Vladimir_M:

For women, it's easy to get delusional in this regard because as a general rule, the attractiveness of men a woman can get for casual sex and non-serious relationships is significantly higher than the attractiveness of those she can get to really commit.

I think that this observation is probably correct. For instance, this study found that men were more interested in casual sex with friends than women (73% vs. 40%), even though the authors tried to spin the results to tell a story of no sex differences.

If women and men are roughly equally selective about long-term partners, but men are much less selective about short-term partners, then it will be a lot easier for women to get stuck in the "just friends with benefits zone", just as it is easier for men to get stuck in the "just friends zone."

Prior probability:

• P( man wants relationship with random women ) = P( woman wants relationship with random man)
• P( woman has sexual interest in a man ) < P( man has sexual interest in a woman)

Conditional probability:

• P( man wants relationship with woman | they have mutual sexual interest) < P( woman wants relationship with man | they have mutual sexual interest)

The cultural obscuring of this plausible sex differences actually does women a great disservice. You would think that feminists, as advocates for women, would be attempting to equip women with the tools to have satisfying dating experiences. The personal is political, right? Yet weirdly, the bias of many feminists against admitting sex differences trumps their concern for women's heterosexual interests.