Yea, Spark.com! Fatties of the world, unite!
Spark.com Thinks BeautifulPeople.com Acted Ugly
New Online Dating Site Offers Free Subscription to ‘Booted Beauties’
BEVERLY HILLS, CA—(Marketwire - January 6, 2010) - Spark®.com, created by the same people behind such successful online dating sites as JDate®.com, BlackSingles.com® and ChristianMingle®.com, announced today that they will offer a free subscription to all 5,000 members ousted from BeautifulPeople.com yesterday for allegedly putting on a few holiday pounds and being “newly chubby.”
“As a company based on inclusion and creating communities where people feel comfortable and safe, we’re outraged over the widely publicized actions taken by BeautifulPeople.com,” said Adam Berger, Chairman and Chief Executive Officer of Spark Networks®, the parent company of Spark.com. “We created Spark.com to be a place where all are welcome and we adhere to the philosophy that any two people willing to take the time to first know themselves, and then learn about others, can improve existing relationships as well as form new and rewarding ones. We are so disappointed in how that ‘other site’ behaved, and feel the right thing to do is to offer a free one-month subscription to anyone who was kicked off that other site for putting on a few extra holiday pounds.”
To take advantage of this special offer, all people have to do is log on to Spark.com, complete a free profile and email their Spark.com username and rejection notice from the other site to .(JavaScript must be enabled to view this email address), and they’ll receive a free one-month subscription within 24 hours.
Easily one of the LEAST attractive attributes I see in both men and women is fat phobia, followed quickly by looks snobs—those folks who look for perfection, even thought they are far from it themselves. Here’s a dating site that is a wonderful refuge for them both—fat phobics and looksists. And see what BeautifulPeople.com, a dating site that has a “strict ban on ugly people” did after the holidays. Charming, huh? At least they have a place of their own to hang out, away from the rest of us who are a bit more tolerant.
Dating site for beautiful people expels ‘fatties’ after holiday weight gain
By Mallory Simon, CNN
(CNN)—A dating site that markets itself as an elite community for beautiful people with a “strict ban on ugly people” has axed about 5,000 members for packing on the pounds during the holiday season.
The international site BeautifulPeople.com threw out members after they posted photos “revealing that they have let themselves go,” according to a company statement.
“As a business, we mourn the loss of any member, but the fact remains that our members demand the high standard of beauty be upheld,” said Robert Hintze, founder of BeautifulPeople.com. “Letting fatties roam the site is a direct threat to our business model and the very concept for which BeautifulPeople.com was founded.”
The site describes itself as an “elite online club, where every member works the door”—that is, users can join only after enough members vote them “beautiful” during the 48 hours after their profile is uploaded.
And apparently, enough beautiful people were angry that some members had enjoyed a bit too many treats during the holiday season.
So BeautifulPeople.com sent those flagged members e-mails, according to the company statement, telling them they could register again for the site when the extra pudge was gone.
“We responded to complaints by moving the newly chubby members back to the rating stage. This is the same as having them re-apply,” Greg Hodge, managing director of BeautifulPeople.com, said in a statement.
The company said it “expelled” 1,520 users from the U.S., 832 from the U.K., 533 from Canada, 510 from Poland, 425 from Germany, 402 from Italy, 323 from France, 220 from Denmark, 176 from Turkey and 88 people from Russia. In the e-mail, it gave users suggestions for boot camps and workout facilities to get themselves back in shape.
Some gave the site a shot again, hoping fellow users might not see them as the “fatties” others had.
“Their re-applications were reviewed by existing members, and only a few hundred were voted back in. Over 5,000 were rejected,” Hodge added.
Hodge admits, and has admitted from the time his company started, that his site may not be fair, but people want to date someone they are attracted to.
“Is it elitist? Yes, it is, because our members want it to be,” Hodge said when the company started out in 2005. “Is it lookist? Yes, it is, because our members want it to be. Is it PC? No, it’s not, but it’s honest.”
And on this site, beauty is certainly in the eye of the beholder; only one in five applicants is normally accepted, a company statement said.
