@nocute:

<3.

Check out the movie AngelA, there is a lovely scene with a Tall Blond Lithe Woman and a Short Hairy, One-Armed Man, she saves him. Later, because of the first scene there is a man who sees a woman and himself differently and on so seeing saves her. Go figure. I don't think height or age or fat nor thin has a thing to do with the love that is available to us. I think it's really about the love we are capable of letting in, letting change us, break us open, soften us. Yes there is risk, and the reward is always found in the risk. You can't change your height. The last man I slept with had the smallest penis, I have ever met. Yet that lovely little rocket was like a perfect pussy seeking missile and boy howdy could it penetrate. The man knows how to use his tools and in lucky for it. Use your assets, get really really good with your cock and your tongue and your personality and you will never have to worry about feet and inches again.

RenF @102: [SPOILER] AngelA was a good movie. But it failed when, at the end, the woman who emerged from the river was the same tall lithe blonde goddess and not a short, dark, dumpy woman, whom the leading man was still mad about, which would have illustrated its "look on the inside for true beauty" point so much better.

Not going to keep up with Eudeamonic who's predictably ridden in on the waambulance with some more festive misogyny. Ugh ugh ugh. Someone else can despatch the troll this week.

Nocute @79: I'm so sorry you were rejected. Really, that's so awful, and I can relate to the "why can't someone unattached fancy me."

There ARE men who prefer curves. And there are men who don't care. If you've got boobs, of any size, they're happy! And at least you do have your FWBs, which is better than nothing. Hang in there. You may not be able to order up a suitable man on the internet at will, but keep looking and it will happen. Hugs.

I don't really want to get involved in the who has it worse, fat people of both sexes or short men.

But I wanted to second something someone has already mentioned above for other (gender ratios) reasons.

Although Internet is brilliant at broadening your pool of potential dates, it also, I think, really makes the looks more salient and important. And this effect is even stronger when using specific dating sites. It's natural - we don't have much to go on, and in particular we don't have all the other physical clues that guide attraction (voice, smell, movement, manner, way of interacting, touch). So it all gets focused on looks. Which is a really shitty deal - statistically speaking - for those who don't conform to the standards.

I've noticed it myself, I don't know if it's just me or a universal thing: looks matter much more online. I was surprised to realise that I had sex with quite a few people in real life that I WOULDN'T consider if I "met" them online. And that wasn't just because I grabbed what was available and willing in the circumstances - these were people I was genuinely attracted, with real chemistry.

There is so much more to attraction than visuals - and not just the personality and attitude part.

Oh, and another thing.

I think that attraction is only one part of the issue here. Social expectations and social competition is another. Guys who would happily fuck fat or slutty women and women who would fuck short or fat or ugly or poor/unemployed dudes won't "officially date" them because of how this might affect their social kudos, and their own self - image. Let's not kid ourselves saying it's all about attraction.

@Nocute: I'm so sorry that happened to you; that sounds horrible, and it's murder on the self-esteem.

But I'm sober enough to think we shouldn't shit on short dudes. My brother is short, and the story you described sounds exactly like his life, except that instead of the outpouring of sympathy you're getting, he gets told "it's not your height, it's you" or victim-blamed about the chip on his shoulder he carries around from a lifetime of being treated worse than you are. See how if a man says "No fatties" we all say "christ, what an asshole?" If a woman says "No shorties," we all say "Yeah, they're horrible, bitter little shits." That's the difference, if you were wondering.

Having it bad does not mean people who have a very similar problem but far less support don't have it worse.

But for what it's worth? If you were having great sex, he was almost certainly lying about not being attracted to you. What he told you isn't the kind of thing people say when it's true, it's the kind of thing assholes say when the real answer is "I'm too much of a coward to handle publicly dating a short guy" or "I'm too much of a coward to handle publicly dating a fat woman." It's not you, it's their bullshit inability to handle the shit their asshole peers say to someone who dates outside of stereotypes. Fuck 'em. No one needs that.

@106: I didn't see this before posting, but basically: Yes, this.

Asshole cowards can't admit when they're doing fine, if it means admitting that they're adults and life's not a fucking TV show. But they're cowardly assholes, so instead of admitting that they just say "I couldn't be attracted to you." Bullshit.

I think Ms Cute deserves to be the first recipient of a new Award. I shall call it the Dukakis Award, with some regret, as, thinking of taste, it really ought to be based on Olympia rather than Michael. But, as Alicia Johnson writes in Lady Susan, "What could I do? Facts are such horrid things!" and here the fact is that Ms Cute deserves recognition for being able to be so dispassionate about this letter, in a way reminiscent of that infamous debate in 1988 when the first question to the Democratic nominee for president was whether he would persist in his noted strong opposition to the death penalty if the case in question were that of his wife being raped and murdered.

Interesting counterpoint to the ’short men’ segments of this thread, going on right now at lawyersgunsandmoneyblog.com; a columnist is decrying how actresses playing female superheroes are cast/made up/trained specifically to appeal to men, whereas male superheroes are not held to that standard, and as example, get this, some of those actors are short.
The fact that some women like tall men is presented as a given, nothin’ to do about it, and this is on a thread inveighing against gender-related social expectations of body image, on a lefty site the majority of whose postings I agree with.

@110 getting off-topic, I've been asked that question in death-penalty discussions. My answer is that I don't know what I would think, because I would be insane with grief and rage. But let's assume I did want vengeance: it is a bad idea to shape social policy to conform to the wishes of people not in their right minds. The relevant question is what is best for society, not "what would a crazy person do?"

