There’s a saying: Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.

The same certainly applies for what we consider as hot or sexy. It depends on the culture we grew up in, the way we live today, the images we are being presented with every day, and of course our own personal taste.

Still, every spring we’re being presented with tons of lists which tell us who the most beautiful or sexy people in our country or even the world are supposed to be. Just last month, U.S. magazine People came out with their annual “100 Most Beautiful People” list. And only a few weeks later, German newspaper Bild proclaimed “Die 100 erotischsten Frauen Deutschlands” (Germany’s 100 most erotic women; read Natazzz’ take on the list here). Unlike People, Bild at least limited the list to Germany. Dear People magazine editors, do you really think that the most beautiful people in the world are almost exclusively Americans? Don’t you think that’s a little – what do they call it? Oh yes: arrogant?

Instead of letting their editors decide, thereby giving their lists the semblance of objectivity, other magazines and websites ask their readers and users to vote for the most beautiful/sexy/hot people. Like AfterEllen.com, whose annual “AfterEllen.com Hot 100” list has become one of the website’s most treasured features. And only last week, FHM magazine published a list of “The Sexiest Women in the World 2009” as voted for by their German and predominantly male readers.

One of the major prejudices about lesbian women is that they’re just like straight men, especially when it comes to taste and interests. After all, just like straight men, lesbians love women, don’t they? Accordingly, a list of the sexiest women in the world voted on by straight men should be very similar to a list voted on by lesbians, shouldn’t it?

Unsurprisingly, it’s not. In fact, there are only very few overlaps. The highest ranking woman who can be found on both lists is actress Megan Fox. But while for the men, she’s among the Top 10 of sexiest women, she’s only No. 32 on the AE list. On the other hand, there are only two women of the AE Top 10 who even made it on the FHM list – Lena Headey (AE: 3, FHM: 34) and Tina Fey (AE: 7, FHM: 83).

Lena Headey (left) and Tina Fey (Pictures: fhm-online.de)

There are various reasons as to why the lists are so very different. As I wrote in the introduction, our perception of what’s hot and what’s not is influenced by what we see every day. AE readers certainly watch different movies and TV shows and read different magazines and websites than FHM readers. I have to admit that I don’t even know a lot of the women on the FHM list, even though they’re German, because I don’t watch the programs they’re on. And the average FHM reader probably doesn’t know “The L Word” and hasn’t seen “I Can’t Think Straight”, otherwise the FHM list would certainly have included Jennifer Beals or Lisa Ray.

Jennifer Beals (left) and Lisa Ray

More significantly, women both gay and straight in general have a very different perception of eroticism and sexiness than men. Whereas men usually want the “naked truth” and as little clothing on a woman as possible, most women prefer images that don’t unveil everything at once, but leave room for their own imagination. That’s why a lot of women aren’t turned on but are rather appalled by the bluntness presented in porn magazines or porn movies.

Furthermore, it seems that for straight men, a woman just can’t be sexy anymore if she’s a lesbian. What other conclusions could be drawn from the fact that there are no out lesbians on the FHM list, even though there are a lot of sexy and hot openly lesbian women out there by now? Portia de Rossi, who took the top spot on the AE list, is certainly known to straight German men as well. And before she came out, TV host Anne Will had once been voted sexiest woman on television by the male readers of another German magazine. Now, she’s No. 11 on the FHM list of “Unsexiest Women in the World 2009”

Anne Will (Picture: fhm-online.de)

To give the guys some credit, even the readers of FHM don’t agree on their various choices. For example, Britney Spears, who didn’t make it on the AE list, is among the Top 10 in both the list of sexiest (No. 9) and “unsexiest” (No. women. And even though enough FHM readers actually think that vice-presidential candidate and hockey mom Sarah Palin is sexy, placing her on No. 28 on the sexiest women list, even more think the exact opposite of her (No. 10 on the “unsexiest” list).

So if beauty and sexiness actually are in the eye of the beholder, and our tastes are so different, what are all the lists good for? Well, for one, it will be interesting for sociologists and anthropologists in upcoming ages to look at those lists and draw conclusions as to what the ideal of beauty of our time was and how much it differed in various groups of society.

But most importantly, the lists are a great excuse for editors and columnists all over the world to write articles about and post pictures of hot women.

This eurOut columnist included.

Posted on eurOut on June 7th, 2009