing the selecting instead of their dads doing it for them.

OpinionThink481 · 2026-02-05T17:46:53+00:00

Because historically since we were in primitive times, there have been two main type of men, providers and lovers.

Lovers were those with great genes and traits and women had sex with them in order to have better healthier children.

Providers were those with resources and who didn’t necessarily have the best genes for off spring.

Women chose providers for long term relationships because despite not having great genes, they were reliable and offered security and resources that the lovers weren’t as willing to provide in order to raise their off spring.

However for the short term they preferred lovers because lovers had better genes. In an ideal world for women, the woman would mate with a guy who had both great genes, and also lots of resources, but that was hard…

Alternatively, they would try to have sex with lovers and then try to get the providers to take care of them, but providers wouldn’t do that because they wanted their own genes to be passed on, not someone else’s kids. So women ultimately adopted the strategy of settling down with providers not because it was their best choice but because it was pragmatic.

Now in a hookup culture, women will prioritize the lovers while they are young even if they have no intention of having kids or a boyfriend, and prioritize providers for marriage. Unless they can make the lover marry them which is too hard.

izz420 · 2026-02-05T18:02:36+00:00

Marriage is just a legal act to legally manage the wealth and inheritance. Nothing more, nothing less.

ultratraditionalist · 2026-02-05T19:56:42+00:00

Lookscoping has gotten out of hand for the past few years, mostly due to the prevalence of dating apps and the drop of in-person interaction. Women experience attraction very differently than men do and I'd say proximity makes up like 80%+ of attraction.

Any guy that's ever been friendzoned likely friendzoned himself (by not escalating, not setting boundaries, etc.). No woman spends time with a guy that they aren't at least comfortable with. And comfort is half the battle.

So physical attraction is severely overblown and mainly egged on by TikTok ragebaiting (6'5, blue eyes, etc.)..

epimpstyle · 2026-02-06T08:45:04+00:00

she can easily sleep with another man with absolutely no money/future for free just because he was "hot".

You’re putting all the eggs in one basket, but you didn’t mention that ONLY certain women behave like that. Others will avoid a “hot” man simply because they know it won’t lead to anything serious and they want to protect their ego. Some will test him to see if he’s actually genuine or not. There are all kinds of personalities and temperaments. I would never say “she can easily sleep with another man” because only certain women do that, and only under certain conditions.

Physical Attraction Definitely Matters Today

Is not only today, always matter but like you can't sell a nice box full of 💩 I saw a podcast with Clavicular... most of the girls were ass kisser and rated him 7-8-9, however one girl gave him an 8 based on looks, but she said that if she takes his talking, attitude, and ideas into consideration, he’s nothing more than a 3.

StopElectingWealthy · 2026-02-05T15:57:00+00:00

This does not represent normal society at all

Title	Why were men Historically Married for Resources if Physical Attraction Definitely Matters Today?
Author	AviBledsoe
Upvotes	0
Comments	22
Date	February 5, 2026 2:00 PM UTC (6 months ago)
Subreddit	Posted in /r/seduction
Original Link	https://old.reddit.com/r/seduction/comments/1qwm1si/why_were_men_historically_married_for_resources/
Archive Link	https://theredarchive.com/r/seduction/why-were-men-historically-married-for-resources-if.1572770 https://theredarchive.com/post/1572770

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