Sometimes I feel like height, physical height, is the elephant in the room when it comes to hegemonic masculinity. Everyone knows it’s a giant friggin’ deal, but nobody wants to talk about it, because, as the inimitable Greta Christina pointed out, what the hell are you supposed to do about it?
There’s a perception, an incredibly pervasive and unspoken one, that tall men are manlier than short men in all meaningful or measurable ways. I personally don’t like to think about this for the same reason white folks don’t like to think about Native American history, but I probably should.
Let me be clear: I’m six foot two. I’m the same height as Batman and Captain America, and if those two don’t say masculine ideal to you, I don’t know what does. I’m very, very lucky in that regard, and to some extent I know it. People take me seriously, people defer to me, I fill out a suit nicely. It’s pretty sweet… I think. I have very little experience of anything else. When I was thirteen, my bones ached horribly for most of a year as I went through a fast and agonizing growth spurt, and when I went back to school for eighth grade, nobody picked on me any more because I was six feet tall in junior high.
Thing is, I’m only about one standard deviation out from the mean, so every so often I meet guys taller than me. And man, I hate those guys. I can’t help it, it’s this visceral reaction; I meet a guy taller than me and he’s got two strikes against him immediately. Most of the time he turns out to be a perfectly nice person, of course, but I have to overcome this initial dislike and distrust, because how dare that bastard be taller than me.
This is my way of saying I can’t imagine how pissed off I’d be all the time if I were five foot six. People make jokes about “short man syndrome” and Napoleon complexes, and there’s something to that, I suppose (I have met Harlan Ellison), but I think it dismissively waves off a pretty serious issue.
Look: Men in our culture are supposed to be active; we are those who act, we are defined by our actions. That applies to our attitude toward achieving masculinity, as well. It’s supposed to be something one does… one performs, perhaps. To weak to appear manly? Toughen up! Too vacillating to appear manly? Man up! Too fat to appear manly? Tone up! Too short to appear manly? Um. Tall… up? I guess?
Seriously, what the fuck do you do when the genetic dice shake out and you’re not tall? I mean, apart from harboring lifelong feelings of inadequacy and resentment. I met a five-foot-five fella once who, within two minutes of meeting me and apropos of nothing, was telling me all about how short people make the best martial artists and a short person could probably kick any tall person’s ass. Maybe it’s just me, but that doesn’t strike me as a really healthy long-term solution. Then again, that’s easy for me to say from up here, isn’t it? There are, of course, horrible medical interventions and the old standby of putting lifts in your shoes (Legendary screenwriter William Goldman swears blind that many diminutive male stars have lifts for their socks), but I suspect these would just end up underlining the problem.
The fact is, for most men in our culture, masculinity is intrinsically tied up with the notion of competition. Guys: how many conversations have you had with other men that were basically about trying to prove who had the bigger metaphorical dick? Who’s stronger, who’s smarter, who can drink more, who knows more Star Trek trivia… my favorite was a guy who frantically tried to prove his superiority over me in the crucial matter of laptop battery life. But as long as one guy in the conversation is looking down and the other one’s looking up, there’s a form of competition that can’t be argued with or finagled. The taller guy is assumed to be more successful, more attractive to women, whatever measure of manliness you like, no matter how good the shorter guy’s laptop is.
This isn’t entirely unfounded, either. Tall guys get hired and promoted easier, folk wisdom holds that we’re more likely to win a Presidential election and some data indicates that old bit about women only digging tall dudes may be true. (I am, as ever, skeptical of monolithic pronouncements about “what women want”, but here my personal experience supports the theory for a change. I am tall, ladies seem to like me.)
Some might say that this isn’t as gendered as I’m making it out, that tall women also get lots of breaks. I’m not sure that’s true. A lot of the tall women I know wish they were short, so they could feel more dainty and feminine, just as many of the short women I know wish they were tall so they could feel more powerful and impressive. I don’t know any tall guys who wish they were short, and I know a bunch of tall guys. (Bastards.)
This is one of those areas that’s obviously grotesquely unfair and harmful, but it’s so deeply ingrained that I haven’t the foggiest fuck of a notion what to do about it. Promote bad posture among the tall? Encourage Tom Cruise to come out of the closet about being a leprechaun? Elect Dukakis next time? Just the fact that those sound like jokes (and okay, the leprechaun bit was a joke, but c’mon, it’s Tom Cruise) speaks to how deeply this notion is ingrained. I’m not sure this idea can be disentangled from our minds, but I figure talking about it has to be a start.