Maintaining those standards is what the site is about, Hodge said, and that’s why people were expelled.
“Every year we see that some of our members from Western cultures eat and drink to excess over the holidays, and clearly their looks suffer,” he said in a statement. “The U.S.A. has been grossly over-indulging since Thanksgiving. It’s no wonder that so many members have been expelled from the network. We hope they will be back after shedding the festive pounds.”
It’s an unfortunate truth that as wonderful a resource as Internet dating has been for adult singles, it also has increased the pressure to be perfect, especially in the looks and weight department. One of the thing that dating online encourages is the fantasy that every beautiful woman OR man is equally available to you, no matter what your relative looks are. Add in that most people overrate their own attractiveness, and you have a gold rush of business to the 10’s online, and nothing or next to it if you are a 5 or below. Large women have the most difficult time of all. In my experience, if you are female and on the heavier side of average or higher (and average is 165 pounds and size 14), either lose some weight or get on a site for larger folks. The lack of traffic and attention to you on the mainstream sites like Match.com and Yahoo! Personals will be deafening.
BBW can’t find SM: Plus-size online dating is hard
Each day, Match.com sends Christie Hyde five potential mates based on preferences in her profile—age, height, education, religion, smoking.
But then she reads “slender” or “athletic and toned” for their preferred body type.
She’s a size 24.
“It literally happens every day on that site,” said Hyde, 33, who works in public
relations in Daytona Beach, Fla. “I am open on the sites about my size. I am who I am.”
The dating show “More to Love” suggests that love comes in all shapes and sizes, but plus-size singles say their weight sometimes gets in the way of finding love online, even though two-thirds of Americans are overweight or obese.
Cynthia Colby, 55, who works in multimedia marketing and promotions in Kitchener, Ontario, Canada, said she tried eHarmony and Match.com with no luck.
“Either I was overlooked or I would sometimes get someone who didn’t read the part where I said how heavy I was,” said Colby. She included that she was a large woman (size 20) in her profile and posted photos, but typically when she reminded matches about her size, they’d say, “‘Oh. I didn’t know. That changes things.’”
Cheryl Sellick, 54, of Cherryville, N.C., who has been on Match.com and Plentyoffish.com, doesn’t say she is a BBW (big beautiful woman), size 26, in her profile, but does post photos.
She sends the men an e-mail before meeting in person: ” “I want to remind you I am a big beautiful woman. Are you sure you want to do this?’ Some guys are gracious about it, she said, but “most of them are just gone.’ “
Sellick is now looking for matches on the MoretoLove.com dating site, and feels more comfortable knowing the men are looking for larger women.
Studies show that people who are overweight face discrimination in many areas, including work, education, health care and even from families and friends, according to Peggy Howell of the National Association to Advance Fat Acceptance. Dating seems to be no different.
A Wake Forest University study earlier this year found that men find thin, seductive women the most attractive. Researchers surveyed 4,000 men and women aged 18 to 70-plus and asked them how attractive they found photos of members of the opposite sex.
The men had similar body type preferences, while the women had a more diverse range of responses, said lead researcher Dustin Wood.
No wonder some women lie on their profiles, choosing a “few extra pounds” instead of “heavyset” or posting photos from younger, thinner years.
Laura Triplett, an assistant professor of communications at California State University, Fullerton, who studies fat discrimination, said many larger-sized women are rejected once they meet a potential mate in person, even if they are upfront about size in profiles and photos.
She said in one instance, a man flew a woman across the country for a meeting, was disappointed when he saw her and asked her to refund the price of the ticket, claiming he flew her there under false pretenses.
“With online dating, I think that people invest themselves with emotion and fantasy of who the other person is,” said Triplett. “The actual facts fall by the wayside. When they actually see the person, taboo takes over. Simply being near someone who possesses a socially undesirable trait is enough to trigger fear of public outcry.”
Triplett suggests overweight women use a niche site like MoretoLove.com, BBPeopleMeet.com and BBWRomance.com. But she does not advise including weight or size in profiles. “People are going to use your physical characteristics to judge you,” she said. “Why not focus on other things about yourself?”
