Are Beautiful People Going Extinct?

The other day, I came across an article entitled “Where Have all the Beautiful Women Gone?” Lest female readers object too quickly, the tagline states, “Desiring beauty isn't the problem—it's the inability to see it.” What follows in the article is a thought-provoking discussion about how single men today have a hard time seeing beauty.

Now, lest my male readers instantly close this tab out of indignation, rest assured that the author of the article, Joshua Rogers, is a man, reflecting on some of his own experiences. I only seek to comment on his article and draw further conclusions, which I hope will be relevant for both men and women.

Why am I still single?

Several of Rogers points resonate with me. Though they by no means provide a comprehensive answer to the question “Why are we still single?” (a question I’ve been pondering for many years now) I believe they do constitute one piece of that puzzle.

As someone who personally thought she’d be married over a decade ago and by now be surrounded by numerous children, “Why?” is a logical question.

I mean, it didn’t used to be like this. Back in the ’60’s, fewer than 1 in 10 adults, ages 25 and older, had never been married. Now it’s 1 in 5.  And if you include those who are divorced, annulled and widowed, the number of singles is even higher. US Census Bureau data from 2014 indicates that 45% of all US residents, aged 18 and older, are single.

One of the “whys” I’ve contemplated in that regard, is how people can attend young adult/ singles groups for years without getting married, save a few lucky folks here and there.

One priest recently told me that helping Catholics meet for good marriages was the main reason he and some others started Theology on Tap in their local area.

It’s been years since they launched it and only a few couples have met and gotten married. Why?

Sparkless in Seattle

It’s certainly a multi-faceted question, but perhaps part of it is that men and women today aren’t attracted enough to one another, so they don’t bother to explore the possibility of a romantic relationship. Rogers speaks of the numerous single men he has encountered who complain that they “simply haven’t felt the ‘spark’ with anyone.”

But if that is indeed the case, then why aren’t men and women as attracted to one another anymore?

Rogers claims that the problem is not that women today lack beauty, but that in this culture we are “drowning in beauty” or perhaps more accurately, “bombarded” by it. By way of example, he relates his experience of visiting an art museum with his wife. Despite their best intentions to really appreciate all the art they viewed, “after walking past hundreds of masterpieces” they had reached their saturation point. They could no longer really take in and appreciate what they were seeing.

Rogers points out that, in like fashion, men have an “endless exhibition of females… at their fingertips today. They're bombarded with thousands of pretty faces in Facebook profile pictures, Instagram selfies, dating apps, and advertisements… [E]ventually, all the faces run together—even the ones in the real world, where the habit of indiscriminate viewing continues.”

He could have added that many of the “pretty faces” seen on the billboards and magazine covers aren't even real—insofar as they have been made up, airbrushed and then photoshopped into someone who doesn’t look remotely like the woman who walked into the studio.

(Dis-honorable mention goes to the plague of pornography which even further reduces the person from a work of art by the Creator to merely an object of gratification.)

Rogers does not deny the value of outer, physical beauty, claiming that inner beauty is the only important ingredient. Rather, his article reflects an integrated view of the person.

St. John Paul II’s Theology of the Body emphasizes that the physical makes visible the invisible reality. The body reveals the person. We are body-soul unities which cannot be disintegrated without reducing the person to less than he or she is.

When we see a truly beautiful person, one who radiates life and joy—often through the eyes—we see their interior beauty through their exterior beauty.

After all, the eye is the “lamp of the body,” the window of the soul.  (Matt. 6:22-23)

When asked for beauty tips, Audrey Hepburn was wont to quote humorist Sam Levenson who wrote, “The beauty of a woman must be seen from in her eyes, because that is the doorway to her heart, the place where love resides.”

Perusing versus pursuing

Continuing with his art museum analogy, Rogers points out that in order to truly appreciate a work of art, one needs to take the time to really contemplate it and take it in. Taking a quick look or just glancing at a piece of art in passing can keep one from seeing all of the beauty that is present.

Especially in today’s world, we can tend to automatically categorize things, including  people we meet, as “useful” or “unuseful.”

Rogers quotes artist artist Makoto Fujimura, who says that “[i]t usually takes at least 10 minutes of sitting, quieting our hearts, and beholding the work before our eyes start to see, and our brain stops [trying] to categorize.”

Do we perhaps categorize people too quickly and then move on to the next “work of art,” all the while missing the beauty that was right before us? And is this because we don’t take the time needed to contemplate and receive what is present?

As I read the article, I thought about my love for beauty in nature—for panoramic views from the tops of mountains, for brilliant fall leaves against the deep blue sky, for glowing sunsets over the Pacific Ocean. I realized that even when I’m with people, something inside me just wants to be quiet and soak in the beauty before me in silence.

Struck dumb in Ireland

This connection of beauty with silence took the form of concrete experience a few years ago when I was in Ireland, on the little peninsula of Knockadoon. A few of us (5 in total) took a walk out to a bluff overlooking the water.

We had been engaged in lively conversation on the way there, but upon arrival something happened, without any discussion or previous arrangement.

Sitting down in the long grass, our conversation waned and we all simply gazed out at the water in silence…lost in thought and contemplation for a long time.

It was more than a quarter of an hour later that the silence was broken and we eventually made our way back.

In our frenzied culture, filled with noise, devices and constant demands, is it possible that our hearts aren’t quiet enough to contemplate the beauty in the people God has put in our lives, wherever we happen to encounter them? Is our attention span too short to take time to really see them? Do we lack the patience to look? In our search for a spouse, it’s something worth considering.

As Rogers concludes, “Beauty is all around you. Will you give yourself time to see it?… If you will, it does not necessarily mean you will suddenly find that elusive ‘spark’ and be on your way to marriage. You will, however, be much more likely to see beauty emerge before your eyes and find that you're unable to break your gaze.”

And if we cannot break our gaze, then perhaps we’ll experience a connection—and a person—that we didn’t know was there.

Anastasia Northrop dedicates her time to promoting John Paul II's understanding of the human person and studying issues common to single Catholics as the founder and director of the National Catholic Singles Conference (happening this year from Sept. 30 to Oct. 2 in Dallas, Texas).