J. Sanilac

Dispelling Beauty Lies

2021-04-25 · 00:00 UTC ·J Sanilac ·364 min read

Brief

J. Sanilac’s “Dispelling Beauty Lies” is a sprawling, aggressively polemical manifesto about heterosexual attraction that argues mainstream discourse on feminine beauty is corrupted by politeness, ideology, commerce, and social desirability bias. The article’s central methodological move is to reject direct surveys and stated preferences in favor of what the author considers revealed preferences: historical depictions of “love goddesses,” sex-doll product catalogs, erotic manga and anime, AI-generated women, glamour imagery, search results, and various self-run polls. From those sources, the author concludes that the mainstream fashion ideal of tall, ultra-thin, and relatively androgynous female beauty is not what most men privately prefer. Instead, the article repeatedly describes a dominant preference for a healthy-weight hourglass body with a small waist, larger breasts, rounded hips and buttocks, thick thighs, and long hair. The piece treats this not as a narrow fetish but as a deep cross-cultural pattern spanning Babylonian and Minoan figures, 19th-century paintings, romance covers, Sophia Loren, sex dolls, and anime.

The article is unusually quantitative for a personal polemic, though its numbers come from eclectic and often dubious proxies. Its most cited comparisons concern body ratios and breast size. The author reports popular sex-doll proportions around 39-24-39 or 37-24-39, with waist-to-bust and waist-to-hip ratios near 0.61, compared with Victoria’s Secret model averages around 32-24-34 and substantially less curvaceous ratios. Similar ratios are claimed for erotic anime characters, reinforcing the article’s assertion that “imaginary women” reveal idealized demand more cleanly than public-facing fashion or celebrity culture. The breast-size chapter is especially data-heavy: one retailer’s categorization allegedly implies that 80% of men choose what ordinary language would call large breasts, while another yields headline numbers such as 2% preferring A cups, 90% preferring above B, 78% preferring D or above, and an average preference around E/F. Throughout, the author argues that academic claims like the canonical 0.7 waist-to-hip ratio or “average breasts are best” are artifacts of biased surveys and poor inference.

From those descriptive claims, the article moves into prescriptive advice, much of it highly specific. The author says weight management is the most important controllable beauty variable but insists the optimal state is slim rather than emaciated, with the right target depending on how body fat distributes between waist and hips/thighs. Exercise advice emphasizes lower-body work—especially glute-focused strength training and sprinting—while warning against upper-body muscle development as masculinizing. Clothing advice stresses waist fit above all, discourages loose cuts, praises chokers and thigh-high stockings, and argues that lingerie should avoid flesh tones in favor of black, pink, white, or red. On cosmetic intervention, the article is notably pro-surgery: it treats breast augmentation as highly effective, argues that good results are common and underrecognized, recommends large rather than conservative implant sizes in roughly the 500-800cc range, and suggests nose jobs and fat transfer as other potentially high-return procedures. Many of these recommendations are framed in economic language: demand exceeds supply for certain traits, so rarity compounds value.

The article’s second half expands from visual attractiveness into sexual behavior and relationship maintenance, where it becomes even more controversial. Sanilac argues that women commonly misunderstand seduction by being too passive and by wrongly projecting female fantasies of male domination onto male desire. The author claims men want enthusiasm, initiative, visible desire, and recurring novelty rather than passivity or coercive dominance scripts. Concrete recommendations include initiating sex roughly one-third of the time, using practiced gait, posture, and erotic movement, varying style and costumes to simulate sexual novelty, and offering oral sex regularly without waiting to be asked. The piece also argues that male and female sexual needs are structurally asymmetric—men needing more “quantity and variety,” women more “quality”—and that good relationships should adapt to this asymmetry rather than chase equality in every interaction. These sections are presented as practical relationship craft, but they rest on broad generalizations, selective evidence, and strongly normative claims.

