ClueChick: real clues from a real chick

One of the most frequent lines in profiles, ads and email responses is, "Please send a pic. Attraction is important!"

This is, of course, entirely true. I, too, am much happier seeing a picture of a guy I might meet, for a variety of reasons, from assuming that I'll be able to tell if he's too old for me to assuming I'll be able to tell if he's hot or not. I also assume that everyone meeting up with people through online connections has a picture and understand that we're all at least a little shallow.

The attraction is important like always strikes me as an attempt not to look shallow, which, conversely, always makes me think that guy is extra shallow, because not only is he concerned with looks, but he's going to some effort to make out like he's not.

You don't need to apologize to me for caring about looks. I care, too. Everyone does. You're right; attraction is important. But you may find that you can't tell attraction from a photo. Certainly, I've found on more than one occasion, someone whose photo made me go "eh" had a real zing in person.

I'll mock you for asking for my picture but not providing one of yourself. I'll mock you for pretending you're just gauging levels of attraction when you're actually gauging levels of attractiveness. But I won't mock you for being up front and saying that appearance matters, because we all know it does. Pussyfooting around it doesn't make you look any better.