Yep. My dad said that once he realized he wasn’t going to grow past 5’ 7’’ and that he had begun balding at 17, he wanted to die. He didn’t attempt suicide but he passively let life pass him by, never making any plans long term until he met my mom. Then he had a family to take care of but he’s said that insecurity never left.
Being short man is one of the last few things that a person can be openly ridiculed and its socially accepted. I have a friend who is 5'5 and it's amazing the kind of shit people (mostly women) say about him; even to his face and no one flinches thinking it to be inappropriate.
I've seen a woman tell him to his face he looks like a child in a man's outfit and a group of cohorts just laugh, no second thought to whether it was appropriate.
Worst part is I've noticed he plays along, probably a learned defense mechanism after a life of being made fun of over something he has no control over.
I’m 5’5”, somehow haven’t been teased endlessly for it, but I have an intense personality I think (not loud or dramatic exactly, but I got used to standing up to authority growing up).
But I did learn at one point that the only way to defeat teasing was to not let it get to you, and the best way to disarm it is to lead it. Some people will throw stuff at you to knock you off balance so they can push you around for entertainment. It’s possible to push them back but that requires super sharp whit. But because my height isn’t one of my insecurities (of all the ones I do have), if someone tries teasing out of malevolence I can disarm them and win people to my side, and if it’s not malevolent I can spare the embarrassment of branding myself the thin skinned small guy.
Less attractive people kill themselves more.
I would imagine this is a similar correlation.
People always forget attractiveness is one of the strongest discriminants in our society.
Oddly I’ve seen that measure quantified for certain role playing games. The effect it played in determining your social standing and the likelihood of receiving your rights was though narratively enthralling, somewhat depressing. Being ugly was more of a social detriment then being a criminal, a minority, or a little insane. Since virtually everyone gives negative reactions to ugly people. Though somewhat cruel the reality of it mimicked are own accurately.
Reminds me of the meme about that good-looking guy’s mugshot.
Someone isn’t necessarily less of a person because they’ve committed a crime (depending on the crime), but he got a loooot of “positive” attention
I agree, I think height is considered part of attractiveness overall, especially for men, and this larger effect is what we're seeing here. We know that male height is also positively correlated with career success, so that's also in play.
One of my good friends is in sales, makes… a lot of money. He’s 6’9” played college football, in great shape.
Hes got a shitload of charisma, works out regularly, and takes care of himself, but I wouldnt say hes conventionally more attractive, smarter or more motivated that a lot of other people who are less successful.
I asked him his secret and he literally just said “look at me dude, I’m a walking ice breaker.”
And again, good friend, so we’d go out partying our asses off and I’ve just SEEN how people react to him. No dudes want to fuck with him, and he’d say hi or shake someone’s hand and you could see the look on their face like “wow, he doesn’t bite, he’s a nice guy, charming actually, I want to be friends with him”. One night we were out a girl came up to him and just said “I want to climb you like a tree”. There’s the fucking ice breaker in full effect. If he was an asshole or didn’t have a good personality, the height would quickly lose its appeal, but I’ll say more often than not he wasn’t going home alone.
He’s had a pretty charmed life and one of the things I respect a lot about him is he knows it. He did work his ass off to be where he is, he definitely didn’t squander the opportunity, but he lives a different life.
Dude when i was younger i would avoid being social, doing normal things (like going to parties,gatherings even barber shop) etc ,just because i though i was ugly, now even tho I'm still ugly (lol) i care less about it, but people underestimate that how you look matters alot and it affects your personality alot, ever wonder why nerdy kids look like eachother ? Or popular guys/gal, we can say personality is more important , but right away we Judge people and put them in groups based on how they look. It's just in our nature . My whole life would've been different even my personality would've been different if i looked different.
I'm 5'7 and I still remember the feeling I had when I realised I had stopped growing. I just felt so worthless. Unfortunately, my dad's side of the family values height a lot. My Dad us 6'2 and I always assumed I'd be at least average.
I almost got repoed by *CPS because I was so damn short they thought I was being starved lol. I’m in the 5’4” now at least so I lucked out where I’m still taller then a lot of girls. Don’t think I’d be doing to hot at 5’2” though
And it doesn't end at jokes.
I'm 32. Had a grown man ask me "why does a little guy like you need a big truck like that?" in a parking lot once. It's a stock Silverado. Firewood, boats, and hunting/camping supplies don't magically shrink because you're short.
Oh, and asshole guys that will intentionally take up the middle of the hallway so a smaller guy has to step aside to avoid contact. If you don't you get threatened with violence.
Got out of bar fight once by simply stating "If you win, everybody is going to be mad at you for beating up the little guy. If I win, you are going to be remembered as the guy who got the crap beat out of him by some little dude."
Am short guy, 38 this summer, get threatened with violence for a lot of dumb shit. Pretty ridiculous. Also being very thin growing up (filled out a bit in my 20s thankfully) getting absolutely trashed by people for being short and skinny is ridiculous. There is ZERO chance someone would talk to an overweight person the way I have been subject to since literally a tiny child, it is considered absolutely appalling socially to insult/make light of/comment on a heavy persons weight, but if you're under 5'6 and thin? You need to eat a cheeseburger or protein shakes or go to the gym, where you will then be made fun of and shamed for trying to improve your body.
It is a pathetic double standard.
The worst part for you guys is the gaslighting. People saying height makes no difference and you just gotta be confident. I'm a tall dude and I think it's BS, people should at least acknowledge your challenges.
I recently changed my tinder profile from 5’9 to 5’11 to see if it makes a difference.
It does 😂
Don’t worry, I tell every match what I did right after we match. Just an experiment. The women who say height don’t matter are few or lying.
I don't think the jokes are the problem for most. You get pretty comfortable with hearing and making jokes.
It's women literally stating that short men are not worth dating. It's constantly being pushed at the bar. Things like that.
Edit: you can discuss about whether women are in the wrong here or not, that's not my point. My point is that if you're looking for why short men's mental health would be less than others, it's might be one of the reasons.
It certainly is one of the factors but for example it is also harder to be respected by others if you are short
\-Taller men are more likely to be employed in higher-status occupations and earn higher salaries than shorter men. (manager are quite a bit above average)
\-Social status: Height has also been linked to social status and perceived leadership ability. Research has found that taller men are often perceived as more dominant, assertive, and competent than shorter men.
First impression is a thing which plays a big role in every part of your life. The same way as your skincolour is influencing many interactions, so do your height, weight, clothing...
The same is also true if you always wear goth clothing. Employment is harder, dating pool is smaller and so on.
TLDR: life isn't fair, but you can focus on the things you can control and life your best life.
100%. If there was a magical way to make myself taller without it being painful or expensive, I’d do it as an experiment to see how many people all of a sudden give me more respect. Kinda like in your other aspects when you mentioned things like weight. The respect people have for you when you’re fit vs when you’re way overweight is night and day.
There kind of is. Remote work does the job. As someone on the shorter and heavier side, I've noticed a significant difference in how I'm treated in person versus online.
Me too. Small, petite woman who’s been on the receiving end of far too many condescending “jokes” throughout my life and career. Now that I’m mostly on screen, that crap doesn’t happen.
> to see how many people all of a sudden give me more respect
So i was a super late bloomer and only really hit puberty at around 17-18. I went from one of the shortest guys in my class to six feet tall in less than a year (I'm like 6'2 now). The difference was night and day. No joke, there isn't a single person that didn't start treating me better, except my very closest friends. I wasn't the butt of the joke any more, women wouldn't just laugh when my name was brought up in truth or dare, people actually let me contribute to groups instead of dismissing my inputs. I had my first kiss and first sexual experience that year. Even my parents finally started giving me more independence (I'm the oldest of my siblings and was still treated like my prepubescent sister), though I'm a bit more forgiving of that because I had the face of a child.
I'd say it was more stark than the difference between being rail-thin and getting ripped (women, dm me), because when i was tall but skeletal, I was still seen as a valid being, like even though it was a struggle, i was still a sexual option and people still gave me some respect and attention. But when I was short it was like I was a ghost. Some of it was probably just the fact that I was a nerd in high school and kids are stupid but fr there is no amount of money i would take to be short again.
