http://www.lfpress.com/comment/columnists/dan_brown/2010/07/08/14650246.html
When it comes to ranking hot chicks, where can a guy turn?
By DAN BROWN, THE LONDON FREE PRESS
Last Updated: July 8, 2010 5:07pm
No doubt you’ve noticed all the hot chicks lately.
In fact, to the attentive eye (and many men boast two of them), it appears 2010 is a golden age of hotness.
As the film/television/music/modeling complex advances inexorably toward its goal of world domination, hotties — not to mention cuties and babes — are proliferating like never before.
The world is rife with beauties, whether they be veteran celebrities (such as former Friends star Jennifer Aniston) or up-and-comers (Avatar’s Zoe Saldana comes to mind).
There’s also the likes of Lady Gaga, who — let’s face facts — may be not even be a woman at all!
If you’re a flaming heterosexual like myself, the question becomes: How to rate all of them? Which sources can be trusted?
The impulse to rank — to quantify and categorize — is a particularly male one, but where can we guys turn for objective information?
Luckily for us, several prestigious publications printed on glossy paper offer easy-to-read annual rankings. The best-known among them are Maxim’s Hot 100 and FHM’s 100 Sexiest Women.
However, a closer examination of these lists reveals that they raise more questions than they settle. Truly, no golden age is without its challenges.
At the top of Maxim’s 2010 list, for instance, sits singer Katy Perry. But on the FHM list, she occupies the 37th slot. What gives?
Nor is there a consensus concerning the ubiquitous actor Megan Fox. FHM ranks her second, while Maxim puts her three pegs down, as only the fifth hottest women in the universe.
And it gets worse.
Entertainer Cheryl Cole was named No. 1 by FHM’s editors — while she doesn’t even appear in Maxim’s Hot 100 at all!
And don’t even try to bring in other authorities to settle these discrepancies.
Entourage star Emmanuelle Chriqui is absent from the FHM rankings, No. 68 on the Hot 100 — yet she is the “most desirable” female celebrity according to a recent cover story in Chill, the magazine put out by the Beer Store here in Ontario.
The problem, simply stated, is that there is no universal standard for hotness.
It’s as if the lists in the so-called lad’s mags are completely subjective.
One man’s Scarlett Johansson is another man’s Mila Kunis. My Jordana Brewster may be your Rihanna; your Jessica Alba could very well be my Kim Kardashian.
It’s the classic case of apples and oranges.
And no, I’m not referring to the synthetic body parts sported by many high-profile entertainers.
What’s needed is a scale that can be applied and understood around the world, in order to avoid confusion and inject some much-needed scientific validity into these rankings.
If the metric system can’t be adapted, then we need to invent an appropriate unit of measurement — the Universal Hotness Unit (UHU).
The first logical step is for the scientific community to agree on a standard for the UHU. Some might suggest one UHU would be equivalent to the heat given off by Sandra Bullock; others might campaign for Jessica Simpson, Shania Twain or Halle Berry (personally, I’d argue in favour of Elizabeth Hurley).
Once we agree on a base, all comparisons will flow naturally and logically.
In the future, we’ll speak of Tyra Banks generating 0.25 UHU or Halle Berry pumping out 5 UHU, Jennifer Love Hewitt being half a UHU short of Denise Richards. We could examine how Lindsay Lohan is losing UHU’s seemingly daily.
If we can put a man on the moon, surely it won’t be a problem to rate the world’s hottest women in their proper order.
Problem solved.
Now if only we could make some sense of Lady Gaga . . .
