Reality

I've seen this a couple times, and I find it not only amusing, but completely true. Enjoy...

  Jewish mothers want their children to marry other Jews. Catholics mothers want their children to marry other Catholics. Mormon mothers want their children to marry other Mormons. Besides their desire to help their children avoid the stress that different belief systems can have on a marital relationship, they also want to ensure that their progeny remain faithful in their respective belief system. I understand this concept, as I am both a product and victim of such pressures. As a Mormon, I understand the necessity of marrying within my religious boundaries--if for no other reason--because regular people think we are weird. And, they're sort of right. Ok, totally right. We're weird. Get over it. Most LDS singles marry in the 20-25 year old age range. We marry young. Agree with the wisdom of this concept or not, mormon people marry young--except for those that don't. I, my patient reader, am one that did not. And, indeed, may not.You want to know why, don't you? Well, I'm sure all my friends and relatives have their own hypotheses. I'm abrasive. I'm combative. I look like I'm mad all the time. I'm too tall. I act like I'm smarter than everybody else. I'm cynical. My expectations are too high. I'm too prudish. I'm too slutty. I've heard all of these from "friends" or family.Well, you're all wrong. The real reason lies in Emily K's Theory of the Mormon Scale of Attractiveness. Allow me to explain...

Here, you see a depiction of a normal Scale of Attractiveness. You are, I am sure, not wholly unfamiliar with this scale as it is a rather common assessment of beauty.

Here you see two adult people of "Average Hotness", both a "5" on the scale in the normal, everyday world. In this normal, everyday world, the ratio of single men to single women is pretty much 1:1. There are as many single men as their are single women.

This ratio does not hold true for the Mormon community, however. Since men tend to drift away from the teachings of the LDS church at a higher rate than women, the ratio of men to women skews a bit, becoming 1:2 or even 1:3 or 4 in some areas of the country.

In an area where there are 3 or 4 Mormon women to ever 1 Mormon man, the balance of power is thrown off. All of a sudden, men who would otherwise get no attention from women become desired commodities, merely because the demand is so high on the limited supply. How does this affect our scale?

Emily K. suggests that, because of the abundance of women, a Mormon woman will move down two points on the scale of attractiveness, while a Mormon man will move up two points. Two people who used to be equals are now 4 levels of attractiveness away from each other.

This movement on the scale causes women of normal attractiveness to consider themselves fugly, impeding their ability to make wise dating decisions. It also inflates the ego of average mormon men into thinking they are more of a catch than they truly are.

Here is another example. Average man sees Beautiful Woman. In the Regular world, he would think her out of his league.

In the Mormon world, since they each slide, they are now considered equals, while Average Man's actual equal, Average Woman, is left down in the "3" range with men that could have started at a Fugly "1" on the scale.

You can scoff at this theory all you want. But, I'm telling you that I've seen it in action. Look around you at church--notice that average men are hooking up with women WAY out of their league all over the place. How many times have I had to listen to my thin, beautiful friends at church cry because none of the ugly guys at church give them even the slightest romantic attention? Every size 8 Mormon woman thinks she's fat. All the women are insecure and all the men have ridiculously high opinions of themselves.

This female insecurity leads my fellow mormon women to act in the most juvenile of ways. There is constant scheming to, not only attract male attention their way (through baked goods or dinner parties), but also put down all women around them (this is obviously not true of ALL Mormon women, but it IS a VERY common phenomenon).

Emily's full theory includes extra-notch-up-moving for men who went on missions or hold a high position at church--but, I'm going to exclude that aspect of the theory for now to let you all respond. I get the feeling you'll have a response.