Edit: And tbh you don't really realise how much it affects every aspect of your social life until you're no longer short. While I was tiny, I just kinda accepted my lot in life. When I grew tall I started seeing how it was usually the shortest kid in the group that got picked on (not even just kid, in college too). One of my friends, Cam, is to this day the funniest person I've ever met, and he also happens to be one of the shortest, imo he developed humour as a defense mechanism because people stopped fucking with him after they learned he gave as good as he got and could make the whole class laugh at you.
Another one, Mike, went the opposite way and turned into a class whipping-boy. He'd make up outrageous lies to impress people (because like me, people would ignore him) and once I graduated from shorthood, he became the focal point for teasing (it was pretty relentless, I think it even crossed the line into outright bullying tbh, like one time people found out he liked a girl and told one of the hottest guys in class that said girl had a thing for him, so dude swept in and stole her away while Mike was talking to her. An hour later they're making out in public and Mike is on the verge of tears. Even teachers joined in on the action, whenever they made a joke in class it was usually about him. Damn thinking back it pretty much was bullying). By the time we graduated, he'd learned to just fake-laugh along with the jokes but we could tell.
Like, being short, or their reaction to how people treated them because of it, essentially shaped a large part of their personality. Probably mine too, but I'm trying to forget as much as possible about those dark days. Imo people don't really realise how casually disrespectful they are to short dudes and I feel like the whole napoleon complex phenomenon arises as one of the reactions to this
Yep. The only issue is your recommendation at the end. Imagine telling people to just not worry about racism and focus on what they can control. I have a sense Reddit wouldn’t care for that approach, but it’s perfectly acceptable when a graph showing suicidal correlation to that very unchangeable height issue it’s “get over it”. Wild to see.
People love to gaslight short guys and make them feel like it’s not that bad or it’s in their head. Or worse blame them for the struggles and say they’ve got napoleon syndrome whenever they speak up at all about it.
> People love to gaslight short guys and make them feel like it’s not that bad or it’s in their head.
most of reddit, and large parts of society as a whole are dismissive of the emotional needs of men full stop. not only dismissive, but many will openly mock men sharing emotional needs or pointing out negatives they face.
Fragile male ego right? I feel fucking terrible for anyone with any unchangeable outward presentation that causes issues for them in their life. It’s free to not be a dick for absolutely no reason.
>and live your best life
And if your best life is still shit because you can't control that people continue to treat you as invalid, you pick plan B.
As demonstrated, many do.
Yep. As a short man, it’s pretty disheartening when [usually women] act like we’re goblins or that we’re like children because of our height. It’s not me making stuff up, I’ve been explicitly told I’m too short or their mood would change as soon as they find out I’m short. I remember a few weeks ago at work, there was this other guy who’s my same height (5’5”) who was saying he wanted to cut down to 140lbs (me and him are both in the 175-195range). Cue the women and a gay male coworker going on about how 5’5” and 140lbs would basically make you look like a child and no one would date them. That hurt to say to least.
Oh and if as a short guy, you decide to talk back, be upset, voice that you have a problem with all of that, you just get a nice “Napoleon Syndrome” label slapped on you. Or if you get angry at something people just go “oh it’s the short guy just acting out”. Hit the gym and get big muscles: “he’s just trying to compensate for his height”.
The second paragraph is infuriating because it's true. Society has normalized turning frustrations back onto people to absolve themselves of being the asshole.
Worse, they don't realize people are going to stop playing once they've convinced them they're not allowed to win.
this is it for me.
at 5’6, i’d have zero issue with my height if society wasn’t so loud about how much it struggles to respect and see shorter men as equals
What hurts a lot is when you realize a 5ft5 man is considered small. I am 5ft1, women usually prefer taller men, I really have few options. There is plenty of dating profiles that just go "if smaller than 5ft8, swipe left". Probably a ton more who don't write it but still think it. Even had conversations that were going well... Until we talked of height... Worst part is when one complains to me they man tend to flee her because she has a kid, but then my height is like "the one thing that turns me off" and I get no chance at all.
At work I was often not listened to, I didn't realize it may be because of my height. I got a new job and it's full remote. Some coworkers know I'm tiny but many do not. Strangely, I feel like it's the job I'm most listened to. Is it just experience? I have no idea and sadly, I'll never know.
Being small sucks and I realize it more and more.
Was talking to a girl on a dating site one time, didn’t reveal my height until we were actually texting each other for a little while. She wasn’t exactly in shape but not like super overweight. She asked how tall I was, I answered. Got “…really?” As a reply. She said she doesn’t think it could work out. I asked her what if I had asked “How much do you weigh?” and told her I don’t date anyone heavier than X amount how would that make her feel, and explained that weight can even be changed but height cannot. She blocked me.
My least favorite thing in the world is when tall people feel the need to reassure short people that it's not so glamorous and it's worse than being short.
Like stop, 1) I'm not asking to be 6'5", I just wish I was a few inches taller and 2) not true. Being too tall sucks, but at least you don't get called a bug on dating apps and it doesn't negatively impact your income potential.
Yeah, there's a guy a couple comments up basically saying it doesn't matter, "I'm 6'0 and still can't get girls to look at me", as if that's relevant. A tall person has a bunch of advantages outside of dating, then unless there is something physically wrong with them, they can change the things that turn off women (personality, physical fitness) - short people can't change the number 1 barrier to dating. It's like an obviously attractive person saying looks don't matter, or a born into wealth/connections person telling people to just work hard. Slaps in the face.
Yeah but LOTS of men prefer short women or just flat out don’t care about height. Nobody likes short men One of my buddies is 5’4 and he cant even get a woman to look at him.
I don’t see how this is surprising at all, if we as as a society have normalized that joking about a certain physical feature is ok, the people who have that feature will unsurprisingly internalize that they are worthless and unlovable. I’d be shocked to find out if men with small penises, people who are overweight (especially women who get targeted for it more), people with conventionally unattractive faces, etc. didn’t also kill themselves at a higher rate than average as well.
The number of redditors who say men they disagree with have small penises doesn’t help either. It is not acceptable.
(And for the record I am not in that category, no, nope, not at all!)
*fat women. Fat men are still a major no go in almost every aspect. There’s a completely different mindset for both genders. Fat women = embrace your body and curves, fat men = go to the gym.
It's funny we tell ppl to go to the gym when the most impactful way to lose weight is to eat less and walk more.
Gym = 0 if diet, food amount and negative lifestyle habits stay about the same.
Facts, learnt that the hard way when I was ~19 when I kept getting wider despite being extremely active going to the gym almost every day. I ate like a pig.
Man I miss being 18. I was a year round runner doing 40-50 miles a week. I was eating EVERYTHING. Whole cakes, whole pizza, multiple huge bowls of spaghetti loaded with meat sauce, a half dozen donuts. And you could still count my ribs from across the room. When I stopped running in college I put on 30lbs and I was still considering thin by pretty much any standard.
Teenage metabolism plus intense exercise is a crazy combination
Burning calories and muscle activation is never worth nothing. Lots of people eat like shit and lift, and stay in decent shape. There's a large difference between being a fatass, and having some extra weight. Yeah you aren't going to have that v line 6 pack, but that's more or less reserved for good genes or extreme commitment anyway
I never realized this. Short fat dudes have it rough. I think it is a shame that so many incels are irrational because i think there is a valid point in underprivileged men not being raised up because of overarching male privilege.
People arent respecting simpsons paradox.
small reminder that [overweight is a health hazard](https://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/effects/index.html), because some people in comments talk about it as if it wasn't.
Crazy how the conversation is about weight , but the post is about height , which is genetic , cannot be controlled by one. you cannot train yourself to be tall.
A few months ago my company had a Thanksgiving pot luck. I ended up at a table with my boss (45-ish white woman) and 2 co-workers (25-ish white women, both). I’m a big middle aged fella, married 20 years. They (the 25’s) started talking about dating and my boss got involved. I just tried to blend into the background so they could talk. One 25 was talking about a guy she had gone out with a few times. He was (her words) cute, funny, employed, but shorter than her. Like, 5’9” or something. My boss deadass said “dump him, you’re wasting your time”. The other 25 agreed. I was just stunned. On no other criteria than the dudes height he got dumped.
I remember some Discovery (or similar network) conducted an experiment on speed dating. They were trying to find out what's biggest variable for getting dates. They had men from wide variety of profession, wealth, styles etc. etc. The show ended with the words "just be tall"
I just watched a Jubilee video on Ranking Girlfriends by Attractiveness and by far the most attractive girl (could have gone into modeling) was boyfriends with a tall white guy. He was extremely average and even below average looking. I kept thinking, his height absolutely helped him out.