I don't think that settles the debate one way or the other. I just think "what would you want" is not a relevant inquiry.

Sorry, should be @109.

Yeah. The answer to "what would you think if you were out of your mind with grief and rage" is almost always "Something completely unproductive which does not form a good basis for lawmaking."

@103 Fan. Follow the rule of trolls. Don't engage. If need be, report them.

CatB, @110, so can you comment on this site? If so, have you called them.
It's like with all the stereotypes us chicks have to one by one dispel from our data banks, you guys have to throw this height shit off.

May your Christmas be filled with light, peace and happiness Mr E. The rest of you lot as well.

@114: If other people are piling crap on you, it's not up to you to throw off. The height shit isn't something short guys are imagining, it's something the rest of us are doing to them. That's like telling black people "If you'll just 'get over' race, the police will stop shooting you for no reason."

Nope. They won't. The people targeting you for a given trait don't actually care what you think about that trait. Someone who hates fat women doesn't give a damn how a given fat woman feels about fatness. People who treat short guys badly don't give a damn about how short guys feel about their height.

Have a good Christmas. We're making pie. Watch out for spiders. {shudder}

@107: Eudaemonic, I am in no way "shitting on short dudes." I feel for the lw: at 5'2", he's genuinely going to have a harder slog of it than most guys. I don't see many people here saying that "shorties are bitter little shits." I'm not calling this guy a little shit, and I concede he likely has cause to be bitter. I just said that as a fat woman who's been rejected cruelly multiple times, it is hard for me to feel a lot of sympathy toward this particular man when he disparages fat women even as he's complaining about rejection for not meeting a cultural norm. The hypocrisy in his attitude is what makes him unlikable to me, not his height, and even so, I recognize his legitimate complaint.

For what it's worth, and taking me as an n of one, I have never, ever heard short men referred to in the way you are suggesting is universal (I don't doubt that it happens; I'm just saying that I've never witnessed it). I think people on this comment thread have tried to offer advice and some have suggested that he have a better attitude. I happen to agree with the person above (too lazy to go back and look up the number of the comment or the name of the commentor) who said that telling people just to "have more self-confidence" is easier said than done, and that self-confidence has to come from somewhere. But people are trying to be helpful.

Also for what it's worth, I can tell you that it's far from a unanimous love-fest when a fat person (I assume this applies to both men and women) talks about the cruelty they experience as a response to their bodies. Quite frequently, the response is along the lines of "if you don't like it, move your fat ass and stop being such a pig and lose weight." Fat people are not treated with a great deal of sympathy. They are virtually the only group left it seems it is possible to publicly shame, frequently under the guise of concern-trolling. There are too many examples to give. Just recently Dan linked to an advertisement for a masturbation toy that showed a fat woman in lingerie and suggested that sticking your dick in a latex sleeve was obviously infinitely preferable to having sex with someone like that.

Lastly, perhaps you missed the part where I said that an ex-boyfriend of mine is 5'3." I speak only for myself, but speaking for myself, I have no height biases.

"when he disparages fat women even as he's complaining about rejection for not meeting a cultural norm. The hypocrisy in his attitude is what makes him unlikable to me, not his height, and even so, I recognize his legitimate complaint."

This is part of the problem. This, right here. Can you quote the part where he disparages fat women? Seriously, go back and try to find it. I'm not kidding: It's not there.

There. Now that we've established that he didn't do that, I think we should look at why he's being accused of disparaging fat women when he didn't.

"For what it's worth, and taking me as an n of one, I have never, ever heard short men referred to in the way you are suggesting is universal (I don't doubt that it happens; I'm just saying that I've never witnessed it)."

Scroll up, and read posts 2, 5, 7, 10, 22, and 27. There. Now you have; these are all things people said. I'd say "welcome to the club," but being a member of the "Notices What Short Guys Go Through" club is depressing as fuck, so our welcome party would be bitterly sarcastic.

Everything you have said about fat people and how they're (we're?) treated is absolutely true. All of it. I agree with you completely. Understand that I am not short and not thin. I am on your side. My "own group" is yours, not short guys'. I feel some of your pain. I don't feel any of theirs. Some of what targets you hits me; none of what targets them hits me. I have every reason to be biased in favor of believing fat people have it worse.

So I hope you understand what it means when I say: Short guys have it worse.

I'm carrying around a lot of extra pounds. If I were thinner, my life would be immeasurably better. But I would put on another hundred pounds before I would give up two inches of height, purely because of what each would do to my life.

@107: My brother is short, and the story you described sounds exactly like his life, except that instead of the outpouring of sympathy you're getting, he gets told "it's not your height, it's you" or victim-blamed about the chip on his shoulder he carries around from a lifetime of being treated worse than you are. See how if a man says "No fatties" we all say "christ, what an asshole?" If a woman says "No shorties," we all say "Yeah, they're horrible, bitter little shits."

Okay, I'm going out on several limbs here, but I'd guess that the reason for the outpouring of sympathy I'm getting here on this comment thread is because I'm a known member of its community, as opposed to a total stranger coming in with her tale of woe. I feel a sense of relationship, of comradery with many of the regular commentors here, and even if I have had some disagreements with some of them from time to time, I wish them all well and genuinely extend my support or sympathy or empathy when one of them says something that makes me feel bad for them. I assume that's the case here.