It’s one of the reasons eHarmony doesn’t ask about weight in its questionnaire. Matching focuses on psychological characteristics, such as shared values, beliefs, attitudes and interests rather than looks, said Paul Breton of eHarmony.
But people should be honest, said James Houran, columnist and spokesman for Online Dating Magazine, whether it’s about size, height or how much hair they have. He calls the eHarmony approach naive; men are visual creatures, he said.
“By sharing who you really are, you are increasing your odds of finding someone who will genuinely have an attraction to you,” he said.
Some men, of course, want to date large women. Bill Fabrey, 68, of Mount Marion, N.Y., owner of Amplestuff, which sells accessories for large people, prefers women who are a size 20 or more. He himself is 5 foot 8 and 220 pounds. He complains that some women on plus-size sites are reluctant to post photos. “Most of the matches that are successful result from photos,” he said.
Linda Arroz, 50, of Los Angeles, a lifestyle expert and former plus-size spokesmodel, said a lot of online success comes from confidence. When she used the headline “Smart, Successful BBW seeks SWM for fun, wine and dine” on Craigslist, she received 100 responses. She vetted six, met five and ended up dating two of the guys.
“I realize that many, if not most men, do not want to date a fat woman,” said Arroz, who is divorced and a size 16-18. “If they like the woman first, they don’t notice her size, they just notice her.”
Finally, some good news for women AND men with a few extra pounds. Here’s some real life numbers about how singles really feel about dating people who are bigger than skinny.
85% of Single Men Would Date Heavy Women; 90% of Single Women Feel Men Can’t See Past a Few Extra Pounds States Date.com
MIAMI BEACH, FL, Kirstie Alley, Jessica Simpson, Kelly Clarkson and Oprah have spent year’s yo-yo dieting, but would they work so hard to be thin if they knew men love them despite the extra pounds? These days, Fat is Fabulous, with reality shows about a heavy bachelor searching for his heavy set sweetheart and zaftig women competing in dance-offs, bringing in big ratings numbers for the Networks. So when Fox’s More to Love Bachelor, Luke Conley, professed to loving big, beautiful women, leading online dating sites Date.com (http://www.date.com), Matchmaker.com (http://www.matchmaker.com), and Amor.com (http://www.amor.com), decided to poll its members to see what they think about dating overweight men or women.
The results were surprising, perhaps even astounding. A whopping 85% of single men professed their love for heavier women with more than 80% of men feeling that overweight women are less bitchy than thin women. These single men thought that overweight women appreciate the attention that men give them and are more loving because of it.
Since the beginning of time men and women have failed to understand each other and this latest poll shows that this continues. While the majority of men have no issue with an overweight woman, 90% of women think men find extra weight unattractive, and that heavy women have a much harder time dating.
“These poll results show such a significant discrepancy in the way men feel about dating overweight women, and what women think men are looking for when it comes to relationships. Unfortunately, these types of misconceptions between the sexes are extremely common, and result in a lot of missed dating and relationship opportunities,” said Shira Zwebner, Relationship Advisor for Date.com, Matchmaker.com and Amor.com. “At the end of the day, what’s important to men is that the women they date be open and receptive to being loved and to giving love, not whether or not they’re a perfect size zero. And once overweight women realize that men aren’t just looking for a thin woman, they’ll have a lot more self-confidence when dating, which will ultimately result in more successful romances.”
In a new survey of thousands of male online daters nationwide, conducted in the months of July and August 2009, we asked: Fox’s hit reality show this Summer, More to Love, is about an overweight guy looking for love amongst overweight women. America is one of the fattest nations on the planet; do you prefer dating skinny or overweight women?
Following are the complete results:
A couple of extra pounds is fine by me: 85%
Thin: 15%
We also asked our male members the following: Why do you prefer to date a heavy woman?