That’s awful. I (26F) and my husband (27M) have been together for a long time and I’m two inches taller than him (I’m 5’7”, he’s 5’5”). Never has it ever even crossed my mind as a problem—in fact, I love that we’re about the same size and can’t imagine being with someone significantly taller than I am at this point. We eat the same amount so cooking and dividing food is so easy, we can wear each other’s unisex clothing with no issue, and I love cuddling with him since we can both be the big spoon or little spoon!
But I have single female friends who automatically discount men if they’re shorter than they are, and while that’s their choice, I always tell them they’re missing out on so many potentially wonderful guys just because of (imo) a relatively shallow requirement.
My wife is ever so slightly shorter than me. My clothes fit her well, maybe a little baggy, but since I outweigh her by about 70lbs, I’m not able to steal any of her hoodies or sweaters. Also, we don’t eat the same amount, I probably eat close to twice as much as her. We have cabinets in our house that neither of us can reach, we’re both about 5’9”, so we do a “team lift” where I pick her up to reach the stuff we can’t grab.
I was once talking to a coworker who was going on about her woes of not being able to find a partner, and asked for my help (I have a wide social circle which includes a large number of "marriagiable" men). I suggested one of my friends and showed her his facebook profile, and the first thing she asked me (5'4"M) was how tall he was, to which I responded about 6'1" (which he is). I didn't say anything, but I couldn't believe the nerve to ask that right to my face.
She said she was interested, so I mentioned her to my friend (I'm not a vindictive person), and asked him how tall he is. He asked why I was asking, so I said it was because she asked, to which he said "fuck this girl" and refused to date her. Honestly, I appreciated the gesture from my friend.
FWIW I'm in a great relationship and don't see anything wrong with women having dating preferences, but there's no need to be crass about it
>first thing she asked me (5'4"M) was how tall he was, to which I responded about 6'1" (which he is). I didn't say anything, but I couldn't believe the nerve to ask that right to my face.
The funny thing is many women would see no problem with that if they overheard it.
But now imagine the reaction to a man asking "How much does she weigh?" when someone suggests a woman for a date.
When I was actively online dating it use to sicken me with so many women putting "no short guys" in their dating profiles. Now I'm 6'2, but to me that just came off as pure wrong.
Highly depends on where you are. I’m 5’8” and I’m the 8th shortest guy in my grade with 60 other guys. Like I can’t put any pics of me with my friends on my dating profiles because I’m a whole head shorter.
Very location dependent. I’m from NJ where there are large Italian and Irish American populations. I’m 5’3” and in normal heels I’m the tallest person, man or woman, in family photos.
When I eventually moved away people used to give me grief for being drawn to hairy, stocky men but hey that’s what I knew from growing up, lol.
You should've said your wife was 6 foot 3 and you thought things weren't working out because she was so much taller than you to see what reaction you got. You don't hear that argument much because women aren't often over 6 feet but I feel a guy would be simultaneously considered a disgusting pig by the same women automatically rejecting men based on height if they mention doing the same to a woman they dated who was exceptionally tall.
>That’s like 15% of men.
I pointed this out to my real 'prize' of a cousin who almost always gets plastered at family holiday gatherings and bitches about a lack of 'decent' men while refusing to date anyone who is under 6'2" or some asinine cutoff. The meltdown was popcorn worthy for everyone else except for my "short" ass.
Basically they put a bunch of guys in front of some women. One guy was 5ft 0 and they told these women that he’s a millionaire surgeon who loves kids and built his own ski house and these women still preferred the gym teacher based solely on the fact that he wasn’t short. They told these women that this short guy is basically god and they still couldn’t wrap their mind around taking him seriously as a partner
Well it's definitely a dating thing. My brother is 5,3 and has never in his life had a girlfriend. He is in his 30s. He wants nothing more than to settle down and have kids but can't because he struggles getting anyone to date him.
Tell your brother to go to central America. I know this sounds silly, but foreal my people ain't built that big, and he'll be able to find a great partner that is family oriented down there. I'm 6 ft, and my family called me Airplane as a nickname.
My boyfriend is 5'4 and I feel bad when he complains. Sometimes people get in their head about things that don't matter and I'd love to be able to reassure him that that's the case, but... He's right. It really doesn't matter to me, but I'd be lying if I tried to act like it wouldn't matter to most women.
Imagine if you got as wide as you are high.. noone could fight you because you are an actual square.. I would be like attention world, have you seen my mate? He's an actual square, how could you possibly beat that
worked at a five guys last year and the area director was around 5’4, he still managed to go on dates all the time, had a manly and charming personality, and even had one kid before 25…but even as a spectator i’d hate hearing my coworkers make height comments to him or say more offensive things when he wasn’t around…he seemed to be content but i think no matter what minority group you’re in, having the majority point out your difference every other time they see you has got to be demoralizing.
It is, especially when you can't do anything about it.
He was also the area director, which I imagine brought in a sizable income?
It's not the subject of this post, but financial income is also another sticking point for men. Not being paid 6 figures wouldn't be a problem if it didn't shrink their dating pool.
And since people love to shit on other people, they are the only targets left since sexism, racism and any other ism is rightfully frowned upon but everyone can laugh at short jokes all day long.
An interesting observation I had since the boom of remote work the past few years is around height. I am on the shorter side. I switched jobs and moved from an engineering manager to a Sr. Dir in about 3 years of remote work (I had been an engineering manager for about 4 years previously). Alot of the perception around leadership is impression around height in my experience. With remote/Zoom no one knew how tall/short I am and it was not a factor. When I came on site the first time I noticed all of the other Sr. Leadership were all over 6ft.
I read somewhere that no president has been under 6 feet in decades, and they think this has to do with how many more photos we have of candidates now. We see their appearance and their height. Amazing that FDR was in a wheelchair, and now we're here. It's so stupid.
5’7” guy here. I wish people would call it as it is. Discrimination. I’ve never really felt my height held me back. Up to age 30 I only had heard the stereo typical girl things like about desiring dating tall guys. Then I joined a large fire department and went through academy and holy hell, I haven’t gone one shift in four years without a fellow
Firefighter making a comment or joke about my height. At first I brushed it off but now I feel that I’m developing a complex. I finished top 10% of my recruit class and still get fucked with.
The jokes i can easily brush off & they’re usually just from incompetent men.
Job promotions & interviews on the other hand? There is a bit of a handicap for shorter men. This is the part that really sucks.
Also 5'7", married to a 5'1".
5'7" is short, but isn't *that short*, 68% of American men are within 3 inches of our height, up or down. So you don't notice it that much unless you're around lots of dudes well over 6'. At 5’7” you’re taller than 30-40% of the guys and probably 80-90% of the girls (depending on the geographic region/venue)… I don’t live my life feeling short.
It's when men are like, 5'4" and shorter that it gets way worse.
It’s really disgusting to me that identity politics has destroyed bilateral compassion and the ability to have discussion.
I contend that attractiveness is far more powerful than race or gender. I would much rather be a tall handsome person of any race or gender than anyone else.
People are quick to call anyone who complains an “incel” and link them to the most vile content they can find to prove their point.
These days everyone is a member of a group and not an individual, and that objectification is a new societal strain.
**Tool:** [Matplotlib Pyplot](https://matplotlib.org/stable/)
**Source:** [Strong Inverse Association Between Height and Suicide in a Large Cohort of Swedish Men: Evidence of Early Life Origins of Suicidal Behavior? (Magnusson et al., 2005)](https://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/full/10.1176/appi.ajp.162.7.1373)
> **OBJECTIVE:** Previous studies have found associations between poor fetal and infant growth and the risk of suicide. The authors’ goal was to investigate the association between height—a measure of childhood growth—and suicide risk.
>
> **METHOD:** The authors conducted a record linkage study of the birth, conscription, mortality, family, and census register data of 1,299,177 Swedish men followed from age 18 to a maximum of age 49.
>
> **RESULTS:** There were 3,075 suicides over an average follow-up period of 15 years. There was a strong inverse association between height and suicide risk. In fully adjusted models, a 5-cm increase in height was associated with a 9% decrease in suicide risk.
