Do dumb blondes have more fun

In this world there are far more blondes than there are real blondes. The reason is because women all over the world are faking the blonde look, no doubt in order to be more attractive. But what is it about being blonde that appeals to women's sense of beauty. Is it a smart move, to look like a dumb blonde. Thinkbomb investigates.

There are several key areas of the dumb blonde persona that need exploration. The first is establishing why she is blonde, then what is meant by dumb and finally, whether the dumb blonde is dumb at all. It is only then that we can get a better handle on answering other questions, such as whether blonde ignorance is bliss. Is the dumb blonde happier being dumb than smart.

Archaeology of the blonde

The blonde archetype, blonde power and being blonde as an ideal emerged in a powerful way in the US in the 1950s. This is at least evident in the emergence of new American Hollywood stars at that time, not always blonde, but very often. This includes most famously Marilyn Monroe. There were however many other (now-forgotten) blondes in Hollywood, including Jean Harlow.

Hollywood did not invent the Blonde archetype in isolation. In the late 1940s and early 1950s the American public was looking outward at other cultures, due to the engagement in WWII and perhaps due to increasing wealth, which created a wave of new aspirations. Sweden was identified in the American eye as a culture with several titillating habits that Americans were excited by. The Swedish hot sauna, with men and women getting together naked in a social setting, was popularized in some American movies. Swedish women were predominantly blonde (a Scandinavian characteristic). They also appeared to be healthy, wholesome and horny (a feature that gained greater emphasis in the 1970s, with the explosion of the porn industry. Sweden was for a time the porn industry Mecca).

We cannot discount the possibility that Nazi ideology played a part during the 1930s. Blondeness was considered a positive Aryan feature, and was promoted as part of a German racial purity movement. It appears likely that American women sought unconsciously to emulate the sexual kudos of Swedish and German culture and the opportunity arose in the form of a chemical: peroxide. Thus the platinum blonde seen in movies. Although the chemicals have improved since the 1950s, women, particularly in America and Australia have been dying to be blonde ever since.

Although the act of becoming blonde is not consciously done with a view to its social archaeology, it nevertheless is clearly related to beautification and status. With such a strong emphasis on beauty in women, it is a simple assumption that beauty is manifest in particular features such as blonde hair.

Fetish

In a sense, the association between dumb and blonde emerges from the American mass blondification movement, in which women, dumb or smart, aspire to the look that makes them more socially attractive.

It has to be said that the association between dumb and blonde was already prevalent at the American outset, with Marilyn Monroe playing the dumb blonde in several movies in the 1950s. She was repeating an emerging social stereotype, and reinforcing it.

What is dumb

The question, what do we mean by dumb, opens up a can of dumb worms. The dumb blonde seems to come in a number of dumb variations. She can be ditzy dumb, having a kind of hopeless and clueless manner. Or she can be genuinely naïve and uneducated. She can be a mental pushover, easily fooled. Being non-intellectual, she cultivates other socially useful characteristics, such as flirtatiousness and cuteness.

In a sense, the key dumbness of the blonde archetype is the part that makes her a pushover for certain men, either because she believes readily what they say, or she is easily seduced by their mental tricks. She lacks powers of observation that more intelligent women have. Alternatively, if she has deliberately cultivated cuteness and the bimbo persona, then she is actively engaging in the development of that mystique. Either way, certain men feel more comfortable in her company than in the company of intelligent women AND these men feel more confident in being forward with her. She is not intimidating, because she lacks key mental assets, usually seen as defensive assets. Without the critical faculties of the intelligent woman, she is more accessible. So certain men feel that she is more likely to be nice, gentle, accommodating and more easily impressed.

With blondeness as both a high status genetic feature and a source of assumptions about dumbness, the dumb blonde embodies two key attractors. The two assumptions work beautifully together, because, she has raised her status, meaning that she may rise out of the orbit of some men, and yet she brings herself back to ground by being dopey, flirtatious, and potentially sexually accessible. It’s a perfect combination of attractiveness, sexual availability and accessability.

It is the potential for seduction and mating that is a core feature of the next question about the dumb blonde.

Are dumb blondes really always dumb. Do women fake being dumb. Damned right.

Smart women are often in a dilemma. They are intimidating to a variety of men. They look critical, scrutinising and judgmental. They have powerful mental assets, as well as being potentially physically attractive. That combination of attractiveness and intelligence means a lot of men feel they cannot approach. They will be slaughtered. They will be humiliated. They are not in the running. This tendency to intimidate is not necessarily what the woman wants. She doesn't want all men to feel they are not contenders. She wants to be seduced and the centre of attention too.

The solution? If the smart woman acts dumb, then she appears to be weaker, softer, more accessible. She is assumed to be friendlier, easier to talk to, because she is simpler. She just wants to have a good time. She's just a kitten who loves pleasure and likes the company of a simple strong man.

Plenty of smart women know that they should pitch themselves down a few notches to have more men (sexually) interested, and so she has more men to choose from. You can always be smarter again later.

The effect of this fake-dumb-blonde is obviously a peculiar one. It involves a form of social camouflage. It’s a case of hiding, not your ignorance, but ironically, your intelligence. To avoid intimidating men and being alienating. Lowering the bar.

Observed in that light you can reassess a few contemporary starlet women like Jessica Simpson and Paris Hilton. Both these women are sometimes seen as dumb blondes.

It has to be said firstly that both these women are probably not necessarily faking dumb for the above reason.

But firstly, lets establish their likely intelligence. I don’t know about Simpson, but if Paris Hilton is the heiress to a massive fortune then she would have received an extraordinary education. She may well be a sort of bimbo, and superficial in one respect, but she does exude intelligence. Women like her and many others, are paid to act dumb. It’s a selling point. It is not necessarily a way for them to get a man. The selling point is that the audience for the dumb-blonde shows are genuinely dumb folk. The people who watch Jessica Simpson want to relate to someone of their own level of intellect: the same mental capacities, but classier and richer. On the other hand, some people watch these women just to get outraged that someone dumb can be so rich. It pushes buttons. There is something really attractive as well as grotesque in seeing someone who is vacuous enjoying the good life, or wasting the good life with their superficial experience of it. Bland and easy. Just simple pleasure without moral reflection or depth of experience. Luxury experienced for its simple and straightforward benefit by beautiful airheads.

In reality, Hilton is probably a kind of entry-level sophisticate. But for her audience she is just into outfits: she is fashion. She's got to do something mindlessly simple to appeal to the crass aspirations of the dumb female masses. The fact remains that her audience knows that she is somehow classy, superior. They want to emulate her. And she can be emulated because she represents simple one-dimensional status superiority. She exudes some kind of moneyed trash superiority.

The dumb things that the current crop of blonde bimbos say are pure contrivance. Jessica Simpson's notorious statement on tuna being chicken of the sea is a perfect feined example. A total gimmick to create empathy (in her dumb audience), as well as controversy and make some people angry (the smart audience). "How can she be so dumb?!"

Do blondes have more fun. Are they happier.

Putting aside the Hollywood archetypes, the real dumb blondes probably have the same opportunities to be happy as anyone else. There is no difference. The only bonus for the dumb blond is that there is a tiny chance that her ability to capture the interest of a greater number of men's attention means that she will have greater choice, and can choose a "better" man. But the question remains whether she is capturing the attention of all types of men. For an intelligent "dumb blonde" this is a particular danger. She may alienate men of her own intelligence with a too successful act. It is inaccurate to assume that the dumb blond captures more men’s interest when many men are actually turned off by the façade. Lastly, in a society that worships blondeness, and half of all women pretend to by dumb or blond, it becomes difficult to stand out from the pack.