Wow, that's a damn near perfect list. I'm not much of a fattist myself, but I do tend to be attracted to the lanky types. But yes, that list is pretty dead on. The wisdom that leakes out of 2 glasses of wine is always surprising.

I agree with that list. I would also like to add that I cannot date guys who spend more time on their hair than I do.

It's a good list, but I always feel like these lists could be funnier/truer/meaner. Mongloids. Would you date a mongloid, C?

I wouldn't date a woman who wears overalls or has anything with Winnie the Pooh on it. Hell, all cartoon characters are verboten. Well, besides Master Shake.

I would never date anyone who couldn't spell "mongoloid"

(sorry, I'm channelling wolfson for some reason)

"6. those without a college degree. does this make me evil?"

Well, it does kind of.

Anyway, it's good to see a woman say outright that she doesn't want to date the short and fat. Maybe this freedom of expression will spread to the male side.

I was hoping someone else would pick up the assist and attack your HUGE HEAD, tom, but fuck. I foiled myself.

1 makes you sound a bit superficial, frankly. Unless indie rock really is that much of a passion in your life, and it would really hurt to be in a relationship with someone with whom you do not share that passion. In my experience, one can have very good relationships with people with which one does not share a particular passion, let alone musical taste. By a similar token, 4 is very odd. Someone can be very uninterested in blogging for perfectly charming reasons.

2 and 3 I can understand. Physical attraction is, after all, very important. But I would probably fuse both items into one: I very likely wouldn't date anyone whom I did not feel physically attracted to.

5 seems very strange to me, but I'm not the one to judge you by it. I certainly don't like most pop culture: never watch friends, nor sex in the city, nor anything of that sort. But that does not mean that I have a self-important attitude about the topic. I don't watch them because they don't appeal to me, not because they happen to be pop culture. In other words, it is incidentally the case that I am not very pleased by pop culture. My wife certainly likes it a bit more than I do. And we've never had a quarrel about it. I've never berated her for watching the few TV programs she's occasionally gotten into, and she doesn't berate me for not getting into any TV programs. I can't understand how people would have problems on this front.

6 makes some sense to me. But 7, I dunno. I've met people who don't drink alcohol but who have no problem with people who do. 8 and 9, not only do they make sense to me, I actually share them. And 10, well, I'm a vegetarian (or a fishetarian as it were), and I have absolutely nothing against people who aren't. If your rationale is strictly culinary, and your passion is cuisine, then I imagine it makes sense. But otherwise, I'd add it with the other weird items on your list.

that's the point - it's my list, idiosyncrasies and all. i'm sure i'd find many items on your list similarly weird, but i wouldn't question your right to have them. and funny you should say, "but I'm not the one to judge you by it," when your whole comment is basically about judging me.

I think that it is important to view the list as what will make Catherine not want to make out with you, rather than what will make her not want to be your friend. Also, the fact that she goes out with Tommy shows her to be remarkably, almost heroically, open-minded about dating.

yes, most of my friends have any number of terrible characteristics, and i don't care! but if i'm going to date you seriously, well, that's the list. of course, it's just a guideline really. if there's a spark, and a genuine connection, it's there regardless of whatever qualifications you would like a mate to have. and then you end up putting up with it because of that whole love thing, and it's worth it.

re: the pop culture thing -- for me it wouldn't be whether they get into frivolous entertainment, it'd be the extent to which they're proud of not getting into it. Does the person work the phrase "I don't even own a TV" into their first conversation with you? If so, immediate disqualification.

My top 5:
1. Smart... perhaps smarter than me if that's possible.
2. Above average height. Being 5'7", I find women a few inches taller than me to be very empowering. My last g-friend was 5'8" and with heels was more like 5'10". Definitely nothing shorter than 5'2".
3. Omnivore... eats anything from escargot to oysters to sushi. Or at least willing to try anything once.
4. No smoking. Not only because it's unhealthy, dirty, and expensive... but because it doesn't make sense. You're inhaling SMOKE!
5. A person who likes to get out and about from exercising, to playing sports, to sightseeing. I get cabin fever easily... like right now.

Despite having a short list, only 0.0000001% of the US female population fits this description (when you factor in age and whatnot). The conclusion: I'm going to be a lonely man for a long time until I lower my standards. Ugh, where's a drink when you need one.

okay: let's check. Here's my list.

1. Women I do not feel the slightest physical attraction towards. Though I could see myself with someone to whom I didn't feel physically attracted, if the attraction is of a different sort and its intensity is overwhelming.

2. Women whose politics are strikingly different from mine (Ann Coulter and the like). I wish I could be more generous in this rubric, but politics matters a lot to me, and I don't feel I would be able to have a healthy relationship with someone on the political right wing, given the importance I ascribe to politics in my personal life.

