Newsweek recently published and article on crazy chick flicks. While the article is an interesting read, what struck me the most was the remark by Sean Kearney that ““I can’t think of a crazy girl who isn’t hot.” I think this one quote stood out the most because it is the sort of thing I have heard over the years, leading me to formulate the Crazy Hotness Principle. According to this principle, hotness and craziness are linked properties such that crazy girls are hot and hot girls are crazy.
Obviously enough, this principle is total bull spit. After all, there are plenty of non-hot girls who are, as a friend of mine might put it, crazy as [email protected] house rats. There are also some unconfirmed sitings of hot girls who are not crazy. However, the idea that there is a link between hotness and craziness is interesting and seems worth exploring.
One plausible explanation is that people are more inclined to tolerate crazy behavior from hot girls. If someone who is not hot starts acting crazy, people are not inclined to put up with that at all. Hence, non-hot people either learn to restrain their crazy tendencies or are excluded. On this view, it is not the hotness that makes them crazy. Rather, the hotness enables them to get away with crazy behavior that would otherwise not be tolerated.
Based on my own observations, this does have some plausibility. After all, one standard “guy thing” when they hear that a woman has some major issue is to ask “but is she hot?” Also, I have (like most people) observed friends and associates putting up with hot woman far longer than they have tolerated the less hot.
Another possibility is that the hotness actually does contribute to their craziness. Feminists have argued for years that girls and woman damage themselves psychologically by buying into the beauty myths and otherwise conforming themselves to the way men supposedly want them to be. So, perhaps the process of becoming hot actually does damage their sanity.
A third possibility is that men find crazy behavior attractive (at least initially) and this leads some men to perceive the crazy chicks as being desirable. Of course, this seems to be limited to certain sorts of behavior (usually relating to sexuality or passion) rather than just general madness.
There are no doubt other possibilities.
Of course, it is well worth considering that the alleged causal links between hotness and craziness (whichever direction they go) are based on perception rather than fact.
First, people tend to pay attention to hot chicks more than not hot chicks. As such, people (mainly men) would tend to notice crazy hot chicks more than crazy non-hot chicks. As such, it could be a biased sample that leads to this view.
Second, it could also be a case of sour grapes. I have most often heard guys who are not dating hot chicks refer to the hot chicks who are dating other men as crazy. It would obviously not be unreasonable to consider that they are simply attributing flaws to the women that they themselves do not date (or marry).
Third, I have heard it said that men are intimidated by assertive, attractive women and hence label them as crazy out of fear or some other sort of disorder. That does seem possible.
Fourth, it is also worth considering that everyone is actually crazy to some degree. Thus, hot chicks would be crazy, too. I think this has the highest plausibility.