Second limb: you say your brother carries a chip on his shoulder. Well, depending on how that chip is manifested, perhaps that's the reason for a dearth of outpouring of sympathy for him. Chips on shoulders may be warranted, but they do little to endear one to anyone. Maybe if your brother talked without rancor about the way he is rejected he would receive a different response.

Third limb: it's not a contest. It's not an either-or. People can be cruel to short men and cruel to fat people and acknowledging one doesn't mean to have to refute the other. I'm not trying to win the award for "most horrible treatment." I know that @79 I said that "I defy any short man to have had that kind of humiliation and rejection as a regular part of his life," but that was wrong of me. I was speaking from a deep well of pain. But still, I wonder how many short men have had a woman say to them, unsolicited, "you're too short for me to date, but we could have sex if you want" (and I wonder, our culture being what it is, if a 19-year-old guy would feel as humiliated and ashamed as the 19-year-old too-fat-to-date-but-not-fat-enough-to-fuck woman did about an offer of what was essentially no-strings sex)? I doubt that short straight men on dating websites have women approach them, actually initiate contact, to tell them that they sound great and if they were only taller the woman would consider dating them. I'm not talking about rejection I face after I introduce myself or ask for a date; I'm talking about men taking the time to compose a message to me in which they simultaneously compliment and berate me. I don't know: if that is your brother's experience, then I apologize, but something tells me it's not.

Final limb: I have have heard of women who put something like "no shorties" on their profiles and I consider them to be as obnoxious and awful as men who put "no fatties." One can have a preference without being cruel in the expression of it, and I happen to think that a dating profile should be a place to pitch yourself, not give your list of deal-breakers.
But I'm on OkCupid, and I've answered a metric fuckton of questions, and I've only seen one about height (would you date someone shorter than you?) and at least 5 about weight, 4 of which were phrased in a way that suggested the question-writer had been treated cruelly (members who've answered a certain number of questions are able to submit their own; frequently, I can guess at an issue that was point of contention in previous relationships by the way the question is worded or just the topic itself), and at least 2 of which had response choices which were themselves opportunities for cruelty--the "no fatties" is one, verbatim from the site.

We are all allowed our preferences. We're even allowed to be hypocrites. But there's no need to advertise those (perhaps) hypocritical preferences in what is often insulting language.

@118: arrgghh! Edit: "19-year-old too-fat-to-date-but-not-fat-enough-to-fuck woman" should have been 19-year-old too-fat-to-date-but-not-too-fat-to-fuck woman."

@118: You referred to post #2 as as an example of someone "shitting on short dudes." Here's #2 in its entirety: "Reading this letter, I sense the lack of confidence and self-esteem is the bigger culprit than height regarding the LW's lack of dating success. I'd recommend the classic advice: do extra-curricular things you love, forge relationships with those who share your passions, and be open to approaching/being approached by those who aren't otherwise perfect."

As so often happens, our interpretations of the original text differ vastly. I don't see this as "shitting on" anyone. I see it as an attempt to be helpful.

I know we're going to disagree; I'm stepping away before you start calling me a liar.

@118: I don't think you can compare being an overweight dude to being an overweight woman. There's a cultural component you seem to be ignoring: women are judged by their looks much, much more than men are. So even if "shortness" in men is comparable to "fatness" in women in terms of being considered physically off-putting, "fatness" has a much, much bigger impact on women simply because looks are deemed that much more important.

How important? I work in a white collar, client-focused office. We hire men of all shapes and sizes: fat ones, bald ones, short ones, etc. While I do not doubt that the taller guys have some advantage in terms of charming clients and being perceived more component, dudes are ultimately judged by their ability.

We also hire women of one shape and size: thin. That's it. There are literally no fat women in my office (outside of ministerial, non-client facing work), likely because fat women are deemed incompetent by HR, clients, or both. I belong to a number of professional organizations, and the same holds true there: virtually all the women are thin or at least not fat. Plenty of short dudes can succeed in the business world, but fat women are pretty much screwed. Example: men's income is largely independent of their weight, while women's income drops the fatter they get. (http://www.prb.org/Publications/Articles…)

Let's move on to dating. I hope it isn't in dispute that men (in general) prize looks much more than women do, at least when it comes to getting long-term partners. The short guys I mentioned above have no trouble getting dates, likely because they are competent and successful professionals. But the not-fat women in my field who are less attractive struggle. Turns out most guys don't care as much about whether their partners have a stable career, and care more about how those gals look.

Shortness in men may be the physical equivalent of fatness in women. But physical attributes are deemed much more important to women than men, skewing in impact of fatness on women. So much so that fat women even have difficulty in their professional lives, which limits their ability to develop other attractive traits for the dating market.

God bless you, I Hate Screen Names.

@121: A short guy complains about the way people treat him because he's short. Another person dismisses his claims--'cause he's just a shorty, after all, amirite?--and acts like he can dictate the LW's own life experience and assert that the LW is to blame for the way other people treat him and that the LW is wrong about why they're doing it.

Textbook victim-blaming.

"Final limb: I have have heard of women who put something like "no shorties" on their profiles and I consider them to be as obnoxious and awful as men who put "no fatties."

Yes. This. You are almost alone in considering this to be the case. That is the beginning and the end of the LW's claim: Millions of people think you shouldn't shit on fat women for being fat, and maybe five people think you shouldn't shit on short men for being short.

