...A while back, I conducted a poll: "Would you go out with a guy who's shorter than you?" Around 40 percent of the women who responded said: "Hell-to-the-no." Another 32 percent or so indicated they'd date a guy the same height or a "teeny bit" shorter. How many women would go out with a significantly shorter man? Around 25 percent. In other words, most women are heightists.
I'm sure there are all sorts of goes-back-to-the-Stone-Age psychological and physiological reasons. A taller man may subconsciously suggest to a woman that he's more likely to provide for her than, say, a shorter dude. True or not, animals conditioned to believe one thing over untold millennia are hard to reprogram.
Via Glenn Reynolds, who says little, but that's probably because he's over six feet tall and has thus never suffered from this form of discrimination.
At 5'6," I have certainly been the victim of "heightism," and I think that the instinctive rejection of shorter partners may well be grounded in our evolutionary past.
But let me examine my individual pathology by starting with a pathological admission: I would not want to have sex with anyone who did not want to have sex with me because of my height.
You don't think that sounds pathological? Well, it is, and I will try to be my own shrink and explain why. Suppose I had bone-lengthening surgery to make me, say, five inches taller. How would I ever know that the people willing to have sex with me after that weren't heightist bigots who would never have had sex with me before the surgery? I wouldn't. So I might even be worse off than I am now. At least this way I know whether people really like me for who I am, and not what I "look like."
But does that really end my fearless and searching moral inventory for today? Hardly. Because, in all honesty, how can I know for certain that those people who are attracted to me now might not actually have a "thing" -- a fetish, if you will -- for short men. What that means is that they really wouldn't necessarily be liking the real me, but they just want to sexually objectivize my shortness. To use and exploit me -- something I should find intolerable!
So while I initially found it refreshing to read that a full 25% apparently do not conform to this kneejerk "cave man" approach to dating, the more I thought about these hidden and subtle forms of heightism, the more I wondered what that might really mean. Are those 25% truly openminded and just don't care? Are they truly "size blind"? Or are they heightist perverts who get turned on by other people's shortness?
Once we posit "heightism" as a form of bigotry, there's no winning. Far be it from me to solve a tall problem like this in a short blog post!
Keeping "heightism" in mind, let's have a look at Obamacareism. To my utter dismay, I learned that some young people with "RockTheVote" (who obviously think they are very cool) are organizing around the idea of rejecting sex with partners who don't believe in Obamacare.
I kid you not. Just look at these geniuses.
At least there's a possible evolutionary explanation for heightism. I don't know what excuse the above twits have.
Question: What would you withhold from someone who opposes health care reform? Cookies, a Christmas gift, sex?
I'd like to turn the question around if I might, and ask,
What would you withhold from someone who supports health care reform? Cookies, a Christmas gift, sex?
Hey, how about maybe their allowance?
Seriously, though, I think these girls (and guys too, at least I think they're being included) might be looking at this the wrong way by speaking about sexual favors in the negative, as something to be withheld. Instead of seeing the glass as half empty, they ought to be offering sexual favors to people who support Obamacare.
Not "I won't have sex with you unless you support Obamacare," but "If you support Obamacare, I'll have sex with you!" They'd get a lot more takers.
I also think they're making an erroneous assumption if they think that no one would lie in order to get laid.
Speaking of young twits, I think Nick Gillespie did a great job of handling this one in the video that Glenn linked earlier:
Ever the gentleman, Gillespie at no point cheapened the debate by threatening to withhold sex from her. I think such restraint is commendable.
(And they say libertarians are against moral lessons!)
posted by Eric on 01.31.10 at 06:39 PM
Comments
I would not want to have sex with anyone who did not want to have sex with me because of my height.
Yeah, they're probably terrible in bed too. Kinda.. sour at it.
But it seems to me you don't want to have sex with women even if they would date a shorter guy. Isn't that in the definition of "gay"?
As for the heightist poll, I would like see the corollary study, how many men would date a woman taller than they are? Not sleep with, date.
I would be utterly unsurprised if the numbers were roughly equivalent and would be surprised if they were markedly different.
It takes a big man to be able to date a taller woman, always hearing snickers behind you even when they're not there. Having to deal with guys coming up and asking your date why she doesn't date someone her own size. Napoleon jokes.
Heck, check a poll on how many men will let a woman drive for a date, even if it's her car.
Civilization is relatively recent in our development, women's lib is ridiculously recent.
Far too recent to have affected us more than skin deep.
There are people alive today who were alive when women couldn't vote.
My mother's generation, come of age in the 50s, was born, bred and expected to become housewives. Their goal was to find a good man, churn out kids, clean the house, do laundry, have dinner on the table when he got home and not worry their pretty, little heads about anything not involved in running the house.
You don't change that in a generation, or three, in either sex.
I once got a letter from a tenant of mine who went to Italy. After taking a tour of a cathedral in Florence conducted by a local priest, she wrote: "He spoke very good English, considering how short he was. I was surprised." I never figured that one out.
chocolatier · January 31, 2010 8:08 PM
I won't get into the "height-ism" thing, it's pretty obvious it exists.
But what I find most fascinating is this;
Most people have an extremely low opinion of women (and men for that matter) that trade their bodies for money, position, or power. There are more than a few disparaging terms for people in that trade. That the handlers of the supporters of "obamacare" would so casually assume that their constituents can be used in such a way is enlightening. It speaks volumes of their opinion of them. The term "useful idiot" springs to mind.
Colonel Bill · January 31, 2010 9:32 PM
I read where French prostitutes who gave a Nazi soldier the clap considered themselves part of the Resistance.
Perhaps these kids have a reason to ensure their sex partners have access to healthcare?
BTW, the easiest way to get more young people to have health insurance is to make health insurance a requirement to get a cell phone with other than barebones service.
JKB · February 1, 2010 12:19 AM
I don't know what excuse the above twits have.
Same one. Selecting for height is selecting for dominance (goes the theory, which is right). Group-selective strategies aim for group dominance (if group selection happens, which it seems to).
But proclaiming a conscious strategy defeats it, as proclaimed. It's received as a call for deception. "Let's do it for our country!"
Darwin is not mocked.
guy on internet · February 1, 2010 1:20 AM
Hmmm...withhold sex from those who oppose health care?
Well, first I'd have to catch them (Aristophenes got that part right).
The Anti-Idiotarian Rottweiler
Don?t bang your head!
I would not want to have sex with anyone who did not want to have sex with me because of my height.
Yeah, they're probably terrible in bed too. Kinda.. sour at it.
But it seems to me you don't want to have sex with women even if they would date a shorter guy. Isn't that in the definition of "gay"?
As for the heightist poll, I would like see the corollary study, how many men would date a woman taller than they are? Not sleep with, date.
I would be utterly unsurprised if the numbers were roughly equivalent and would be surprised if they were markedly different.
It takes a big man to be able to date a taller woman, always hearing snickers behind you even when they're not there. Having to deal with guys coming up and asking your date why she doesn't date someone her own size. Napoleon jokes.
Heck, check a poll on how many men will let a woman drive for a date, even if it's her car.
Civilization is relatively recent in our development, women's lib is ridiculously recent.
Far too recent to have affected us more than skin deep.
There are people alive today who were alive when women couldn't vote.
My mother's generation, come of age in the 50s, was born, bred and expected to become housewives. Their goal was to find a good man, churn out kids, clean the house, do laundry, have dinner on the table when he got home and not worry their pretty, little heads about anything not involved in running the house.
You don't change that in a generation, or three, in either sex.