LostAlone said:
no... emotional baggage doenst always mean self harm. it can be abuse they've been holding inside (the case of the girl i knew, she didnt feel comfortable telling people but she doesnt mind now if i say it), or the abuse someone delivered on them. But you're right, there should be a line between... well... lets just say non intended scars and "self-harm" scars.
But I dont know if women like the idea of a rugged man. I think they like the idea of security, where they can feel safe in the man's arms or presense, but not the idea of the man be a roughneck drunk. Thats how a good percentage of domestic abuse cases start. and if there's anyhting to the "oh, women want a sweet sensitive boy" argument, they could view scars as a rugged roughneck and there by unattractive. It goes into gender roles, but that is a topic that would... well... wouldnt be off topic, but its more or less beyond the range of this thread.
And eventually, you're mostly likely going to ask how someone got the scar one you see it. BUt yeah, I can see what you mena, thats going beyond the scope of this thread. its almost 330 am where I live and I've been running a fever so I havnet been thinking straight and been rambling recently. But i will say this about how someone got hte scar. Depending on the size, shape, and location of the scar, you're going to assume. I'll give a for instance on two seperate people
If oyu take me, and look at my right arm, I have a scar on each finger somewhere from the nail to the knuckle that i've gotten from various things (fights, black widow bites, me just being stupid). I have one on the under side of my arm where a peice of burning hot glass ripped up my arm and on the elbow I have five small scars that are from a chemical burn i had gotten while in chem class (also where the glass came from). Now, as I'm right hand dominated, I like to walk on the left side of a girl, so if anything goes down, I can tight with my right and protect and fend off with my left till i can get her at least to a safer location (protective instincts). The girl will see those eventually and she'll think, "small scars, probably from little fights or accidents when boys were being boys. She'll assume how i got them and think whether its an attractive quality in me.
Now, if you take my friend Stephenie, she has a few small scars but she has one big one. She has a small scar on her shoulder whens he fell of the top of the cheerleader pyramid, a small one on her left arm where she burnt herself with a curling iron (accident) and a thats about it. But she has one LARGE scar on her back that you can see if she wears shorter shirts or if the shirt billows from when a person we knew... did something I'd rather not repeat. But it runs from her left shoulder blade to her lower right of her back. If you saw that, you'd assume, "wow this girl has a story, am I ready for that? I mean, thats a deep jagged scar not like that cute little one on her shoulder or the little burn mark here her skin is a little scaly."
So thats more or less where i was coming from when i said assuming or knowing how it happend would affect the cuteness factor. Self-harm scars are kinda in the same way. where if you seem them (and its somewhat inevitable if you get serious with someone, unless you walk around like my friend Gloria who has them all down her arm from her elbow (non vertical) and covers them with those wrapping bandages every day. yeah, you havent seen scars till you've seen a girl that wraps her entire arm each day just to hide them. cause they're not all horizontal) you're going to think "ew... thats a lot of pain, am I ready? I mean, if he was just knicked up it wouldnt be a big deal but thats so methodical." Or int he case of girls "whoa,... serious shit went on in her life. Lot of pent up emotions there. and there's so many, when she either had really good skin, had average skin, or didnt have that great of skin to begin with. dont want none of that".
So I think its more the assumptions people draw fromt he scar, rather the the scar its self being physically attractive.
... Though... I'll admit... we have a girl who goes to our school that lost her left eye to cancer and wears one of those square eye patch things and grows her hair long on that side (her hair in general goes all the way down past the middle of her back), to hide it that i find REALLY attractive and I dont know why... I think its cause I look at her, see she's got alot of problems, and want to be there for her. But she's got a bf (one of my friends), and i'm one of her better friends so it worked out. and my friends knows about it to, so its not like i"m sneaking around behind his back.
? When they study these kinda things, its done on the assumption that the people involved have no knowledge of each other... And they do say that scars are attractive, because we make assumptions about them. 