3. Women whose ethical values are at deep odds with mine. I don't think this needs any explanation at all.

There are no other requirements, as it were. If the question were, people I wouldn't be likely to date, the answer would probably include a few more items, but that's not the question.

I understand it's kind of cute to write a longer list, to reveal a bit of one's own prejudices or biases. And I understand that some of us commenters (who don't know you personally) can come across as a bit judgmental and mean-spirited by responding the way I did. For that, I truly apologize, although I certainly never felt like I could judge you for what you wrote. (I take a very dim view of the idea that one can judge a person for what they write a day on a blog, for what it's worth.)

Well, Tom. Are you really sure it's an immediate disqualification? What if the person says that in a charming, nonjudgmental way? What if the person makes it evident that she is interested in what you have to say about the shows you watch, and she doesn't come across at all as being judgmental? I think snobbism is what you're put off by, isn't it? I wouldn't disqualify someone for watching Friends, for example (I don't like the show), but I would certainly disqualify someone who thinks not watching Friends is enough to earn me a disqualification.

In fact, I think I can add one bullet to my list, now a list of people I wouldn't be likely to date (not people I would never date):

4. Zealots-lite: by which I mean, people likely to judge others rather pettily (like "argh, you watch TV, how unsophisticated!").

Well, that's a bit too much to ask, I suppose. All of us have been guilty of being a bit snobbish at some point, in whatever way. So scratch that item from *my* list. But consider it an addition to the conversation.

dude. pedro, you judged my entire list very very pettily. you called me superficial because i listed music preferences as an important trait.

I was just trying to write something snappy, Pedro. Relax. Obviously snobbery is what I dislike.

"I don't even own a TV" *IS* a major pet peeve of mine, though.

Catherine--I did judge your list as superficial (and I offered reasons for that judgment). But I didn't judge *you* as superficial, and I tried to make that clear in my previous message, in which I apologized for my behaviour. This is obviously a friendly blog, in which the commenters are part of a community, and I'm an outsider (coming via a link from a political website I frequent), and I had no right to criticize your post. I did apologize to you, Catherine, and I apologize again. It wasn't my intention to make you feel judged harshly.

what part of "makes *you* sound a bit superficial" is not judging me? and yes, for the record, music is very important to me. i do doubt i would have put it first, otherwise.

however, i see where you are coming from on some points, and i would never say that no one is allowed to criticize or judge what i've put here...i just won't always like it :) but this is the internet, after all and i do love when random people comment, even if it's to disagree. i don't even think you were as judgmental as i suspected people to be, once i saw yglesias link this post. i thought a lot of people would be bitchy about the fat/short thing.

I'm afraid you'll have to trust me that I didn't come to the conclusion that you *were* a bit superficial, simply because what you wrote made you *sound* a bit superficial to my stranger's ears :-) For all I know, you may be a wonderful human being, and I would hate to ruin your day with my stupid comment. Please, accept my apologies once and for all?

oh fine. but you're ruining my day but not allowing me to remain pissed off at judgmental people.

Oh man, I would have totally aced this list if I had been an inch taller (and unmarried), plus I was mentioned in #1...

I'm not soooo judgmental. I'm simply in a bad mood, and just like you wouldn't like being disqualified on account of your... say, love of indie rock (I like Dar Williams, is that indie rock?), I didn't like being disqualified on account of my being a vegetarian (for health reasons, to begin with--not even an iota of love for panda bears in me! lol). And that got me thinking about the many ways in which items in checklists can unintentionally exclude people in unfair ways. (eg: mental exercises like: I dislike snobs, therefore I include in my list people who don't like any contemporary music, but then I'm excluding people like my cousin the cellist who is as far from being a snob as anyone can be, except that she doesn't actually like contemporary music.) & then I wrote what I thought in a rather impulsive way. I may not be too judgmental (I seriously did not judge you), but I am at times a bit too sensitive, and way too impulsive. Have a good day, and don't keep pissed off at judgmental people. I truly don't think many people will come from Yglesias's blog and be all obnoxious about your post.

i have already been disqualified on a couple of unfogged's people's lists - for being a capricorn, for being a relatively thin blonde (makes me crazy apparently), for wearing high heels. but, i don't mind it. people will like what they like, and they will write about it on the internet, and they can't be so PC as to try to not insult the many many potential readers the list may get.

anyway, i have a feeling i'm not being coherent anymore.

The only entry on my list is that I can't imagine myself dating anyone who would make lists of traits in a perfect mate.

That's not a dis, it's just true. Or they'd have to have been drunk on wine coolers at the time. Wine coolers explain away anything.

She can't have a cat.

Catherine,
In Herman Wouk's "Winds of War",the central character is a naval officer who is shorter than his wife.The author comments,"Still,in the long run it is probably not a good thing for a man to be shorter than his wife.he looks faintly ridiculous and other meen will tend to make passes at her".