Everything else is an attempt to obfuscate the issue. Short men and fat women are targets for abuse. Many people attempt to defend fat women from this. Virtually no people attempt to defend short men from this.

The LW is allowed to have negative feelings about that. We should not retaliate by falsely accusing him of shitting on fat women, because there is nothing to retaliate against. He talked about how shitty his life is. There's no reason to punish him for that.

We should stop hurting people and then shaming them for acting hurt. There is no circumstance and no person and no gender for which that's ever the right thing to do.

@119: "But still, I wonder how many short men have had a woman say to them, unsolicited, "you're too short for me to date, but we could have sex if you want" (and I wonder, our culture being what it is, if a 19-year-old guy would feel as humiliated and ashamed as the 19-year-old too-fat-to-date-but-not-fat-enough-to-fuck woman did about an offer of what was essentially no-strings sex)?"

From my experience, short men at 19 would give anything to have women say that to them unsolicited, even once, instead of just saying the first half. Their lives were far worse than yours. You were excluded from relationships but not casual sex; they were excluded from both of those. Let's not get into another of these spirals of falsely claiming that no one likes casual sex and that therefore being excluded from it doesn't suck. Privilege-denial may be fun, but let's stick to the truth.

Casual sex is fucking awesome, and access to it has been a privilege and a blessing. Being excluded from that would have been emotionally crippling, as well as just a whole hell of a lot less fun.

@122: The studies seem very clear that short men make less than tall men, and this is born out by my experience, which is the opposite of yours. I have a fair amount of contact with various executive offices; I've never laid eyes on a C-level executive who was under six feet, and I've never seen a man in even junior management who was fat or under 5'8. We have women of most shapes and sizes at almost all levels, with the exception of the C-suite (where I've only ever seen very fit women).

There is an obvious confounder, which is that the more money you have, the easier it is to be thin; there is nothing you can do to be tall. I was heavier when I made less money, because I couldn't afford a gym membership or much healthy food, and had to spend a lot of time commuting. If my salary tripled, my weight would almost certainly drop by a third in short order, and I've seen this happen to other people, men and women. Correlation is not causation, and I doubt you can argue that not being promoted makes you short.

But that's beside the point. I never equated male fatness with female; I was making the mistake of sharing something personal on here, which I keep being reminded is a terrible idea. My background is only relevant in exposing my bias, which I thought I'd made clear and I hoped no one would ignore in favor of red herrings: If there's a Team Fatties and Team Shorties, I'm much closer to Team Fatties.

So it should matter when I'm willing to grant someone else the gold in the Oppression Olympics between those two teams. Hands down; it's not even a contest.

Eudaemonic, @82, drjones said this to me: "I would suggest reconsidering your preconceptions a little though. Personally, I am attracted to mildly plump/curvy/overweight women and like BBW porn, but it does not feel particularly fetishistic, it's just what I like. I have had successful relationships with women of many sizes but ended up with a bigger girl than is fashionable who I married and am very happy with. I have heard of larger women avoiding people like me because they don't want to be 'fetishized' for their weight, but that feels very self-defeating. Yeah, don't date a guy who treats you like a piece of meat (all the time, not just in the bedroom when you might want to be a piece of meat) but don't assume that every dude whose dick gets hard to big ladies is a creep who is incapable of recognizing your humanity.";

@98, I Hate Screen Names said this to me: "A thought: have you been limiting yourself to white guys? IME, minority dudes like me tend to like a fuller figure. It's a stereotype for a reason!"

Now, it happens that the advice both those men gave me was unnecessary, in that I already do the things or don't have the attitude they assumed I didn't do or do have. But I understood them to be offering support and advice and trying to be helpful, not as victim-blaming.

You and I tend to take the same words and apply different interpretations. What I see as well-meaning, if slightly unhelpful suggestions and am grateful for because it suggests someone's desire to help me based on their goodwill towards me, you see as someone " act[ing] like he can dictate the LW's own life experience and assert that the LW is to blame for the way other people treat him and that the LW is wrong about why they're doing it."

I would be tempted to suggest that you try to rearrange your world view and not assume everyone is trying to dictate your own life experience and blame you for your unhappiness, but I realize that you would see my suggestion as yet another example of "textbook victim blaming" and as someone who is trying to dictate your life experience and tell you why your unhappiness is all your own fault. So I won't.

I will say that I strongly believe happiness is largely a mental state that one can control for oneself. I am in emotional pain right now--I just said goodbye to someone I love (and by the way, I broke up with him, not the other way around, because I don't want to be in a relationship with someone whom I love and who feels that he can never love me. I think that's unhealthy. He was willing to continue as we were because why not?)--and still, I am a generally happy person. I consider myself lucky in life more than unlucky, overall. I have friends, wonderful friends; my health is good; I have children I love who are thriving and happy and succeeding in things they're doing; I have a job which is highly stressful and pays for shit, but it is what I love to do and what I trained to do and that is not always the case for people with advanced degrees in the humanities. I live in a beautiful part of the country, where the climate is great and the population is liberal. I am by no means a bitter person.

@116: I'm going to ask you to read more carefully. @79 I didn't say that at the age of 19, I was excluded from relationships; I wasn't fat--not even plump--then; I was about Amy Shumerish. And @118, I conceded that I didn't think a 19-year-old male would be too upset at being considered eligible for casual sex.