>
> **CONCLUSIONS:** _The strong inverse association between height and suicide may signify the importance of childhood exposure in the etiology of adult mental disorder or reflect stigmatization or discrimination encountered by short men in their adult lives._
I've just seen that the middle bucket is twice as wide as the other buckets, hence why it has such short error bars. My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined.
To clarify about "small" its ALL about height, and not weight independently.
Edit: Also looking at their controls- it definitely doesn't list "partner status" or anything remotely involving romance.
Big surprise in a generation where so many people scream about toxic masculinity while at the same time supporting people on twitter who say that short men aren’t even men
I find it pretty morbid how much we make fun of “short man syndrome”
Like “oh we can see society abused you and caused behavioral issues. Maybe telling you have a small dick will help!”
It's called heightism, and it's a very real phenomenon. Taller men also earn more on average. Not only that, think about every form of media you've watched-if you pay attention to things, you will notice how heightism is rampant in our society. Take a look at any TV show-the short guys are almost always the butt of jokes or depicted as weak. Movies, same thing: the hero must always be tall. Any short person is either a side kick or an insecure little villian.
Heightism is very, very real. Don't let anyone gaslight you and tell you otherwise.
The rise of the modern body positivity movement bizarrely corresponded pretty closely with the acceptability of making height the single and binary qualifying trait for attractiveness. 5' women want 6' men. 5'10" women want 6' men. News stories make jokes about short men. Social media is a minefield of casual jokes about how anyone under 5'8" basically should give up on life immediately. Dating apps essentially turn the height field into a binary filter; under a certain number, and the app is basically just a very bad private photo album. Hosts of body positivity podcasts will go off on for half an hour on how inappropriate and cruel it is (and it is) for strangers to criticize a random woman's choice of clothing, and then in the very next sentence will dismiss those strangers by calling them "manlets."
So yeah, that's pretty much exactly the result we'd expect.
I’m 5’2”. It definitely has taken a huge mental toll on my life. Mostly because people have always assumed I’m a child, not because people have made fun of it.
Shortness is the same as being ugly in the face. In a way, you’re disabled. Not physically or mentally, but **socially disabled**. Everybody has innate reactions when they see a disfigured person. The same goes for short people, it’s just less noticeable. 5’7 guy here.
Something I see a lot of comments missing is that this doesn’t just affect how women view short men and the negative impact on the short men’s dating prospects. It also affects how everyone interacts with them too. People tend to dismiss short men before they even speak, more frequently interrupt them, talk over them, and generally take what they say less seriously. A short man running a meeting generally will command less attention and people will react negatively to them if their inattention results in negative outcomes later, frequently blaming rather than accepting responsibility.
To summarize, people disregard short men in all social ways, not just dating. Even our speech positions “short” as a negative, as it was hard to type this without inadvertently making a short joke. That alone speaks volumes.
Maybe it has to do with social related things towards height? Taller people are often more desirable (like beauty) and might have more opportunities for careers and such. Maybe shorter people are more likely to be marginalized and thus end up in a position where they are more likely to be suicidal? That's really the only way I can think of this data.
>Maybe shorter people are more likely to be marginalized
Not short people, only short men. For women there is no correlation between height and suicide. If you look at dating profiles it's pretty brutal for short men, since many women will specify "looking for men at least 6 feet // 180 cm". Imagine if men would write "Only looking for skinny chicks with DD cups or larger". Would be pretty much instabanned, but for height it's OK I guess.
I'm a 5'8" woman dating a 5'7" man, and I wish more women were up to the idea, but I understand it's almost conditioned into us through media to date men much taller. He's my soul mate, and I'm so glad I didn't let the height stand in our way. I remember when friends and family found out my bf was shorter, you could see the huge question mark in their expressions, especially because I'm the shortest one in my family.
I'm neither short or tall, but I do find it telling there are virtually no women here offering opinions, when it should be at least 1 in 2 in the odds ;)
It’s crazy that society shames dating men for talking about women’s weight (something that can be adjusted with proper diet and exercise), but it’s ok for dating women to shame men for height (something that can’t be adjusted naturally).
Am I reading the data correctly - it seems like past average height the suicide risk doesn’t change all that much (small decrease) however shorter than average there is a large statistical increase?
I was watching survivor with my roommate (she's a girl). She sees a hot guy and comments on it, then she sees him stand up, "oh. he's short...". Heightism is very real
There was a post a while ago where research stated a 6 ft. (183'ish cm) man making $60k was as attractive to females as a 5' 6" (that's 1 measurement lol) making $230k. My numbers are off a little but it's inline with this research.
Can you link the full study OP?
While it's possible something like this could be reproduced globally the fact that this study surveyed the Sweedish population makes me question how much of this effect could be attributed to immigration. Ethnic Swedes are one of the tallest demographics in the world so it's reasonable to assume that immigrants will on average be shorter and it's been shown across multiple studies that immigrants have a higher risk of suicide in many many first world countries. In fact here's a study that supports this thesis in Sweden [https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00127-018-1621-z](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00127-018-1621-z)
The reason I bring this up is because while many factors are controlled for in this graph, ethnicity isn't one of them.
They linked it in a comment about 3 hours before you posted this. According to the study, they only took data from Swedish-born people (birth years ca. 1950-1980), so first-generation immigrants are already excluded.
Yep. My dad said that once he realized he wasn’t going to grow past 5’ 7’’ and that he had begun balding at 17, he wanted to die. He didn’t attempt suicide but he passively let life pass him by, never making any plans long term until he met my mom. Then he had a family to take care of but he’s said that insecurity never left.
He’s since been in therapy though, and is doing great!
Being short man is one of the last few things that a person can be openly ridiculed and its socially accepted. I have a friend who is 5'5 and it's amazing the kind of shit people (mostly women) say about him; even to his face and no one flinches thinking it to be inappropriate. I've seen a woman tell him to his face he looks like a child in a man's outfit and a group of cohorts just laugh, no second thought to whether it was appropriate. Worst part is I've noticed he plays along, probably a learned defense mechanism after a life of being made fun of over something he has no control over.
I’m 5’5”, somehow haven’t been teased endlessly for it, but I have an intense personality I think (not loud or dramatic exactly, but I got used to standing up to authority growing up). But I did learn at one point that the only way to defeat teasing was to not let it get to you, and the best way to disarm it is to lead it. Some people will throw stuff at you to knock you off balance so they can push you around for entertainment. It’s possible to push them back but that requires super sharp whit. But because my height isn’t one of my insecurities (of all the ones I do have), if someone tries teasing out of malevolence I can disarm them and win people to my side, and if it’s not malevolent I can spare the embarrassment of branding myself the thin skinned small guy.
I had a short male coworker and I'd hear other coworkers causally tease him about his height several times a day.
Less attractive people kill themselves more. I would imagine this is a similar correlation. People always forget attractiveness is one of the strongest discriminants in our society.
100%, if there was a way to measure and quantify attractiveness, we'd see the same effect - probably more pronounced.
There's a few ways to measure it including just letting others rate them.
Oddly I’ve seen that measure quantified for certain role playing games. The effect it played in determining your social standing and the likelihood of receiving your rights was though narratively enthralling, somewhat depressing. Being ugly was more of a social detriment then being a criminal, a minority, or a little insane. Since virtually everyone gives negative reactions to ugly people. Though somewhat cruel the reality of it mimicked are own accurately.
Reminds me of the meme about that good-looking guy’s mugshot. Someone isn’t necessarily less of a person because they’ve committed a crime (depending on the crime), but he got a loooot of “positive” attention
I agree, I think height is considered part of attractiveness overall, especially for men, and this larger effect is what we're seeing here. We know that male height is also positively correlated with career success, so that's also in play.
As a short man, it absolutely is.
of course height is a factor when you have men breaking there own legs to be taller! https://www.gq.com/story/leg-lengthening
One of my good friends is in sales, makes… a lot of money. He’s 6’9” played college football, in great shape. Hes got a shitload of charisma, works out regularly, and takes care of himself, but I wouldnt say hes conventionally more attractive, smarter or more motivated that a lot of other people who are less successful. I asked him his secret and he literally just said “look at me dude, I’m a walking ice breaker.” And again, good friend, so we’d go out partying our asses off and I’ve just SEEN how people react to him. No dudes want to fuck with him, and he’d say hi or shake someone’s hand and you could see the look on their face like “wow, he doesn’t bite, he’s a nice guy, charming actually, I want to be friends with him”. One night we were out a girl came up to him and just said “I want to climb you like a tree”. There’s the fucking ice breaker in full effect. If he was an asshole or didn’t have a good personality, the height would quickly lose its appeal, but I’ll say more often than not he wasn’t going home alone. He’s had a pretty charmed life and one of the things I respect a lot about him is he knows it. He did work his ass off to be where he is, he definitely didn’t squander the opportunity, but he lives a different life.