The final chapters turn openly ideological. The author attacks the fashion industry, journalists, academics, social media, body positivity, and what is described as the “male gaze” critique, arguing they sustain a negative-sum signaling game that harms relationships and women’s real interests. The piece claims women experience a psychological block that prevents them from acknowledging what men actually like, and it presents the article as a kind of dissident samizdat suppressed by platforms, moderators, search engines, and NGOs. The overall result is less a neutral study than a maximalist worldview: part amateur aesthetics, part mating-market economics, part self-help manual, and part culture-war tract. Whatever one thinks of its claims, it is an unusually detailed and highly opinionated attempt to systematize attraction using nontraditional data sources and to convert those claims into behavioral and cosmetic prescriptions.

Why it matters

Context sentence: J. Sanilac’s 2021 article is an 81,832-word polemic arguing that mainstream beauty culture misrepresents heterosexual male preferences and proposing an alternative framework built from art history, sex-doll catalogs, erotic illustrations, AI imagery, and the author’s own polls.

Key details

The author’s core empirical claim is that the modal male preference is an exaggerated hourglass rather than runway thinness, citing sex-doll inventory averages around 37-24-39 to 39-24-39 with waist-to-bust and waist-to-hip ratios near 0.61-0.65, versus Victoria’s Secret model averages of roughly 32-24-34 with ratios of 0.75 and 0.71.
The piece repeatedly rejects survey-based academic beauty research as unreliable on “milgram question” topics, arguing that social desirability bias makes direct self-reports about attraction untrustworthy and favoring revealed-preference proxies such as private purchases of sex dolls, erotic anime proportions, search results, and user behavior.
On breast size, the author claims “bigger is better” in an economic sense, using retailer category data to argue that about 80% of men choose what would conventionally count as large breasts; one cited retailer breakdown says only 2% prefer A cups, 90% prefer above B, 78% prefer D cup or larger, and the average preference is around E/F.
The article frames fashion-industry norms as systematically anti-feminine, asserting that influential designers favor tall, thin, boyish silhouettes and even clothes that impose a masculine V-shape; it contrasts that with historical “love goddesses,” romance-cover art, Sophia Loren’s 38-24-38 figure, and AI/anime imagery as evidence of continuity in preference for curvier bodies.
The author treats facial preference as partly individualized rather than purely generic, claiming that men often have highly specific recurring “types”; in one cited face survey of roughly 300 men, the most popular composite face drew well over 100 first-choice-equivalent points while the least popular drew only one suitor, suggesting large supply-demand differences even among otherwise pretty faces.

Cleaned source text

title: Dispelling Beauty Lies

author: J Sanilac

content_type: article

publication: J. Sanilac

published: 2021-04-25T00:00:00

source_url: https://www.jsanilac.com/dispelling-beauty-lies/

word_count: 81832

Dispelling Beauty Lies: The Truth About Feminine Beauty

The facts about feminine beauty are simple and intuitive, even obvious. But public discussion of the topic is dominated by lies that confuse many women. Oddly enough, intelligent women seem to be the most susceptible. This makes it harder for them to attract mates, subjects them to misguided self-doubts, and even damages their health. Their efforts to improve their appearance are in vain because they aim at the wrong target. All too often they simply give up on a game they could win if they understood the rules. But for fear of being impolite, men never correct their illusions.

In this article I’ll dispel the confusion and tell you the straight truth about feminine attractiveness. In the closing section I’ll offer some practical advice. If you're in a hurry and just want a few quick beauty tips, you can start here and come back to Dispelling Beauty Lies when you're ready for it. (Note: if you can't read the font, click the "translate" button above.)

A warning before you continue: I won't pander to boost your self-esteem. Writing the truth instead of repeating familiar lies will offend some readers. Most women will experience discomfort. If you're emotionally fragile or psychologically troubled, you should stop here. However, learning the truth will enable clear-sighted women to improve their appearance and succeed at the game of beauty. This is a prize that's worth the cost.