And, since you seem to have misunderstood me at both those posts, it's not about the difference between being acceptable for a relationship vs. being acceptable to fuck casually; it was about being shamed and humiliated and treated cruelly by someone who could easily have not done so.

I Hate Screen Names @122
I looked at the article you referenced. It does not seem to support your argument.
1) The article says that there is a stronger relationship between weight and income for women than for men, but that the reasons are complex and unclear.
2) If anything, the article suggests that lack of income causes weight gain, not the other way around. The article mentions lack of availability of healthy food and lack of time for healthy activities.

In any event, this is a statistical article. There is only a correlation.

As far as mens' height and business success, 90% of all CEOs are taller than average, and less than 3% are shorter than 5' 7" ("Short Guys Finish Last" The world's most enduring form of discrimination. The Economist, 23 December 1995).

I'm not claiming that short men are worse off than fat women, or vice versa. As Nocute says (and I paraphrase), this is not a pissing contest.

I posted before I saw Eud @ 126. It looks like he already commented on the study referenced by 122.

Going against my own views, Mr E, I will answer you @ 116.
Yes, these stereotypes can and have to be thrown off. Waiting for all of society to stop will never happen.
Like I said, we women if we want to feel our lives are worth living, have to throw them off. Stop being influenced and defined by others' notion of beauty, etc etc.
Nobody is less than because of their height. Everything there, I assume.
Legs, heart, kidneys etc etc. a body in good working order.
If some people want to hang onto superficial reasons for their attractions to other people, nothing anyone can do about it. One doesn't have to join them though.

Re that other thread I mentioned, ooof, worth a look, if only to see how we lefties can be as goalpost-movy and dismissive of others as Reddit's Head MRA.

It would be interesting to get a spreadsheet on which women rejected me d/t height; I remember one front-desk girl in Seattle I thought was cute, when asked (in front of me, by someone else) what her type was, she immediately spread her arms and said, Big and Tall like this! She herself was rete petite, maybe scraping 5'2, and 105, soaking wet and holding a brick. I thought it was kind of too bad that she wouldn't be into me, but....

A trope Dan often trots out, that he really should retire, is 'Don't sleep with/try to date X, because Y, and there are this many billion people on the planet besides X." None of us, not Hugh Jackman/Salma Hayek crossed with a unicorn made of kittens, gets the rest of the world to line up so we get to take our pick. Gotta have standards, yeah, but every tick you put on your list is striking people off that part of the population that
a. You'll encounter
And
b. Is open to a relationship with you.
A x B is often not a huge number. You can have standards, but better be at peace with who on there is left after you've culled via your List. I submit height is a dumb reason to do so.

I'm not saying the physical isn't important. It is.
Attraction, as a poster above says, is not just dependent on the physical, however.
A man I loved dearly as a young woman, was balding in his early thirties and a stocky, bulky build. His mind was just so exciting to me, his heart, his craziness. He had a kind and lovely face.
Of course good looking people get looked at. Nothing amiss here. Beautiful specimens of humans are beautiful specimens of humans.
Most of us are not in this group. Yet people love us. Are attracted to us, sexually. Mind wise. Heart wise.

B. Are open.

CatB.. Soaking wet and holding a brick.. Please interpret. I like the sound of it, just not sure how offensive it is.

Yeah CatB, and how many years you got.
Intimacy is not something we just throw around. Yes, sex is different. It's nice when they go together.
I interact with all sorts of men sexually, that I see in the street. A momentary sharing of erotic energy, subtle and not acknowledged.
But hey, we all know when someone looks at us with interest.
I just realized this dating site culture has got rid of seduction.
This man I spoke of above, our over time slow seduction of each other, was such a big part of my enjoyment of my time with him.
It was the 70s, women were initiating connections as strongly as men. Hook up culture was in its infancy.

135 - It's not offensive, just descriptive of someone with a non-robust physique.The water and brick add weight, d'you see, so if she needs 'em to reach that weight, she's pretty light and could stand to eat more fried food.

@131: "Nobody is less than because of their height."

Aside from, y'know, literally. ;)

(Yes, I know, I'm a terrible person. Couldn't resist.)

“My type” in men is tall. 6'4"+. Height gets me interested in a man even if he has nothing else going for him. I don’t know whether that’s imprinting from my first boyfriend (6'4" as a teen) or whether it’s my ovaries signaling to me that this man comes from genetic stock that has access to so much surplus food it can feed a teenaged boy through a spectacular growth spurt.

But that’s just a detail. I don’t limiit myself to “my type.” Anyone who would consider themselves undatable by me because of a minor quirk in what gets my attention has completely misunderstood. I have dated all kinds of men (and women).

Height is noticeable right off, from across a room. Smell is noticable right off, close up. Other relevant traits like kindness, thoughtfulness, intelligence, family orientation, ambition, drug use, adventurousness, humour, creativity, curiosity and so on take more time to notice. It is simply going to take me more time to notice the attractive qualities of a short man than of a tall one. It’s not a disqualification.

@127: "But I understood them to be offering support and advice and trying to be helpful, not as victim-blaming.

You and I tend to take the same words and apply different interpretations. What I see as well-meaning, if slightly unhelpful suggestions and am grateful for because it suggests someone's desire to help me based on their goodwill towards me, you see as someone..."

This is because we have extremely different life experiences, which leads to wildly diverging levels of trust in certain kinds of people. FWIW, I didn't think they were trying to victim-blame you either, but this is getting into intent. A quick googling might be in order on the subject of intent, specifically on whether it is or isn't magic.