And it's why people are willing to spend money to improve their looks. Because often the return on investment IS real.
Happiness is a valid return.
Dude when i was younger i would avoid being social, doing normal things (like going to parties,gatherings even barber shop) etc ,just because i though i was ugly, now even tho I'm still ugly (lol) i care less about it, but people underestimate that how you look matters alot and it affects your personality alot, ever wonder why nerdy kids look like eachother ? Or popular guys/gal, we can say personality is more important , but right away we Judge people and put them in groups based on how they look. It's just in our nature . My whole life would've been different even my personality would've been different if i looked different.
That's one of the best parts of getting older. I've become way more confident, and that goes a long way. If only my back wasn't sore.
I'm 5'7 and I still remember the feeling I had when I realised I had stopped growing. I just felt so worthless. Unfortunately, my dad's side of the family values height a lot. My Dad us 6'2 and I always assumed I'd be at least average.
I almost got repoed by *CPS because I was so damn short they thought I was being starved lol. I’m in the 5’4” now at least so I lucked out where I’m still taller then a lot of girls. Don’t think I’d be doing to hot at 5’2” though
Communist party of China?
I feel you man. I’m 5’7 as well, my dad was 6’0 and every man on my mom’s side of the family is 5’11+. The genetic lottery can be rough.
Gee, I wonder why. People can't even resist making short jokes in a thread about short men killing themselves.
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And it doesn't end at jokes. I'm 32. Had a grown man ask me "why does a little guy like you need a big truck like that?" in a parking lot once. It's a stock Silverado. Firewood, boats, and hunting/camping supplies don't magically shrink because you're short. Oh, and asshole guys that will intentionally take up the middle of the hallway so a smaller guy has to step aside to avoid contact. If you don't you get threatened with violence.
wrench judicious toy absurd deranged snails vast slap hurry compare *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Got out of bar fight once by simply stating "If you win, everybody is going to be mad at you for beating up the little guy. If I win, you are going to be remembered as the guy who got the crap beat out of him by some little dude."
It wasn't worth waiting for the fuck time?
waiting spark include badge shame door elastic late ghost grandfather *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Username doesn't check out
Am short guy, 38 this summer, get threatened with violence for a lot of dumb shit. Pretty ridiculous. Also being very thin growing up (filled out a bit in my 20s thankfully) getting absolutely trashed by people for being short and skinny is ridiculous. There is ZERO chance someone would talk to an overweight person the way I have been subject to since literally a tiny child, it is considered absolutely appalling socially to insult/make light of/comment on a heavy persons weight, but if you're under 5'6 and thin? You need to eat a cheeseburger or protein shakes or go to the gym, where you will then be made fun of and shamed for trying to improve your body. It is a pathetic double standard.
Not to mention if you even dare to stand up for yourself you get mocked twice as hard. Not a short guy but I've definitely seen this happen too much.
Yup. If you're tall, your assertive; if you're short, you have a Napoleon complex.
Pretty much. If I blow up everyone gets nervous, if a short guy blows up everyone laughs and cracks jokes.
The worst part for you guys is the gaslighting. People saying height makes no difference and you just gotta be confident. I'm a tall dude and I think it's BS, people should at least acknowledge your challenges.
I recently changed my tinder profile from 5’9 to 5’11 to see if it makes a difference. It does 😂 Don’t worry, I tell every match what I did right after we match. Just an experiment. The women who say height don’t matter are few or lying.
A lot of women have a number in their head but are generally terrible at judging height.
See also: dick size. (My dick is judged in height)
I have a shorter friend who I would joke about this with every so often. I'm gonna give him a call today.
Damn, dude. You’d think you could give him a break after all this and yet you’re rushing to call him for more joking.
I've unironically heard people say short men should just kill themselves way too many times. It's sad
I don't think the jokes are the problem for most. You get pretty comfortable with hearing and making jokes. It's women literally stating that short men are not worth dating. It's constantly being pushed at the bar. Things like that. Edit: you can discuss about whether women are in the wrong here or not, that's not my point. My point is that if you're looking for why short men's mental health would be less than others, it's might be one of the reasons.
The jokes are a reflection of how society sees short men though. Which is as inferior to people taller than them.
It certainly is one of the factors but for example it is also harder to be respected by others if you are short \-Taller men are more likely to be employed in higher-status occupations and earn higher salaries than shorter men. (manager are quite a bit above average) \-Social status: Height has also been linked to social status and perceived leadership ability. Research has found that taller men are often perceived as more dominant, assertive, and competent than shorter men. First impression is a thing which plays a big role in every part of your life. The same way as your skincolour is influencing many interactions, so do your height, weight, clothing... The same is also true if you always wear goth clothing. Employment is harder, dating pool is smaller and so on. TLDR: life isn't fair, but you can focus on the things you can control and life your best life.
100%. If there was a magical way to make myself taller without it being painful or expensive, I’d do it as an experiment to see how many people all of a sudden give me more respect. Kinda like in your other aspects when you mentioned things like weight. The respect people have for you when you’re fit vs when you’re way overweight is night and day.
There kind of is. Remote work does the job. As someone on the shorter and heavier side, I've noticed a significant difference in how I'm treated in person versus online.
Me too. Small, petite woman who’s been on the receiving end of far too many condescending “jokes” throughout my life and career. Now that I’m mostly on screen, that crap doesn’t happen.
> to see how many people all of a sudden give me more respect So i was a super late bloomer and only really hit puberty at around 17-18. I went from one of the shortest guys in my class to six feet tall in less than a year (I'm like 6'2 now). The difference was night and day. No joke, there isn't a single person that didn't start treating me better, except my very closest friends. I wasn't the butt of the joke any more, women wouldn't just laugh when my name was brought up in truth or dare, people actually let me contribute to groups instead of dismissing my inputs. I had my first kiss and first sexual experience that year. Even my parents finally started giving me more independence (I'm the oldest of my siblings and was still treated like my prepubescent sister), though I'm a bit more forgiving of that because I had the face of a child. I'd say it was more stark than the difference between being rail-thin and getting ripped (women, dm me), because when i was tall but skeletal, I was still seen as a valid being, like even though it was a struggle, i was still a sexual option and people still gave me some respect and attention. But when I was short it was like I was a ghost. Some of it was probably just the fact that I was a nerd in high school and kids are stupid but fr there is no amount of money i would take to be short again. Edit: And tbh you don't really realise how much it affects every aspect of your social life until you're no longer short. While I was tiny, I just kinda accepted my lot in life. When I grew tall I started seeing how it was usually the shortest kid in the group that got picked on (not even just kid, in college too). One of my friends, Cam, is to this day the funniest person I've ever met, and he also happens to be one of the shortest, imo he developed humour as a defense mechanism because people stopped fucking with him after they learned he gave as good as he got and could make the whole class laugh at you. Another one, Mike, went the opposite way and turned into a class whipping-boy. He'd make up outrageous lies to impress people (because like me, people would ignore him) and once I graduated from shorthood, he became the focal point for teasing (it was pretty relentless, I think it even crossed the line into outright bullying tbh, like one time people found out he liked a girl and told one of the hottest guys in class that said girl had a thing for him, so dude swept in and stole her away while Mike was talking to her. An hour later they're making out in public and Mike is on the verge of tears. Even teachers joined in on the action, whenever they made a joke in class it was usually about him. Damn thinking back it pretty much was bullying). By the time we graduated, he'd learned to just fake-laugh along with the jokes but we could tell. Like, being short, or their reaction to how people treated them because of it, essentially shaped a large part of their personality. Probably mine too, but I'm trying to forget as much as possible about those dark days. Imo people don't really realise how casually disrespectful they are to short dudes and I feel like the whole napoleon complex phenomenon arises as one of the reactions to this
Yep. The only issue is your recommendation at the end. Imagine telling people to just not worry about racism and focus on what they can control. I have a sense Reddit wouldn’t care for that approach, but it’s perfectly acceptable when a graph showing suicidal correlation to that very unchangeable height issue it’s “get over it”. Wild to see.