Following are the complete results:
I find that overweight women are less bitchy than thin women, they appreciate the attention men give them and are more loving because of it: 80%
Because it matters what’s on the inside, not on the outside: 68.7%
Heavier women are better in bed: 54.2%
Overweight women have more fun, especially those who are happy in their own skin: 12.5%
All of the above: 34.6%
We also asked our male members the following: And if you would date an overweight woman, how heavy can she be?
Following are the complete results:
She can be obese; it doesn’t matter as long as I love her: 79.9%
A couple of pounds overweight, but she should be working on losing it: 63.8%
20 pounds is my limit: 42.5%
I wouldn’t date someone who is overweight: 20.5%
In a new survey of thousands of female online daters nationwide, we asked: Fox’s hit reality show this Summer, More to Love, is about an overweight guy looking for love amongst overweight women. America is one of the fattest nations on the Planet; do you think overweight women have a harder time dating?
Following are the complete results:
Absolutely, men can’t see beyond a few extra pounds: 90.0%
Not really, they’re just single like the rest of us: 10.0%
We also asked our female members the following: Would you date an overweight guy?
Following are the complete results:
Yes, I love a teddy bear, I feel protected by a bigger guy: 87.6%
Depends on how overweight he is, I’d like someone who is health conscious and not a couch potato: 74.3%
No, I want a guy who is fit and keeps in shape: 29.8%
Women want tall men and men want little women, but only 15% of men are six feet tall or more, and roughly 1/3 of adults are obese. So think of all those good ones you are passing by, just because you are prejudiced against the vertically or horizontally challenged.
The big and small of dating
By Dusan In General |
Most of us think up the most ideal situations when it comes to dating is a petite girl and a tall, dark and handsome man. But what happens when the guy is shorter than girl, or the girl weighs a few more pounds than her man?
This is an important question to be asking — obesity is rampant in the United States with more than 31% of the dating population being overweight.
Dating a short guy should no longer cause a problem, as we are no longer fighting for survival - so the height and strength of a man is not a question of life and death. But it seems that the guys are more self-conscious about this. If you want to date a short guy, you should consider measuring up his self-confidence first.
Though it seems that the bigger ladies will have more of a problem finding a date, as there is much more of a stigma around dating big women. This is met with rude stares and a lack of acceptance. However, this does not mean the big and tall ladies do not deserve just as much love as the men. The ratio between overweight women and men is fairly even, so why all the hang-ups?
Basically, those who have been wading through the dating pool for a long time and just haven’t found anyone, should try opening their horizons. A few inches more here and few less there does not mean that someone does not have the kind heart and love that you are looking for.
Here’s the first article I have seen that begins to address the problems of singles who are on the chubby or more side of the bell shaped curve of weight. Actually, I think the bell is weighted (pun intended) with heavier folks, more and more all the time as our country gains in size.
Larger than average folks have a harder time finding a mate online and off. (Though what is average? At 189 pounds for men, 162 pounds for women, the average is pretty hefty. And that makes for a lot of those folks well above the averages stated here.) Internet dating and the compulsory photo have put heavier folks at a real disadvantage. And if one should use an old or flattering picture, the bump with reality at the first real date can send the new flirtation into the gutter. The numbers of possibilities via online dating too encourage the search for perfection, which usually does not include fat.
Let’s hear some comments from readers about dating and body size.
Best, Kathryn Lord
THE GREAT WEIGHT DEBATE
By DAWN YANEK
July 15, 2007—PARTICIPATING IN OUR ROUNDTABLE:
Stacy Kravetz, author of The Dating Race
Robert Rosenwein, Ph.D., sociology professor at Lehigh University
Jeff, 29, teacher, New York
Heather, 30, social worker, New York
Diny, 31, student, Massachusetts
Q: Let’s face it: Weight is a hot button when it comes to dating. Let’s hear what your experiences have been like.
Stacy: There is such a weight phobia in this culture! People are so used to the images on TV and the models in magazines that their perception gets a little skewed.