I have not always had the good fortune to be able to safely assume other people had good intentions or were communicating in good faith, and I have not forgot what this taught me, and never will. But you're right; people giving well-meaning advice to fat women with whom they're friendly is an extremely different context from people giving "advice" to short men who they perceive as whining (that's two strikes right there, when it comes to gender role performance, and pretty much everyone you'll meet is hardcore devoted to punishing even one strike).

And since he's perceived as whining about not getting laid, that's a third strike; he's out of the "acceptably masculine" zone completely, and pretty much every one of us can be counted on to respond accordingly. So at this point we should hold what people say about him to the same level of scrutiny we'd apply to a Stormfront commenter telling us what black people "really" need to do to deal with racism, and for the same reasons.

These are two very different things, and it's simply not true that I saw drjones and IHSN's the way you're saying. What we've said about the LW and what we've said about you are completely different contexts. Do you really think I'd have said nothing about it if I had? I mean, I have trouble imagining that I've somehow come across as the kind of person who'd have kept his mouth shut if he thought he saw something like that. ;)

That's kind of the opposite of the problem I have, and deliberately so; people's consciences are quirky, and everyone becomes a lot happier once they adapt their behavior to the quirks of their own.

Nocute, you simply aren't crazy enough. You are far less reactive than I am. I admire it and you. I hope someone out there recognizes what a jewel you are. I personally get a big charge out of finding my gem and wonder how he was looked over.

Although I am probably going to screen shot this discussion because it's the first time I've been accused of rape by *refusing* to engage in sex, but i've decided to resort to Wadsworth: Whom the gods would destroy, they first make mad....

Well CatB @137. if she eats more fried food, it will make her physique that much less robust. This some Southern confusion?

Excuse me. Can we leave the Fat word out. Unless built like a rake or you know, a gym rat, most of us have a little extra padding.
Obesity. That is a problem relating to health, and different to having some
cuddly flesh.

Less than Human, @ 138.
Not less than space.

Just a note about putting yourself out there online as a short man: Don't fucking lie about your height. It's something dates will notice and not something you can fake in real life (she'll see those heels you're wearing). I once met up with a guy who on okcupid said he was 5'5", which is the same height as me (I don't wear heels) and when I greeted him I could see clear over his head. He was maybe 5'2", and that wasn't a problem for me at all, but that kind of petty lying is a huge turn-off and a red flag.

@141: Thanks, DarkHorse! Funny, i generally feel pretty dang crazy.
I'm glad you found and appreciate your gem and hope that he appreciates you.

That's of course true Nocute, you are dang crazy, that's why so many of us are saying to you that that's great.
Dang Crazy.

E I have to ask say short guys 'win' this contest that exists only in your mind? Then what?

Are they given a huge party? Do they get a million dollar check? Do all the people who made them feel bad about their height apologize and offer a blowjob? Does God himself descend from the heavens and give them the inches they so desire?

Or does none of this happen and you are once again looking for a way to say women don't matter. Our feelings don't matter. Our experiences don't matter. The only thing that matter is how a MAN feels. And if he thinks something is unfair then it's unfair. And if he thinks treating people, women especially because we're not people, like shit will help, then he should get to do that. And anyone who complains is somehow 'victim blaming'.

Hell if you listened to DarkHorseRising instead of making a bunch of claims about things she never said or inferred you'd see she agrees with you about how people who don't fit our ridiculous and unrealistic beauty are treated. And how maybe we should spend some time thinking about that.

But that would involve both men and women admitting they were shallow or wrong and we can't have that now can we?

@139 yes, I think what you describe is fairly typical; you have a preference for tall men (like almost all women, I'm afraid), but it's not a must for attraction and in the long run other things are more important. Online dating doesn't give short men any chance to roll out their positive traits because because the height is the first, and maybe only, thing someone browsing their profile will notice. And they might not even get that if the reader, due to the sheer volume of profiles she has to deal with, employs a height filter when searching. I'd just add that its unfair that short people (especially men, since they are the ones who will be filtered out for it) have to list their exact height rather than just general categories like "Tall/Average/Below Average". Imagine if instead of general body type categories people had to enter their exact weight or BMI numbers! I'm sure women wouldn't stand for it

Oh, and Merry Christmas eve, everyone!

@149: jasha1, that's a good point. Maybe dating websites could change and ask for those broad categories, rather than specific heights. I don't know if it would help that much, but it's worth a try.
Match.com used to have a place in your profile where you listed what body types and heights you were searching for, as well as you listing your own (they may still do this--I have't been on Match in over 6 years). It certainly made self-weeding faster.

@145 you might want to consider how you might act if you were required to enter your weight in pounds or your dress size as part of your profile. Don't you think you might be fudge a bit and not want to be judged too harshly for it? As long as women use height as a strict criteria for consideration men are going to fudge it. It doesn't sound like you gave the guy a chance; if it was the fudging of his height that's pretty judgemental, and if it really was the height (I suspect it was) that's pretty shallow.

@151 - 'Fudging' is one thing, outright lying is something else. I do not take height into consideration when chatting up guys online. It just isn't a factor. But I had one similar to @145's experience, where we meet up and have a chat and I can see clear over the dude's head. Now, we just didn't mesh, but there was something bugging me about the guy the whole time I was with him. So I go back and look at his profile again. Height - 5'11". I'm 5'7", and I can see over his head? So even though it wasn't a conscious thing, because I had forgotten what he even claimed his height to be, I subconsciously picked up on the fact that he was a liar, and that was enough to put me off of him.