Dispelling Beauty Lies* is the most accurate and comprehensive guide to feminine beauty ever written. If you’re ready for real answers, read on.

I. Everyone liesII. Learning from love goddessesIII. Imaginary women IV. The truth about breast sizeV. Common and uncommon tastesVI. Market forcesVII. The most important secret about facesVIII. A note on masculine beautyIX. "Beauty" and "hotness"X. Correcting homeworkXI. Drawing the right conclusionsXII. Reality-based beauty tips1. Finding the best weight for you2. Clothing and fashion3. Cosmetics and cosmetic surgery4. Hair, skin, and eyes5. Motion and posture6. The most common misconception about seduction7. Personality and individuality8. Beauty and aging.XIII. Answering objectionsXIV. Censorship and suppressionAppendix: survey resultsReview: the top twenty-two worst liesAfterwordIndex

I. Everyone lies

a. The many reasons to lieb. Who's really your enemy?c. Beauty is an athletic skill

a. The many reasons to lie

Why are lies about beauty abundant? Beauty is so socially important that almost everyone has a reason to lie about it.

The fashion industry uses tall, ultra-thin models to impress and intimidate customers. The tactic increases clothing sales, but these models aren’t the best examples of beauty. Similarly, paid beauty writers and influencers make their money from advertising fashion and beauty products. The conflict of interest discourages them from giving accurate advice.

Body-positive influencers sometimes praise the beauty of unhealthy figures in a way that seems disconnected from reality. They expand their audience through flattery and pandering, not honesty. Journalists lie about beauty to bolster their favorite social and political causes, which they consider far more important than the truth.

The masses on social media unthinkingly repeat false ideas just because they’re trending. They form mobs to insult or compliment the appearance of random celebrities, only to contradict themselves once the trend changes.

Market forces compel even well-meaning people in the beauty industry to endorse conventional lies instead of providing all the help they could. As one cosmetic surgeon informed me with regret, “You can't tell women the truth because they'll crucify you. You'll go out of business.”

Men have incentives to lie about what attracts them as well. To be polite, or to flatter. Or even to show their good taste. Pretending not to notice overt sex appeal is a way of signaling refinement and class. It implies they’re subtler and more perceptive than other men. But it also projects a false picture of what they really want. It's not that men think through these lies with reason. They tell them compulsively by default, because they know what they're supposed to say and what you want to hear. They'll even lie unconsciously to test whether your feminine instincts are so weak that you listen.

Some insecure women deride any concept of beauty that doesn't match what they see in the mirror. Unable to acknowledge their own imperfections, they hope words alone can make them the fairest of all. Others intentionally promote beauty lies with fabrications, malicious gossip, and petty insults directed at their more attractive competitors.

Even the most beautiful and self-assured women will lie, whether to guard their secrets, to sabotage their competitors, or because they don’t really know the answers themselves.

Self-deception compounds the problem. Once you're invested in the lies you've been told by marketers, flatterers, and competitors, it's psychologically difficult to accept the truth. You're tempted to behead the messenger and cling to feeble counterarguments you wouldn't take seriously in any other context. And your friends tell you what you want to hear, because their only alternative is to hurt and offend someone they love.

“What makes a woman attractive?” is a milgram question. In other words, the social penalty for an unflattering answer is much higher than the reward for telling the truth. Because of this we simply can’t trust the answers we receive, even if they’re coming from friends.

In sum, everyone’s lying about beauty. And when you consider the motivations I’ve just listed, it shouldn’t be a surprise. We have very good reasons to lie!

All these lies can carry over into science. Scientific studies of beauty are often based on questionnaires. The scientists just perform a statistical analysis and repackage the results as verified truth. But survey responses on sexual topics are unreliable. Fancy mathematical language might make these studies sound authoritative, but it can't transform a collection of false answers into a true one. And there's a limit to how well a handful of numbers can characterize beauty.