Theoretically, criticism of beauty standards applies to the media and in the limited senses Ozy lines out. In real life, I agree it spills over into thought-policing and any place anywhere where a man expresses a preference someone else doesn’t like. If challenged on it, they’ll retreat back to the former, restricted definitions as a defense. Clarence’s approach is best here. Ignore them and do what thou wilt. I also do agree with the gist of what balconyscene is saying. I appreciate JENN1985’s honesty and can corroborate that what she’s saying is the truth. (I juuuuuust miss the cutoff for… Read more »
“Beauty standards are problematic” means “a narrow swathe of women is depicted as beautiful, even though people actually consider a far wider group of women beautiful”
Truer words… Media has somehow made tall thin women with chiseled jaws and substantial foreheads boring, and I’ve never actually met a woman like that in person.
It’s rather high-handed to talk about “What men find hot” in the first place. One of the major objections to bullshit media beauty standards, as Ozy and others have pointed out, is that they don’t map to real people’s tastes very well. Sure, it’s possible for skinny blonde girls with a lot of makeup to be your type, but what media beauty standards do is unilaterally declare that to be everyone’s type, which is of course ridiculous on the face of it. So yes, this is yet another feminist value that is not, in fact, a secret project to oppress… Read more »
I could give a crap less about what a feminist or heck, anybody else thinks of my “beauty standards”.
They are my own, I don’t force them on anybody, and I like what I like.
@baloneyscene
If this statement means that the main purpose and effect of the “beauty standards are problematic” discourse, then that would indeed be an overstatement.
Yet if this statement merely means that shaming men for what they find attractive is one of the goals and effects of that discourse, then I would agree. There is a massive public double-standard about the acceptability of critiques of men’s vs. women’s sexual preferences.
“Jesus H. Christ on a bed of lettuce. Sometimes, dude? When millions of women talk about their internalized feelings of shame and self-hatred? It’s not about your goddamn sense of entitlement and grievance.” Except when it’s a on man devoted to men’s issues. Then it *is* about his perception. And the shaming language is out of line. Take it to Twisty Faster where that kind of thing fits right in. Concern about millions of women internalized shame is valid of course. It’s an important issue. But there are lots and lots and lots of what about the wimminz blogs to… Read more »
I think it’s important to note that “Beauty standards are problematic” is not “Beauty standards are evil”. For example, in a theoretical society in which a person’s worth is derived from many different factors, these factors are independent of each other and no group gains more worth for having any 1 factor than any other…then there is nothing wrong with beauty standards, because there is choice in where a person’s worth is being derived from. However, when (like in mainstream society) beauty is often the ONLY factor or one in a very limited pool of factors in which a person… Read more »
@Noah I think believing beauty standards is more problematic than the standards themselves. The standards are unlikely to go away, but people could decide it means nothing to them, avoid people who think it means much, and live much more fulfilling lives with less self-hatred. Same for “real man” standards. So I’m for teaching people, as young as possible, that following those standards IS crappy, because the standards only mean something objectively to assholes (both ways, real men, beautiful women – people who would shun and mistreat (not just “not date) those people are assholes, period. The same as homophobes,… Read more »
“The majority of women – regardless of their won height – lust after tall men. It’s just in our biology.” I’m 5’6″, and while I might prefer as tall or taller (for practical reasons foremost), it’s by no means something I find attractive more than anything else. I much prefer long hair, preferably let down (I see nothing at all beautiful in maintaining ‘dos’, for men or women – it only hides the beauty). More muscled than me (anyone who isn’t bed-ridden qualifies), more dominant than me (I’m assertive, but actually *need* guidance to actually do lots of stuff). See:… Read more »
Would you kindly show where I have expressed ‘entitlement’ in this exchange? I won’t be so arrogant as to say you’re absolutely wrong, but I have my doubts.
” When’s the last time you saw a man with a less attractive woman?’
I notice that all the time, and ususally she is basically a beard.
” And the other way around? Happens all the time.”
Well, yes, and there’s a word for that, hell, a whole vocabulary. Money talks, they all love the lead singer, etc…..
“”In case you haven’t noticed, men ARE allowed to be MORE shallow than women.’
Because choosing someone for looks is so much more shallow than hoosing based on social position or whatever.
Yet that’s what this whole “beauty standards are problematic” thing amounts to, shaming men for being attracted to what they find attractive.
Yet that’s what this whole “beauty standards are problematic” thing amounts to, shaming men for being attracted to what they find attractive.