@152 so it would have been just as bad if he'd been three inches taller than his profile said vs three inches shorter? I think we both know the answer.

No, because that wouldn't have made an impact on me one way or the other. My brain remembered that he was 'taller' than me, so if he had genuinely been taller it wouldn't have registered. I don't carry a tape measure around with me, so 6'2" instead of 5'11" would have been of no particular note.

@153 I think the problem isn't the height but the lying about the height. It's hard not to see that as a sign of someone being insecure and manipulative. Which is going to put people off.

So just don’t enter height or body type at all. I don’t. I don’t waste a lot of time chatting with people: I want to meet them immediately. Chemistry and who they are in person is the important part.

I have photos on my profile. They show my body type and they are suggestive of my personality but they aren’t necessarily flattering. I figure if someone can’t be interested in me unless I look a particular way then we probably aren’t a match. I’ve been told several times that I am more attractive in-person than in my photos which is exactly what I want.

@149 Jasha1 - This is tricky. I recently used a dating app that does not have a filter for height but I wrote in my profile that I'm tall because I know guys tend to prefer women who are shorter than they are. I did not include my exact height because I didn't want men to come to the erroneous conclusion that they needed to be taller than I am. When I matched with men, some did ask "how tall is tall" which was fine because at that point we had a dialogue going. I did notice that all of the men who matched with me were of above average height, so maybe just describing myself as "tall" filtered out some people. I like nocute's idea of having the opportunity to also state your own preferences. OTOH, there's beauty to leaving things open, chemistry is so mysterious.

The app I used really only filters for age which is possibly more limiting for middle aged and older women than for middle aged and older men.

I've said this before but I'm a big fan of total full disclosure about physical things on dating websites or apps. When you meet someone in real life, without a dating app or site, like, you know, at a party or at the local bookstore, both of you reaching for the same Bill Bryson book or something, you can tell right away how tall they are or what their body type is or how much hair they have or how old they appear (may not be how old they really are; some of us age more kindly than others). If those things are important to you, you don't even have to strike up a conversation, which I agree might be a pity, because, like DarkHorseRising and her husband, you might initially be less than thrilled that what you thought of as an important criterion is lacking, only to discover, if you keep going, that it's not as important as you thought it was. It might be a case of a preference vs. an absolute necessity. (This, by the way, is the case with my ex-boyfriend: he hoped that like DarkHorse, he would come to find that what he thought was a necessity was conquered by all the other stuff. He turned on to be wrong and the wishful thinking didn't pan out. C'est la vie.)

I don't want to waste my time starting up a flirtatious conversation with someone whom I know there's no chance I'llI be attracted to (that's why the photos matter)--and yes, I too have my preferences, hypocritical as that makes me (I just don't lead with my list of "must haves" or "must not haves" in my own profile, and I'm tactful and polite to the end. If someone whom I find unattractive approaches me on a dating website, I say something to the effect of "thank you for the message and the ---. I don't think we're a match/I'm not interested but I wish you the best in your search." If someone approaches me in real life, I use a variation of this. If we go on a date or two and I don't feel chemistry, I write an email or call to say something like "it's been very nice meeting you, but I'm just not feeling 'it'.")

But more importantly, I don't want to waste not only my time but also take the hit to my self-esteem that I risk if I don't disclose all my possible physical drawbacks, like my age or my body type and then meet and see a look of disgust or irritation on the guy's face. That's the main reason I am so upfront. That's why my photos are recent and show how old I really am and there's at least one full-body shot. That's why I give my age, my height, and my body type truthfully when filling out those damn things. It's for my benefit, for my protection: I don't want to go out with someone who doesn't like my face or body. That's why I'm so upset at the ex-bf: he knew going in he was attracted only to slender women, but he contacted me anyway, as sort of an experiment to see if he could get over that preference if the other stuff was good enough. He fucked with my heart.

When you lie about your physical being on a dating profile, either by omission or explicitly, it is stupid because it's always apparent the minute that you meet or when the clothes come off that you were lying. When I see a man with a profile picture so closely cropped that I can't see the perimeter of his face, I know that he's bald, and possibly also cropping out a triple chin. While I don't care about hair (though I do care about triple chins), I find myself irritated: who does he think he's fooling? If someone posts photos and when you meet you realize that they are 15 years old or 30 pounds ago, that's more irritating--that falls under the category of "don't waste my time" if either age or weighty/body type is important to you. If someone explicitly lies about their height or gives their age as younger than they are, same thing--with the added bonus that now they've revealed themself to be a liar to get what they want--never a good start to any dating relationship. Will they be lying when they say their last STI test came back clean? Will they be honest when they say they're single?
When someone lies in the beginning of a profile, and then discloses the truth, usually about age, later in the profile, do they think that they get points for ultimate honesty?
They are all banking on the fact that when you meet them in person, you'll be so swept away by their charm or how youthful they really look, or whatever, that things you thought were important to you won't still be. That's a pretty big gamble, and pretty narcissistic or desperate.

And in the long run, the person it hurts is the person who did the lying, who gets rejected on the basis of whatever they were lying about in the first place as soon as a real-life meeting takes place.

