Two Day Magazine

Talk about a niche market. TheUglyBugBall.co.uk (TUBB) is the first online dating site that specifically targets “those who weren’t blessed with great looks”. This site excludes anyone “who is overtly pretty or attractive”. According to the site’s creator Howard James, a multimillionaire entrepreneur from Mayfair, London, this website offers the “aesthetically challenged” a much needed service.

According to the website, there are five ugly truths about dating.

“Half of UK daters aren’t pretty, so instead of fishing in a small pool of prettiness and getting nowhere, dive into an ocean of uglies and have more choice.”

Well, clearly this marketing strategy is working. Already 15,000 members have signed up to the site, which went live on Monday.

James believes that by being so open and honest, his site allows “people who aren’t attractive to engage in the dating game without fear of ridicule for being ugly or excessively overweight.”

 “Ugly people are a better calibre of human - pretty people generally aren’t very nice and are often a bit shallow.”

Now, this seems like a gross generalization. Yes, while there are some “pretty” people out there who are vain and unlikeable, there are also less physically attractive people out there who aren’t exactly fun to be around, either.  

“Ugly people have had a tougher life and therefore tend to be more considerate and more loyal. A recent TUBB survey also proved that they try harder in bed.”

This site assumes to know a lot about people based mostly on stereotypes. Who’s to say who has it tough? Everyone has their own struggles, their own tribulations to overcome. As far as sex is concerned, if someone is happy with themselves and confident about their sexuality, they will be a better lover, no matter what they look like.

“Once with an ugly partner it is unlikely that anyone will try and take them from you, meaning you can let yourself go completely once you’re together.”

Yikes! What a horrible piece of advice. Any relationship that is going to succeed always takes effort. It doesn’t matter what the people involved look like. If you want your relationship to stand the test of time, you must work at it, be kind and loving to one another, and take care of each other. “Letting yourself go completely” will only lead to a sad life. If you don’t respect yourself, how can you ever be with someone who will respect you?

“In these straightened times, TUBB is cheaper as a.) We don’t charge as much as the pretty sites and b.) Ugly people have lower expectations--for a first date a Family Bucket will usually do the trick.

At first, when I heard about this site, I thought it was a joke. No one would actually create a site for “ugly” people. Who’s to say what is “ugly” and what is “attractive”, anyway?

James has a solution for that. Potential members are screened before they can sign up. Meaning: you must be ugly to join. Clearly, James is working off of our standards of beauty when he speaks about “pretty people” and “ugly people”.

“Some of these will be moderately ugly, but others will have fallen from the ugly tree and hit ever branch on their way down.

“Just because they don’t look like Kate Moss or Cheryl Cole doesn’t mean they don’t have a lot of love to give and we’re scooping up these people and offering them a glimmer of hope--in many cases their first and only opportunity of meeting a member of the opposite sex.”

What are your thoughts? Do you believe that there should be a site dedicated to helping “ugly” people find love, or is this only exploiting people who may already feel degraded by our society, already?

My problem with this website isn’t so much the idea of bringing “aesthetically challenged” people together as it is so much the negative stereotypes the site reinforces. Instead of creating a positive framework, the site insists on reiterating time and again how this is a site for “ugly” people. By creating a space where people are labeled as unlikeable, unattractive or freakish, the site itself becomes less credible and more of a circus side show.

Yes, there needs to be more honesty when people look for love online. People post fake pictures all the time out of embarrassment, fear or wanting to remain anonymous. But, the industry also needs to remove the emphasis of looks from the equation and focus on long-term compatibility. Those traits are usually found in a person’s character and cannot be easily identified from a tiny photo on a website. As we all know, looks fade, but if the person you are with values you, respects you, and loves you, then your relationship has a much better chance of succeeding in the long run.

Perhaps if James had focused more on the positive and less on the shock value, he may actually have been able to shift the collective consciousness of people looking for love online to focus more on what is inside the person. But, silly me. The “shock value” has secured him 15,000 members, and I am sure many more to follow. Misery loves company, after all.