The Top 30 Most Desirable Black Women of the Past 20 Years: 30-28

Rank: #30

Name: Ashanti


Overall Average: 6.23

• Natural Beauty: #28 (5.92)
• Sex Appeal: #25 (6.75)
• Class: #29 (5.75)
• Personality: #29 (5.50)
• Talent: #26 (5.75)
• Mother's Approval: #28 (5.17)
• Maternal Instincts: #30 (4.92)
• "Ride-or-Die-ness": #16 (6.83)
• Reputation: #29 (5.58)
• Originality: #31 (4.92)

Commentary: Horrible showing by the "First Lady of Murder Inc." (LOL!)...apparently trying to fill the void left by Aaliyah doesn't win you many originality points. It also doesn't help that she sounds like someone singing in the shower in all her songs. Still though, looking at some of her rankings you have to wonder if men in general just DON'T like her...or maybe the competition is just that heavy...we shall see.

Rank: #29

Name: Free

Overall Average: 6.46

• Natural Beauty: #29 (5.54)
• Sex Appeal: Tied for #23 (6.79)
• Class: #26 (6.00)
• Personality: #14 (7.21)
• Talent: #31 (4.25)
• Mother's Approval: #29 (5.17)
• Maternal Instincts: Tied for #21 (6.08)
• "Ride-or-Die-ness": #22 (6.25)
• Reputation: #20 (6.83)
• Originality: #30 (5.08)

Commentary: The former host of BET's 106 & Park landed in the middle of the pack in personality but was done in by her perceived lack of talent and originality since she's pretty much known for announcing OTHER people's work. You have to wonder how much damage her sexually explicit verse on the "Whisper Song" remix did to certain categories like Class and Mother's Approval since men generally prefer their women to be freaky behind closed doors only. Plus...has anyone seen her lately?

Rank: #28

Name: Kimora Lee

Overall Average: 6.49

• Natural Beauty: #21 (6.77)
• Sex Appeal: #31 (5.68)
• Class: #14 (7.30)
• Personality: #30 (5.10)
• Talent: #29 (5.10)
• Mother's Approval: #30 (4.60)
• Maternal Instincts: #15 (6.90)
• "Ride-or-Die-ness": #31 (3.70)
• Reputation: Tied for #27 (6.00)
• Originality: #16 (6.90)

Commentary: Obviously the ex-wife of Russell Simmons has seen her reputation dragged through the mud as a result of her perceived gold-digging tactics in taking him to the bank. Even before that something about her seemed superficial and fake hence the horrible personality rating. Apparently she doesn't even get credit for her "Baby Phat" products as is reflected in the awful Talent ranking. All of that aside though, it's clear that men don't appreciate women who keep their eye$ on the prize at all times.

The Top 30 Most Desirable Black Women of the Past 20 Years: The One That Didn't Make It

In honor of Black History Month, we've decided to recognize some of the most outstanding Black women of recent times. We developed a rating system designed to determine who is the most well-rounded (and thus most desirable) out of the women selected by the numerous individuals we polled. The categories are as follows:

• Natural Beauty


• Sex Appeal


• Class


• Personality


• Talent


• Mother's Approval (To what extent would your mother approve if you brought a woman like her home?)


• Maternal Instincts (What kind of mother do you think she would be?)


• "Ride-or-Die-ness"


• Reputation


• Originality
  

Obviously, some of the categories are based purely on perceptions, but as the saying goes "perception is reality" and besides it's all up for debate. Each woman was assigned a number on a scale from 1 to 10 (10 being the highest) in the aforementioned categories. Those scores were then averaged to arrive at an overall score out of 10 which was then used to rank them in numerical order. We will be counting down from 30-1, posting a few results per day so be sure to follow the blog and check it daily to see who claimed the top spot.

Here's one that didn't quite make cut:

Name: Nicki Minaj

Overall Average: 4.79

Rankings:

• Natural Beauty: 30th (4.54)


• Sex Appeal: 20th (7.17)


• Class: 31st (2.58)


• Personality: 31st (4.58)


• Talent: 28th (5.42)


• Mother's Approval: 31st (2.25)


• Maternal Instincts: 31st (2.82)


• "Ride-or-Die-ness": 26th (5.75)


• Reputation: 31st (3.42)


• Originality: 30th (5.17)

Commentary: This pretty much says that any woman patterning herself after Ms. Minaj is actually making a fool out of herself. She's annoying, ridiculous, classless, etc. and her sex appeal is NOT enough to overcome these fatal flaws.

This countdown is a peek inside the male psyche as it pertains to the way we view and perceive women and their qualities. Be sure to provide your feedback at the bottom of the posts!