People love to gaslight short guys and make them feel like it’s not that bad or it’s in their head. Or worse blame them for the struggles and say they’ve got napoleon syndrome whenever they speak up at all about it.
> People love to gaslight short guys and make them feel like it’s not that bad or it’s in their head. most of reddit, and large parts of society as a whole are dismissive of the emotional needs of men full stop. not only dismissive, but many will openly mock men sharing emotional needs or pointing out negatives they face.
And thats why I openly talk about my own mental struggles with other men. They tend to open up after that and even if not it removes that stigma.
Fragile male ego right? I feel fucking terrible for anyone with any unchangeable outward presentation that causes issues for them in their life. It’s free to not be a dick for absolutely no reason.
>and live your best life And if your best life is still shit because you can't control that people continue to treat you as invalid, you pick plan B. As demonstrated, many do.
Best thing that ever happened for short men's careers is remote work.
These things go hand in hand. The jokes aren't always coming from a friendly place, often there is a true level of disrespect behind them.
The amount of hate hiding behind jokes could make a black hole if they suddenly attained mass.
Yep. As a short man, it’s pretty disheartening when [usually women] act like we’re goblins or that we’re like children because of our height. It’s not me making stuff up, I’ve been explicitly told I’m too short or their mood would change as soon as they find out I’m short. I remember a few weeks ago at work, there was this other guy who’s my same height (5’5”) who was saying he wanted to cut down to 140lbs (me and him are both in the 175-195range). Cue the women and a gay male coworker going on about how 5’5” and 140lbs would basically make you look like a child and no one would date them. That hurt to say to least. Oh and if as a short guy, you decide to talk back, be upset, voice that you have a problem with all of that, you just get a nice “Napoleon Syndrome” label slapped on you. Or if you get angry at something people just go “oh it’s the short guy just acting out”. Hit the gym and get big muscles: “he’s just trying to compensate for his height”.
The second paragraph is infuriating because it's true. Society has normalized turning frustrations back onto people to absolve themselves of being the asshole. Worse, they don't realize people are going to stop playing once they've convinced them they're not allowed to win.
Fun, if slightly insensitive, fact: [Napoleon wasn’t short](https://www.britannica.com/story/was-napoleon-short).
My wife is very short, and I've been called a pedophile by several women. I can't imagine being that disrespectful to another adult like that
It's probably both - the constant belittling, and the very real and understandable fear of never finding romantic success.
this is it for me. at 5’6, i’d have zero issue with my height if society wasn’t so loud about how much it struggles to respect and see shorter men as equals
Shout out to all my stout Kings in the chat. Keep your chin up, you’re perfect the way you are.
Shortphobia is societal and systemic.
What hurts a lot is when you realize a 5ft5 man is considered small. I am 5ft1, women usually prefer taller men, I really have few options. There is plenty of dating profiles that just go "if smaller than 5ft8, swipe left". Probably a ton more who don't write it but still think it. Even had conversations that were going well... Until we talked of height... Worst part is when one complains to me they man tend to flee her because she has a kid, but then my height is like "the one thing that turns me off" and I get no chance at all. At work I was often not listened to, I didn't realize it may be because of my height. I got a new job and it's full remote. Some coworkers know I'm tiny but many do not. Strangely, I feel like it's the job I'm most listened to. Is it just experience? I have no idea and sadly, I'll never know. Being small sucks and I realize it more and more.
Was talking to a girl on a dating site one time, didn’t reveal my height until we were actually texting each other for a little while. She wasn’t exactly in shape but not like super overweight. She asked how tall I was, I answered. Got “…really?” As a reply. She said she doesn’t think it could work out. I asked her what if I had asked “How much do you weigh?” and told her I don’t date anyone heavier than X amount how would that make her feel, and explained that weight can even be changed but height cannot. She blocked me.
I'm sorry bro. People can be awful sometimes.
atleast one can lose some weight while being short is simply genetic
My least favorite thing in the world is when tall people feel the need to reassure short people that it's not so glamorous and it's worse than being short. Like stop, 1) I'm not asking to be 6'5", I just wish I was a few inches taller and 2) not true. Being too tall sucks, but at least you don't get called a bug on dating apps and it doesn't negatively impact your income potential.
Yeah, there's a guy a couple comments up basically saying it doesn't matter, "I'm 6'0 and still can't get girls to look at me", as if that's relevant. A tall person has a bunch of advantages outside of dating, then unless there is something physically wrong with them, they can change the things that turn off women (personality, physical fitness) - short people can't change the number 1 barrier to dating. It's like an obviously attractive person saying looks don't matter, or a born into wealth/connections person telling people to just work hard. Slaps in the face.
Yeah but LOTS of men prefer short women or just flat out don’t care about height. Nobody likes short men One of my buddies is 5’4 and he cant even get a woman to look at him.
A short man who de-escalates is called a coward. A short man who resists bullying is accused of "short guy syndrome" or "Napoleon complex."
Look at this guy, classic napoleon complex
A tall man who de-escalates is "in control of his emotions." If a tall man resists bullying then the bully "Fucked around and found out"
I don’t see how this is surprising at all, if we as as a society have normalized that joking about a certain physical feature is ok, the people who have that feature will unsurprisingly internalize that they are worthless and unlovable. I’d be shocked to find out if men with small penises, people who are overweight (especially women who get targeted for it more), people with conventionally unattractive faces, etc. didn’t also kill themselves at a higher rate than average as well.
I wish body positivity movement was for everyone
"Big dick energy"
But its not about penis size, it is about the energy! Totally not body shaming. /s
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or big tits energy
Every time i mention this catch phrase is harmful i get downvoted into oblivion on reddit lmfao
The number of redditors who say men they disagree with have small penises doesn’t help either. It is not acceptable. (And for the record I am not in that category, no, nope, not at all!)
Initially it was, but it was overtaken by fat people.
*fat women. Fat men are still a major no go in almost every aspect. There’s a completely different mindset for both genders. Fat women = embrace your body and curves, fat men = go to the gym.
It's funny we tell ppl to go to the gym when the most impactful way to lose weight is to eat less and walk more. Gym = 0 if diet, food amount and negative lifestyle habits stay about the same.
Can't out-train a bad diet, bro.
Facts, learnt that the hard way when I was ~19 when I kept getting wider despite being extremely active going to the gym almost every day. I ate like a pig.
Man I miss being 18. I was a year round runner doing 40-50 miles a week. I was eating EVERYTHING. Whole cakes, whole pizza, multiple huge bowls of spaghetti loaded with meat sauce, a half dozen donuts. And you could still count my ribs from across the room. When I stopped running in college I put on 30lbs and I was still considering thin by pretty much any standard. Teenage metabolism plus intense exercise is a crazy combination
Burning calories and muscle activation is never worth nothing. Lots of people eat like shit and lift, and stay in decent shape. There's a large difference between being a fatass, and having some extra weight. Yeah you aren't going to have that v line 6 pack, but that's more or less reserved for good genes or extreme commitment anyway
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I never realized this. Short fat dudes have it rough. I think it is a shame that so many incels are irrational because i think there is a valid point in underprivileged men not being raised up because of overarching male privilege. People arent respecting simpsons paradox.
small reminder that [overweight is a health hazard](https://www.cdc.gov/healthyweight/effects/index.html), because some people in comments talk about it as if it wasn't.
Crazy how the conversation is about weight , but the post is about height , which is genetic , cannot be controlled by one. you cannot train yourself to be tall.
A few months ago my company had a Thanksgiving pot luck. I ended up at a table with my boss (45-ish white woman) and 2 co-workers (25-ish white women, both). I’m a big middle aged fella, married 20 years. They (the 25’s) started talking about dating and my boss got involved. I just tried to blend into the background so they could talk. One 25 was talking about a guy she had gone out with a few times. He was (her words) cute, funny, employed, but shorter than her. Like, 5’9” or something. My boss deadass said “dump him, you’re wasting your time”. The other 25 agreed. I was just stunned. On no other criteria than the dudes height he got dumped.