So to reveal the truth I won’t rely on surveys or professed opinions. Instead I’ll present direct evidence of men’s real preferences.

b. Who's really your enemy?

Why should men be the ones to judge what's beautiful? My approach here is simple and practical, not philosophical. The main purpose of personal beauty is to attract and satisfy a member of the opposite sex. There are other reasons to be beautiful, but they make a much smaller contribution to human happiness. That means men are the most important judges of feminine beauty, just as women are the most important judges of masculine beauty.

Your professors may have taught you to loathe the "male gaze." This crazy attitude will do you more harm than good. In fact, it's far worse than a beauty lie. You can't win by condemning the judges. Instead you should embrace your potential for beauty, and use it to cultivate a fulfilling relationship.

Women's intuition for feminine beauty isn't as different from men's as some suppose. But because it's less firmly grounded in instinct, it's more susceptible to distortion by media and marketing. Often what women superficially think of as “their” sense of beauty is really a set of prejudices pasted over their intuitions by profiteers and propagandists. You might doubt this claim, but be patient. I'll demonstrate it in detail later on.

Some claim an uncompromising analysis of feminine beauty is inherently misogynistic. This is quite opposite to the truth. Empowerment is about being able to get what you want. The more beauty you have, the easier it is to get what you want. And the better you understand beauty, the easier it is to obtain it. It's that simple.

Those who justify dishonesty by labelling the truth misogynistic are taking advantage of you. They're disempowering you and implying women are too fragile to handle reality. This article, in contrast, aims to help any woman who's ready to open her eyes. In the final account, its accuracy will be borne out by its efficacy.

Don't Trust Me

Some claim the author is a tasteless scoundrel who can't be

trusted

. As it happens, the author doesn't

want

to be trusted. Instead, examine the evidence and reasoning. Don't take anything you read on faith.### c. Beauty is an athletic skill

The hardest lies to conquer are the ones we tell ourselves. So before we continue I'm going to explain the right way to think about your beauty. This explanation will anticipate some conclusions I haven't justified yet, but I'm offering it in advance to ease your mind.

Beauty is confusing because it combines elements that seem personal with elements that are purely physical, and we easily mix these up. Figure skating is a good metaphor. Both a great figure skater and a great beauty seamlessly blend personal expression with physical excellence. Yet these are still two different things. And in beauty as in skating, physical excellence is more important.

It's popular to tell women beauty is just self-expression, and the unique person you are will always be beautiful to the right man. This sounds nice, but it's the verbal equivalent of a frenemy giving you a warm hug as she stabs you in the back. It's no different from telling someone she can be good at figure skating simply by expressing herself, and that physical skill doesn't matter. A skater who follows this sort of advice won't only miss the Olympics, she'll skate badly and never improve.

In fact, this “nice” idea is the single most harmful beauty lie. It reinforces the misperception that a woman's beauty is her personal essence, so if men don't appreciate your appearance, you must be a worthless person with an unlovable soul. That isn't true at all, and believing it is will damage your mental health.

For your own good, please stop thinking of beauty as only or even mainly self-expression. Instead, start thinking of beauty as an athletic skill that allows you to express yourself better. Some women are more naturally talented at this skill than others. But just as everyone can skate better with practice, everyone can contribute more beauty to the world if she makes a well-directed effort.

Once you reorient yourself in this way, you'll realize your imperfections aren't cause for despair. Even the few women who bring home medals still make mistakes.

Your personality is, of course, already golden. But you're about to learn how to score top marks for technical merit too. And instead of just winning medals, you're going to win hearts. Are you ready?

If you suffer from anorexia, body dysmorphia, or distress related to your body image, consider reading the section titled “

Finding The Best Weight For You

” first.II. Learning from love goddesses

II. Learning from love goddesses

a. Historical exemplars of feminine beautyb. Limitations of the historical record

a. Historical exemplars of feminine beauty

Let’s begin with the most enduring visual examples of feminine beauty: love goddesses. The representations below were created hundreds or even thousands of years apart by groups that spoke different languages and lived in different climates. Despite differences in their style, function, and degree of realism, they share common features.