Heather: In my experience dating as a woman who is not thin, I think guys are more obsessed with weight than women are. If you look at my dating history, you’d know that I’m not just into looks. But with guys, sometimes their online profile will say, “I like a woman who takes care of herself physically, spiritually and mentally”-and “physically” is underlined. And you should see the guys who have the nerve to be so concerned about that!
Jeff: I have an average build, but a little bit of a belly. However, I like to surf and be active, and I want to be with someone who likes those things. If someone’s on the bigger side, they’re probably not going to be interested in that. It’s not only about attraction to a certain body type-it’s also about lifestyle choices.
Q: Heather raised the issue of online profiles, so let’s talk about that: What’s online dating like for people who are overweight?
Stacy: Online dating gives you an opportunity to not be eliminated right off the bat because of weight and general appearance. If you build a rapport with someone and you don’t measure up to what you’ve described, there’s always the chance that it won’t matter.
Diny: If you meet someone at a bar, you’ve seen each other, so there won’t be any disappointment the next time you meet. I had a great rapport via email with one guy I met online, but when we met, I guess he thought I looked different than my picture and his face fell. The whole lunch was uncomfortable.
Heather: It can be hard, because for some guys weight can be a critical factor in whether they want to date you. I’ve found that since there are so many prospects online, guys feel like they can be really selective.
Q: Do you ever fudge the truth about your weight on your profile?
Heather: I never lie about my weight because I never want someone to be like, “Ohhh, I thought you were thin.” My friends say that I go too much in the other direction; I’ll check a box that might describe me as bigger than I am.
Jeff: I’ve never lied. I want them to know what they’re getting. If a girl’s not going to like me because I have a belly, I’m not interested.
Diny: I have good pictures: They only show my upper body, and they’re taken from a flattering angle. But I feel like everybody looks at a picture, bumps it down by 20% and thinks, “She’s probably less attractive than that.” Since I’m overweight, I don’t know how to accurately represent myself without taking myself out of the running.
Q: Have you ever met someone online, then gone on a date and found that they’re heavier than you thought they’d be? Was it a deal-breaker?
Jeff: I met a woman whose picture was a little dark and far away, and she looked much heavier in person. She just wasn’t my type physically and I would’ve known that if she’d posted a more accurate picture. I didn’t make future plans with her. You’re on a dating site to make your life easier and because you’re busy, so you don’t want to show up on a date and be like, “Who are you?” It’s a waste of time.
Heather: I’ve met guys whose pictures looked like they’d been taken years before. It’s like, “You’re not giving me credit. Maybe I would’ve liked you.” And I think it says a lot about a person - especially their confidence level - and that’s what’s unattractive.
Dr. Rosenwein: You know, the common view is that people will lie, but I truly believe there’s a lot more self-disclosure online, so you get deeper faster. And if there is some exaggeration when you meet, since you know more about this person, you might be more willing to give it more time and see where things lead.
Q. Do most people fudge their weight on a profile?
Stacy: Having interviewed online daters for my book, I think it’s pretty common to make yourself sound a little better, especially since there’s such a weight phobia in this culture.
Dr. Rosenwein: But there really isn’t really much of a benefit to exaggerate a lot if you’re going to meet the other person. There’s a disconnect, and it also communicates that you can’t trust that person.
Q: What’s the solution? Are there acceptable ways to bend the truth?
Stacy: There’s a continuum of lies. If you say you’re 10 years younger, you’re Catholic if you’re not or you’re significantly less heavy, those are pretty big deceptions. But if you say you’re five pounds lighter, it’s kind of like lying on your driver’s license about your weight: Everybody does it.
Jeff: I’m all about being honest. A lot of people go into online dating with the attitude of, “I have to talk myself up, sell myself.” I just put myself out there and say, “This is me.” Different people like different things, so you never know what will click.
Heather: I use humor to deal with my weight. If I don’t describe myself as cuddly, I might say I eat a few too many hot dogs on Saturdays. I look for a guy who gets my sense of humor and has one himself.
Dawn Yanek is the author of Women’s Best-Kept Secrets. She now realizes that publishing a book on that topic probably wasn’t the best way of keeping those secrets hush-hush.
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