@154, I can only note that you indicated that a 6'2 liar would not have been a problem, but a 5'7 liar was (and 5'7 isn't even particularly short). I don't even blame you, the female preference for tall over short men is about as close to universal as anything I've seen in my life.
@157, not denying your experiences but in my whole life I've never heard any men indicate that they were not attracted to/did not want to date women who are taller than themselves and I HAVE had friends express the opposite preference (i.e. liking taller women).

During my single years I tried online dating several times (never lied about my height) and had absolutely no luck. No women ever contacted me. I wrote dozens of well thought out, personalized messages to women and got only a few perfunctory responses and no dates. (And I'm not alone; see http://www.ayi.com/dating-blog/online-da…)

So that's the reason for my original advice: don't date online if you are a man significantly below average height. Take dance classes, join toastmasters, or develop other hobbies where you can meet women. Ask your friends to set you up. And when you find the right one, do everything you can to make it work because chances are going to be few and far between. I'm married now *HUGE SIGH OF RELIEF* and I hope I never have to seek a mate again.

Merry Christmas all, got to get back to my family now!

@159 - Where did I say that it wouldn't have been a problem? I said it wouldn't *register*, because subconsciously I would be thinking 'taller than me'. Again, not a specific height, just not 'about level with my chin', which is a huge difference. You can try to twist it any way you like, but I still would have met with the guy if he had said he was 5'2" on his profile.

Happy Jesus-festivus-Saturnalia birthday!

Preferences, must-haves, is Internet dating more or less superficial than who you speak to in a bar. Getting past a preference because the person underneath is special or not. Before I was derailed, this final issue is the conundrum I proposed.

Love is.... attraction is.... ineffable. How many people know or have experienced that "someone" who checks off every box that they intellectually wanted and ... nothing.... no kismet, no fire, no electricity.

That is the danger of Internet dating Imho. We know we don't like short. We know we don't want a portly girl. So we strike that off the list and drive out the possibility that the total package of what that short man represents rings our bell.

In a less plugged in time, a cute bartender might hit on us, but we also met someone's frat brother in class and he is a bit short but he makes us laugh. We'd have missed that humor had we'd only seen him as a spread sheet.

So I met my husband online. My motto was to meet them fast and in public because I was well aware what a curated image people post. My husband did peak my interest with a funny email. We talked on the phone and he had a nice voice. But I wasn't that intrigued or attracted. I thought he seemed like a nice guy and we had a little banter. But we met because I thought "eh, a drink." As I walked across the street I thought my fateful words, "eh, not my type, but I could always use a friend." I went in without the expectation of sex or marriage or dating but friendship. Not where it ended and it wasn't the beer.

I dont know what the answer is. If one can't be sexual attracted to short or skinny or flat chested, that ends it. And I don't actually consider it shallow. If lw doesn't like a curvy gal he doesn't. But I get worried that online dating leads us into a deceptive world where we think we can select our desireable mate like a barbie doll (or ken) off the shelves. We peer in through the shiny packaging and think "eh fat" before we ever hear them laugh. It's the "je ne se quoi" that is lost.

@161 DarkHorse - I am currently dating someone I met on a dating app. The app I used really only filtered for age and location and my initial filter choices excluded him. I matched with him only after adjusting my filters slightly. It's an unlikely match, mostly due to the one filter item I adjusted. It's absolutely my experience that filters can cause us to filter out people we might otherwise connect with, but there must be some way to narrow down profiles for consideration. It isn't like being in a bar, it's like being in 100 bars at once.

At cat lady. 162. I agree. It is the problem with online dating as a woman. That's why I agree with many who have recommended the writer being careful with online dating. His luck, I feel like, would be better in the real world.

I find online dating to be dehumanizing for all the reasons you're all giving. The problem for me is, I don't think I would have ever gone on more than one date if I had tried to meet people the "real world" way over the last 7+ years. It is pretty easy to meet new people all the time, most of them single and unattached, when you're in college or in your early twenties. Friends meet through work, through the gym, through volunteer work or some sort of intermural-type sports thing. I met friends at concerts, even. Those things still happen, but now, the friends I meet are all already partnered, or single women as well, who have no single male friends. In fact, I don't run across unattached straight men who don't live in their mother's basement in the real world. I'm not saying they don't exist; I'm just saying I don't meet them in the real world.

People give the standard advice to get involved and join groups or activities of things you're interested in so as to meet potential dates in the real world. I honestly don't find that to be so much the case when you're in your 50s. I'm not talking about not being desirable because of my weight (which hasn't always been this high, either). I literally don't meet unattached men unless I'm online.

@ 164. I agree. Not a great answer, especially when no longer in school. It makes you wonder where all the single men are.

@159: I think the point was that if you're five-something, the difference between 6'0 and 6'4 is close to invisible--so you probably wouldn't notice--but if you're 5'6, the difference between 5'4 and 5'8 is really obvious, since it's the difference between looking up and looking down.

@164: "People give the standard advice to get involved and join groups or activities of things you're interested in so as to meet potential dates in the real world. I honestly don't find that to be so much the case when you're in your 50s. ... literally don't meet unattached men unless I'm online."

For what it's worth, I think people usually give that advice to men. (Dating advice doesn't work across genders, since the advice is usually to go where people of your sex are scarce and the opposite sex is plentiful.) That advice is basically "Go where unattached men are rare" which works if you are one, and not so well if you're looking for one.

Effective general-purpose advice is a lot harder to give, given that situations are different.