The love goddesses typically have an hourglass figure, with a small waist, larger than average breasts, and pronounced hips. They have a moderate, healthy weight: fairly slim, but not skinny.

This Indian statue is two thousand years old.

These two Minoan examples are more than three thousand years old.

This Babylonian love goddess is nearly four thousand years old.

Below are erotic odalisque paintings from 19th-century America, France, and Italy.

A mountain of historical evidence shows no correlation between high status and a taste for thin, curveless women. This is a sculpture of a famous upper-class courtesan from 19th-century Paris.

The Prime Minister of Spain commissioned the paintings below to depict his mistress and later wife.

Nor were obese women widely preferred. Rubens is often cited as a counterexample to conventional beauty ideals. But his corpulent figures, such as the last image below, are exceptions in a long history of love-goddess representations that fit the general trend. Outliers like this don't nullify the rule.

Obese prehistoric figurines like the 30,000-year-old “Venus of Willendorf” are also frequently raised as counterexamples. But they don't qualify as love goddesses. The “Venus” appellation is arbitrary and disputed by scholars. These figurines weren't found with a label, and their true meaning and function are unknown.

And there is, in fact, no shortage of ancient figurines which do exhibit the hourglass shape common in verifiable love-goddess representations.

In the next gallery you’ll find a selection of famous cartoons of attractive women that spans several decades: Sleeping Beauty, Jasmine, Jessica Rabbit, and three popular anime characters. Fujiko Mine, at the bottom left, has been repeatedly voted the most beautiful character in Japan.

These images are in some cases exaggerated, but that’s the nature of cartoon art. On the other hand, social conventions set limits on the figures "serious" artists could depict. For instance, critics condemned William Etty's Venus and her Satellites (below) as pornographic in the 1830s.

Most paintings and sculptures are sexually understated, partly because they’re made for public display in places where it would be inappropriate to inspire lust, and partly because unrestrained sex appeal would dominate men's attention and distract them from subtler elements of the artwork.

The moralistic theme of resistance to temptation could sometimes excuse franker depictions of desirable women, at least after sexually repressive traditions began to weaken. But the general rule was to avoid them in serious painting. In past centuries those who broke that rule might even be subject to unexpected visits from the Spanish Inquisition.

Similar pressures limit artistic representations of the female form even today, as the news stories below demonstrate. Artists are discouraged or prohibited from depicting women who might be deemed too attractive. As a result, it's impossible a priori for a survey of serious art to show what an ideally attractive woman looks like.

Despite these limitations, the cartoons, paintings, and sculptures of love goddesses share the same salient characteristics.

Cultural and regional variations do exist, but are smaller than you might assume. For instance, the ideal women preferred by American and Japanese men are more similar than real American and Japanese women!

Finally, here are three of the goddesses juxtaposed with human models.

b. Limitations of the historical record

So love goddesses and archetypes of beauty follow a pattern. However, they're not all identical. For instance, classical Greek statues don't have the small waist and wide hips evident in our other examples. Nor do the later Venuses copied from them. In fact, Van Gogh quit art school when he was assigned to copy the Venus de Milo because he believed its hips were too narrow.

While the persistence of this particular deviation was partly driven by a founder effect, its original motive is open to debate. Even in ancient times many influential artists were homosexual, perhaps including Botticelli himself.

When we look earlier into Greek history, we can find the familiar figure seen in love-goddess representations around the world.

Nevertheless, exceptions are real and can't all be dismissed so easily.

Historical artwork may be compelling, but it's not enough to make a strong case. Furthermore, we can't rule out the possibility that current tastes differ from traditional ones. To reliably determine what men find attractive today, we'll have to examine more evidence.

III. Imaginary women