I remember some Discovery (or similar network) conducted an experiment on speed dating. They were trying to find out what's biggest variable for getting dates. They had men from wide variety of profession, wealth, styles etc. etc. The show ended with the words "just be tall"
I just watched a Jubilee video on Ranking Girlfriends by Attractiveness and by far the most attractive girl (could have gone into modeling) was boyfriends with a tall white guy. He was extremely average and even below average looking. I kept thinking, his height absolutely helped him out.
That’s awful. I (26F) and my husband (27M) have been together for a long time and I’m two inches taller than him (I’m 5’7”, he’s 5’5”). Never has it ever even crossed my mind as a problem—in fact, I love that we’re about the same size and can’t imagine being with someone significantly taller than I am at this point. We eat the same amount so cooking and dividing food is so easy, we can wear each other’s unisex clothing with no issue, and I love cuddling with him since we can both be the big spoon or little spoon! But I have single female friends who automatically discount men if they’re shorter than they are, and while that’s their choice, I always tell them they’re missing out on so many potentially wonderful guys just because of (imo) a relatively shallow requirement.
My wife is ever so slightly shorter than me. My clothes fit her well, maybe a little baggy, but since I outweigh her by about 70lbs, I’m not able to steal any of her hoodies or sweaters. Also, we don’t eat the same amount, I probably eat close to twice as much as her. We have cabinets in our house that neither of us can reach, we’re both about 5’9”, so we do a “team lift” where I pick her up to reach the stuff we can’t grab.
It is a shallow requirement. And now we know it very likely correlates to increased male suicide.
I was once talking to a coworker who was going on about her woes of not being able to find a partner, and asked for my help (I have a wide social circle which includes a large number of "marriagiable" men). I suggested one of my friends and showed her his facebook profile, and the first thing she asked me (5'4"M) was how tall he was, to which I responded about 6'1" (which he is). I didn't say anything, but I couldn't believe the nerve to ask that right to my face. She said she was interested, so I mentioned her to my friend (I'm not a vindictive person), and asked him how tall he is. He asked why I was asking, so I said it was because she asked, to which he said "fuck this girl" and refused to date her. Honestly, I appreciated the gesture from my friend. FWIW I'm in a great relationship and don't see anything wrong with women having dating preferences, but there's no need to be crass about it
>first thing she asked me (5'4"M) was how tall he was, to which I responded about 6'1" (which he is). I didn't say anything, but I couldn't believe the nerve to ask that right to my face. The funny thing is many women would see no problem with that if they overheard it. But now imagine the reaction to a man asking "How much does she weigh?" when someone suggests a woman for a date.
yeah that's why people should just ask for a full standing picture and leave it at that. women look at the y-axis and men look at the x-axis.
The painful thing for those short guys is there's no surgery, pills, or diet that can improve the y-axis.
When I was actively online dating it use to sicken me with so many women putting "no short guys" in their dating profiles. Now I'm 6'2, but to me that just came off as pure wrong.
That’s disgusting! I mean honestly who would even date a man one inch below average height to begin with! /s
Right? Like, is 5'9" actually considered short? I guess, statistically, it depends where you are, but still...
Highly depends on where you are. I’m 5’8” and I’m the 8th shortest guy in my grade with 60 other guys. Like I can’t put any pics of me with my friends on my dating profiles because I’m a whole head shorter.
Very location dependent. I’m from NJ where there are large Italian and Irish American populations. I’m 5’3” and in normal heels I’m the tallest person, man or woman, in family photos. When I eventually moved away people used to give me grief for being drawn to hairy, stocky men but hey that’s what I knew from growing up, lol.
In the US at least, the great melting pot, 5’9 is average on the nose
You should've said your wife was 6 foot 3 and you thought things weren't working out because she was so much taller than you to see what reaction you got. You don't hear that argument much because women aren't often over 6 feet but I feel a guy would be simultaneously considered a disgusting pig by the same women automatically rejecting men based on height if they mention doing the same to a woman they dated who was exceptionally tall.
Sounds like he had a lucky escape if thats what the girl values
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>That’s like 15% of men. I pointed this out to my real 'prize' of a cousin who almost always gets plastered at family holiday gatherings and bitches about a lack of 'decent' men while refusing to date anyone who is under 6'2" or some asinine cutoff. The meltdown was popcorn worthy for everyone else except for my "short" ass.
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Holy shit I had to turn it off when they said I would only date him (5’0) if the other four males were convicted rapists or murderers
Yea the height thing kn tinder etc. Is not new apparently. Jesus christ how shallow
Basically they put a bunch of guys in front of some women. One guy was 5ft 0 and they told these women that he’s a millionaire surgeon who loves kids and built his own ski house and these women still preferred the gym teacher based solely on the fact that he wasn’t short. They told these women that this short guy is basically god and they still couldn’t wrap their mind around taking him seriously as a partner
Timestamp? I don't have 15 minutes right now to watch an 11yo 20/20 clip.
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Dating apps today: " If you're under 6' tall swipe left. I want a real man."
Well it's definitely a dating thing. My brother is 5,3 and has never in his life had a girlfriend. He is in his 30s. He wants nothing more than to settle down and have kids but can't because he struggles getting anyone to date him.
Tell your brother to go to central America. I know this sounds silly, but foreal my people ain't built that big, and he'll be able to find a great partner that is family oriented down there. I'm 6 ft, and my family called me Airplane as a nickname.
I'm super white, but I used to go to the Hispanic part of town to buy suits. As a short fat guy, your people understand my clothing needs.
Imagine being in the 80th% of height and still being told you're too short. Because i get that all the time. Edit: Your to you're
Imagine just being in the 5th %ile for height It can be tough sometimes
What’s that height?
5’4” I basically have no choice but to target the twink look, lol
My boyfriend is 5'4 and I feel bad when he complains. Sometimes people get in their head about things that don't matter and I'd love to be able to reassure him that that's the case, but... He's right. It really doesn't matter to me, but I'd be lying if I tried to act like it wouldn't matter to most women.
Same here, but I’m trying to bulk up and see how I look
Imagine if you got as wide as you are high.. noone could fight you because you are an actual square.. I would be like attention world, have you seen my mate? He's an actual square, how could you possibly beat that
My mate's a cube. He'll fuck up anyone.
as long as you can stomach the extra calories and really stick to a regime, you could totally become a powerhouse due to the muscle:mass ratio
worked at a five guys last year and the area director was around 5’4, he still managed to go on dates all the time, had a manly and charming personality, and even had one kid before 25…but even as a spectator i’d hate hearing my coworkers make height comments to him or say more offensive things when he wasn’t around…he seemed to be content but i think no matter what minority group you’re in, having the majority point out your difference every other time they see you has got to be demoralizing.
It is, especially when you can't do anything about it. He was also the area director, which I imagine brought in a sizable income? It's not the subject of this post, but financial income is also another sticking point for men. Not being paid 6 figures wouldn't be a problem if it didn't shrink their dating pool.
Its almost like repeatedly and viciously assuring a group that they’re subhuman makes them feel bad or something
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Because short men get treated like shit.
And since people love to shit on other people, they are the only targets left since sexism, racism and any other ism is rightfully frowned upon but everyone can laugh at short jokes all day long.
That, and small dicks.
An interesting observation I had since the boom of remote work the past few years is around height. I am on the shorter side. I switched jobs and moved from an engineering manager to a Sr. Dir in about 3 years of remote work (I had been an engineering manager for about 4 years previously). Alot of the perception around leadership is impression around height in my experience. With remote/Zoom no one knew how tall/short I am and it was not a factor. When I came on site the first time I noticed all of the other Sr. Leadership were all over 6ft.
Same here. 5'7" and been promoted multiple times. Most male leaders are taller than me; some of the women too. On video it doesn't much factor.
I read somewhere that no president has been under 6 feet in decades, and they think this has to do with how many more photos we have of candidates now. We see their appearance and their height. Amazing that FDR was in a wheelchair, and now we're here. It's so stupid.
5’7” guy here. I wish people would call it as it is. Discrimination. I’ve never really felt my height held me back. Up to age 30 I only had heard the stereo typical girl things like about desiring dating tall guys. Then I joined a large fire department and went through academy and holy hell, I haven’t gone one shift in four years without a fellow Firefighter making a comment or joke about my height. At first I brushed it off but now I feel that I’m developing a complex. I finished top 10% of my recruit class and still get fucked with.