Jesus H. Christ on a bed of lettuce. Sometimes, dude? When millions of women talk about their internalized feelings of shame and self-hatred? It’s not about your goddamn sense of entitlement and grievance.
There’s a reason feminists complain about men in feminist spaces not understanding what “it’s not about you” means. Because very often that is exactly the problem.
I mean, in practice.
For instance, and I’m not saying I’d do this myself, I rejected a woman and made it plain it was because I found her fat.
Would I not be censured in some form or another? Even if only from the one being rejected?
You might say “Well, nobody LIKES being rejected/dumped” but again, men are treated as toxic if they show anything but the most mild and toothless disappointment at rejection.
No. “Beauty standards are problematic” means “a narrow swathe of women is depicted as beautiful, even though people actually consider a far wider group of women beautiful” and also “it is fucked up that much of women’s career success, etc., depends on her attractiveness.”
I’d be more fine with women being shallow the moment men are allowed to be just as shallow.
i.e. “Beauty standards are problematic,” doesn’t that essentially amount to “Men are scum if they reject women for shallow reasons?”
In case you haven’t noticed, men ARE allowed to be MORE shallow than women. When’s the last time you saw a man with a less attractive woman? And the other way around? Happens all the time. Most people I know wouldn’t bat an eye if a guy turned a woman down for her looks.
I’m female-bodied and I like short men. Don’t tell me what’s in my biology.
Sam said: … I saw an American study with an online companion calculator that calculated the percentage of people of the other sex who are (self-reportedly) attracted to a specific height of the opposite sex. I’m rather short, 5,7ish, and that figure was not too bad. Actually it was, if I remember correctly, pretty much up there, and ahead of taller guys. That’s because most smaller women, while being attracted to guys taller than them, are mostly attracted to a specific range of “taller”, not just the higher the better. Since most women are still smaller than 5’7”, at least… Read more »
Is this the que for me as a member of the lower class (pun intended) to point out that taller people of course are more priveleged – because that would be really productive. More seriously, I don’t think any discussions about the negative effect of something for one group suffers when people point out that other groups also is affected by the same thing or that the “opposite” group also have their struggles. People are too quick to interpret it as a slight towards their suffering, it’s not, it’s more a matter of not letting some victims be invisible and… Read more »
Skidd:
Don’t forget having to buy special beds, increased risk of cancer, having to have expensive extra-length coffins, not fitting in cars, bumping your head on ceilings, back problems… Being tall isn’t all THAT awesome.
Yeah. I just thought of something. Going on and on about the supposed pluses of a certain characteristic and never bringing up the negatives. Sounds familiar…
I call what about teh tall peoplez!!!? 😛
> I met a five-foot-five fella once who, within two minutes of meeting me and apropos of nothing, was telling me all about how short people make the best martial artists and a short person could probably kick any tall person’s ass. Maybe it’s just me, but that doesn’t strike me as a really healthy long-term solution. While this guy does sound a little insecure, it is kind of an empowering thought to keep in mind. After all, as a taller, larger man, I have an assumed physical advantage — something that speaks to the primitive mind telling everybody I… Read more »
Don’t forget having to buy special beds, increased risk of cancer, having to have expensive extra-length coffins, not fitting in cars, bumping your head on ceilings, back problems… Being tall isn’t all THAT awesome.
http://tall-ppl-problems.tumblr.com/post/8354137998/not-a-colorized-square-but-still
People take me seriously, people defer to me, I fill out a suit nicely. It’s pretty sweet… I think. I have very little experience of anything else. When I was thirteen, my bones ached horribly for most of a year as I went through a fast and agonizing growth spurt, and when I went back to school for eighth grade, nobody picked on me any more because I was six feet tall in junior high. Lucky you (I’ll expand on that if you wish.). I met a five-foot-five fella once who, within two minutes of meeting me and apropos of… Read more »
I play chess to an acceptable casual level, and my boyfriend knows how to play, but we never play. We played once, he claimed I made up rules as we went because of castling and prise en passant. So we never played again.
I’m definitely the better chess player of my family, though my father could be as good – I just didn’t play him since years.
My husband and I are much the same size–he’s maybe an inch shorter, 5’5″ to my 5’6″. We can wear each others’ clothes. I have no problem with this. My mother-in-law, though, went through a period of buying gifts for the petite Japanese woman I *should* have been, instead of my gauche, large, European self. We had to give them all away. Dating is a weird thing. When I was in my teens and early twenties I was a hard-core competitive chessplayer, and almost all the female chessplayers I knew averred that men with a rating lower than yours would… Read more »