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I've been told a few times that I have a "pretty penis", so I'm wondering what attributes constitute a good-looking penis? Is it biological? Is it social, such as with the myth-making and idolizing in the media of certain penises? A combination of the two? And if so, how much? This is an aesthetic question really, so I'm not expecting to find only one answer.
I guess to answer my own question first, I'd have to say a combination of the two. If all emotion is material, then there must be some designed process that takes place once the eyes are stimulated by sense data. I look at a penis, I have an emotion, and that emotion is either positive, negative, or any combination therein. The question is why those reactions happened in that way at that particular time.
I think a lot of it has to do with memory and reinforcement. During our formative years, we are exposed to media images of certain penises and not others. For example, look sometime at the pictures of sex ed books and you'll probably find a straight, smooth, fairly long and thick-looking penis (and un/circumcised depending on the detail and cultural source of the image). These observations are logged as memories and reinforced with neural connections. We then access these memories, which then almost simultaneously inspire in us a chemical emotion, when we see a similar penis. We log what we've learned a penis should look like, and then compare with what is in front of us. I believe for many people the Image of the penis from these books and other media sources (porn), which is constantly referenced and used as catalogue whenever we use words to describe them, serves as a symbolic and also Platonic form. We aspire to find the images in our head of the "perfect" penis so that we may be satisfied and have good feelings. Conversely, when we see a penis with a lot of protruding veins or long foreskin, we might say that is an "ugly" penis instead of a "different" penis.
Also, I think for a lot of straight guys (and this may be stretching it since I'm not), there is a jealousy issue with the acknowledgment of a "good-looking" penis. It's not so much that the straight guy has a positive emotion attached to an image of a penis, but that he sees other penises that look different from his and recognizes that there is a trend. He then internalizes this trend as a signal from the general society. He says, "That's a good-looking penis" because he wants to fit in and not cause trouble. Further, he might have negative feelings because this trend is getting more exposure than he is. He's competing for the attention of others on something that is very precious to him.
These are just a few examples and nowhere near representative of the diversified population at large (that's why I'm making an entire thread :smile. There are other reasons for such an aesthetic judgment that I can think of (for example, it's not so much how the penis looks as it is attached to a person you care deeply for, flaccid versus erect aesthetics, etc.), but I don't feel like elaborating on these right now. Maybe I'll write a book lol.
I'd like to hear from a lot of the women too, since I have no idea what's going on in their minds at any point in time, much less when they see a penis and judge it. :tongue: Please feel free to post images of what you think is a pretty penis, and also what you think is a ugly penis so a range can be established. Thanks for reading this far everyone! :biggrin1:
Btw, thank you Henry Miller for inspiring the above paragraphs with your thread about wanting to "BE" like other guys.
I guess to answer my own question first, I'd have to say a combination of the two. If all emotion is material, then there must be some designed process that takes place once the eyes are stimulated by sense data. I look at a penis, I have an emotion, and that emotion is either positive, negative, or any combination therein. The question is why those reactions happened in that way at that particular time.
I think a lot of it has to do with memory and reinforcement. During our formative years, we are exposed to media images of certain penises and not others. For example, look sometime at the pictures of sex ed books and you'll probably find a straight, smooth, fairly long and thick-looking penis (and un/circumcised depending on the detail and cultural source of the image). These observations are logged as memories and reinforced with neural connections. We then access these memories, which then almost simultaneously inspire in us a chemical emotion, when we see a similar penis. We log what we've learned a penis should look like, and then compare with what is in front of us. I believe for many people the Image of the penis from these books and other media sources (porn), which is constantly referenced and used as catalogue whenever we use words to describe them, serves as a symbolic and also Platonic form. We aspire to find the images in our head of the "perfect" penis so that we may be satisfied and have good feelings. Conversely, when we see a penis with a lot of protruding veins or long foreskin, we might say that is an "ugly" penis instead of a "different" penis.
Also, I think for a lot of straight guys (and this may be stretching it since I'm not), there is a jealousy issue with the acknowledgment of a "good-looking" penis. It's not so much that the straight guy has a positive emotion attached to an image of a penis, but that he sees other penises that look different from his and recognizes that there is a trend. He then internalizes this trend as a signal from the general society. He says, "That's a good-looking penis" because he wants to fit in and not cause trouble. Further, he might have negative feelings because this trend is getting more exposure than he is. He's competing for the attention of others on something that is very precious to him.
These are just a few examples and nowhere near representative of the diversified population at large (that's why I'm making an entire thread :smile. There are other reasons for such an aesthetic judgment that I can think of (for example, it's not so much how the penis looks as it is attached to a person you care deeply for, flaccid versus erect aesthetics, etc.), but I don't feel like elaborating on these right now. Maybe I'll write a book lol.
I'd like to hear from a lot of the women too, since I have no idea what's going on in their minds at any point in time, much less when they see a penis and judge it. :tongue: Please feel free to post images of what you think is a pretty penis, and also what you think is a ugly penis so a range can be established. Thanks for reading this far everyone! :biggrin1:
Btw, thank you Henry Miller for inspiring the above paragraphs with your thread about wanting to "BE" like other guys.