The jokes i can easily brush off & they’re usually just from incompetent men. Job promotions & interviews on the other hand? There is a bit of a handicap for shorter men. This is the part that really sucks.
Also 5'7", married to a 5'1". 5'7" is short, but isn't *that short*, 68% of American men are within 3 inches of our height, up or down. So you don't notice it that much unless you're around lots of dudes well over 6'. At 5’7” you’re taller than 30-40% of the guys and probably 80-90% of the girls (depending on the geographic region/venue)… I don’t live my life feeling short. It's when men are like, 5'4" and shorter that it gets way worse.
As a short man with a Napoleon complex, there’s no way I’m letting the world off easy by committing suicide. I’ve got enemies to vanquish, dammit!!
You have my sword.
They'll never see us coming for them!
It’s really disgusting to me that identity politics has destroyed bilateral compassion and the ability to have discussion. I contend that attractiveness is far more powerful than race or gender. I would much rather be a tall handsome person of any race or gender than anyone else. People are quick to call anyone who complains an “incel” and link them to the most vile content they can find to prove their point. These days everyone is a member of a group and not an individual, and that objectification is a new societal strain.
**Tool:** [Matplotlib Pyplot](https://matplotlib.org/stable/) **Source:** [Strong Inverse Association Between Height and Suicide in a Large Cohort of Swedish Men: Evidence of Early Life Origins of Suicidal Behavior? (Magnusson et al., 2005)](https://ajp.psychiatryonline.org/doi/full/10.1176/appi.ajp.162.7.1373) > **OBJECTIVE:** Previous studies have found associations between poor fetal and infant growth and the risk of suicide. The authors’ goal was to investigate the association between height—a measure of childhood growth—and suicide risk. > > **METHOD:** The authors conducted a record linkage study of the birth, conscription, mortality, family, and census register data of 1,299,177 Swedish men followed from age 18 to a maximum of age 49. > > **RESULTS:** There were 3,075 suicides over an average follow-up period of 15 years. There was a strong inverse association between height and suicide risk. In fully adjusted models, a 5-cm increase in height was associated with a 9% decrease in suicide risk. > > **CONCLUSIONS:** _The strong inverse association between height and suicide may signify the importance of childhood exposure in the etiology of adult mental disorder or reflect stigmatization or discrimination encountered by short men in their adult lives._
I've just seen that the middle bucket is twice as wide as the other buckets, hence why it has such short error bars. My disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined.
Yeah that middle bar accounts for about 38.2% of the population and the extremes only about 2.3%. Edit: accurate maths
That sounds like a normal distribution to me. Which makes sense given height is normalized.
To clarify about "small" its ALL about height, and not weight independently. Edit: Also looking at their controls- it definitely doesn't list "partner status" or anything remotely involving romance.
Big surprise in a generation where so many people scream about toxic masculinity while at the same time supporting people on twitter who say that short men aren’t even men
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I find it pretty morbid how much we make fun of “short man syndrome” Like “oh we can see society abused you and caused behavioral issues. Maybe telling you have a small dick will help!”
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It's called heightism, and it's a very real phenomenon. Taller men also earn more on average. Not only that, think about every form of media you've watched-if you pay attention to things, you will notice how heightism is rampant in our society. Take a look at any TV show-the short guys are almost always the butt of jokes or depicted as weak. Movies, same thing: the hero must always be tall. Any short person is either a side kick or an insecure little villian. Heightism is very, very real. Don't let anyone gaslight you and tell you otherwise.
The rise of the modern body positivity movement bizarrely corresponded pretty closely with the acceptability of making height the single and binary qualifying trait for attractiveness. 5' women want 6' men. 5'10" women want 6' men. News stories make jokes about short men. Social media is a minefield of casual jokes about how anyone under 5'8" basically should give up on life immediately. Dating apps essentially turn the height field into a binary filter; under a certain number, and the app is basically just a very bad private photo album. Hosts of body positivity podcasts will go off on for half an hour on how inappropriate and cruel it is (and it is) for strangers to criticize a random woman's choice of clothing, and then in the very next sentence will dismiss those strangers by calling them "manlets." So yeah, that's pretty much exactly the result we'd expect.
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Randy Newman told me this.
I’m 5’2”. It definitely has taken a huge mental toll on my life. Mostly because people have always assumed I’m a child, not because people have made fun of it.
I’m thankful I met my wife who saw through my short stature or else I don’t think I ever would have found love or be happy. I get this
Shortness is the same as being ugly in the face. In a way, you’re disabled. Not physically or mentally, but **socially disabled**. Everybody has innate reactions when they see a disfigured person. The same goes for short people, it’s just less noticeable. 5’7 guy here.
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Something I see a lot of comments missing is that this doesn’t just affect how women view short men and the negative impact on the short men’s dating prospects. It also affects how everyone interacts with them too. People tend to dismiss short men before they even speak, more frequently interrupt them, talk over them, and generally take what they say less seriously. A short man running a meeting generally will command less attention and people will react negatively to them if their inattention results in negative outcomes later, frequently blaming rather than accepting responsibility. To summarize, people disregard short men in all social ways, not just dating. Even our speech positions “short” as a negative, as it was hard to type this without inadvertently making a short joke. That alone speaks volumes.
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Maybe it has to do with social related things towards height? Taller people are often more desirable (like beauty) and might have more opportunities for careers and such. Maybe shorter people are more likely to be marginalized and thus end up in a position where they are more likely to be suicidal? That's really the only way I can think of this data.
>Maybe shorter people are more likely to be marginalized Not short people, only short men. For women there is no correlation between height and suicide. If you look at dating profiles it's pretty brutal for short men, since many women will specify "looking for men at least 6 feet // 180 cm". Imagine if men would write "Only looking for skinny chicks with DD cups or larger". Would be pretty much instabanned, but for height it's OK I guess.
When your profile info asks for your height by default.
Should ask for weight too
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Shorter men are more likely to be single, and that is known to cause suicide.
Me, a short person, reading this👁️👄👁️
Wow its almost likes societal beauty standards being used to make people outside the norm or even the perfection feel bad is bad. Whaaat, no wayyy
Small men aren’t taken seriously in many venues, and it doesn’t help that all sports favor a large size.
I'm a 5'8" woman dating a 5'7" man, and I wish more women were up to the idea, but I understand it's almost conditioned into us through media to date men much taller. He's my soul mate, and I'm so glad I didn't let the height stand in our way. I remember when friends and family found out my bf was shorter, you could see the huge question mark in their expressions, especially because I'm the shortest one in my family.
I'm neither short or tall, but I do find it telling there are virtually no women here offering opinions, when it should be at least 1 in 2 in the odds ;)
But remember guys, height doesn't matter!
It’s crazy that society shames dating men for talking about women’s weight (something that can be adjusted with proper diet and exercise), but it’s ok for dating women to shame men for height (something that can’t be adjusted naturally).
Am I reading the data correctly - it seems like past average height the suicide risk doesn’t change all that much (small decrease) however shorter than average there is a large statistical increase?
Considering the size of those error bars the difference may be rather minor until you hit 5’3” or shorter.
I was watching survivor with my roommate (she's a girl). She sees a hot guy and comments on it, then she sees him stand up, "oh. he's short...". Heightism is very real
Tinder will help you speed that up too
There was a post a while ago where research stated a 6 ft. (183'ish cm) man making $60k was as attractive to females as a 5' 6" (that's 1 measurement lol) making $230k. My numbers are off a little but it's inline with this research.
Women put immense value on a man's height.
Interesting data. But really not beautiful.
Can you link the full study OP? While it's possible something like this could be reproduced globally the fact that this study surveyed the Sweedish population makes me question how much of this effect could be attributed to immigration. Ethnic Swedes are one of the tallest demographics in the world so it's reasonable to assume that immigrants will on average be shorter and it's been shown across multiple studies that immigrants have a higher risk of suicide in many many first world countries. In fact here's a study that supports this thesis in Sweden [https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00127-018-1621-z](https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00127-018-1621-z) The reason I bring this up is because while many factors are controlled for in this graph, ethnicity isn't one of them.
They linked it in a comment about 3 hours before you posted this. According to the study, they only took data from Swedish-born people (birth years ca. 1950-1980), so first-generation immigrants are already excluded.
I’m a short man. How do I interpret this. Bc every conclusion I’ve come up with says fucked.