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>there aren't really downsides to short stature in modern life It even have several health benefits. Except that in dating, women overwhelmingly prefer men ove

>there aren't really downsides to short stature in modern life It even have several health benefits. Except that in dating, women overwhelmingly prefer men over 6', and very small differences like 5'7 vs 5'9 double or triple the matches in online dating sites. If we are talking about 5'6 vs 6'0 the difference is ridiculous, like over 200X more matches. Women even divorce short men at double the rate of tall men. Those sites have years of very precise statistics that support this fact. Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future.

chrischen 4y ago
Lucky for short people, height is a lot less of a factor in modern society. Wealth is a much bigger factor. And what's the best path to wealth? Software. Even more lucky for them, software and internet doesn't care about height.
- ummonk 4y ago
  You've got that backwards. Wealth was a far bigger factor in traditional society than in modern society.
- aortega 4y ago
  - bigfudge 4y ago
    Is that really why humans are getting taller? Most increase in height has happened in the last 70 years and linked to increases in nutrition. Selective pressure seems implausible as an explanation for any measurable increases in height in historical time.
    - Salgat 4y ago
      What if better nutrition has allowed for better selection of taller genes? Back when everyone was more nutrient deficient and had stunted growth, I imagine it would be much harder to select for a suppressed trait.
      - t-3 4y ago
        There was never really a time when everyone was nutrient deficient, unless you specify by region and economic class.
    - astrange 4y ago
      The selective pressure is actually for shorter people as all the taller people were killed in WW1.
      - doubleunplussed 4y ago
        It's the opposite [1]: "taller soldiers are more likely to survive battle and that taller parents are more likely to have sons". This was based on his research of British Army records from the First World War, which showed that "surviving soldiers were on average more than one inch (3.33 cm) taller than fallen soldiers" [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Returning_soldier_effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Returning_soldier_effect
        astrange 4y ago
        I was thinking that the taller men were recruited to the army first, while the rest didn't leave home at all. But eventually everyone would've joined I suppose.
    - chrischen 4y ago
      Yep, and studies show after 1980 people have actually been getting shorter (at least in Japan, which can be considered almost a post-modern society when compared to the US) [1]. [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/science-health/average-height-japanese-born-1980-later-declining-study-finds/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/scienc...
  - chrischen 4y ago
    I think the stats you are referencing about humans getting taller are from improvements in childhood nutrition. I don't think genetically we've been selecting for taller people, as that is harder to conclude (plus, even if woman select for taller men, men do not necessarily select for taller woman, and woman are part of this too let's not forget). > Women usually marry the millionaire, but have sex with the pool boy. This dual-mating strategy is instinctive. Yea and the man has concubines, and the prenup? Pretty sure the woman usually doesn't have the pool boy's children in these stories. EDIT: See here for a study showing after 1980 people have actually been getting shorter (at least in Japan, which can be considered almost a post-modern society when compared to the US) [1]. [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/science-health/average-height-japanese-born-1980-later-declining-study-finds/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/scienc...
    - aortega 4y ago
      >Pretty sure the woman usually doesn't have the pool boy's children You'd be surprised.
      - lupire 4y ago
        Pool boys barely even exist in real life.
        to1y 4y ago
        In this context it's: Any attractive available man she spends enough time alone with.
        magicalist 4y ago
        Really it's a made up story from "data" that hasn't been shared from someone who is apparently happily married and learned about online dating at least second hand but seemingly just from tropes they've heard in online forums, so I'm not too worked up about the situation.
    - 4y ago
  - LAC-Tech 4y ago
    I am sure there are some women for which that's true, but do you really think it's that strong of a universal? IDK, whenever men write stuff like that I always think to myself "you need to hang around better people". Like you can absolutely 100% find women that cold and calculating and dishonest. But acting like all women are that impulsive is really strange to me. That's like saying all men will beat you up and rob you because it makes sense in evolutionary terms.
    - Jensson 4y ago
      We are talking about attractiveness here, you can't choose who you are attracted to. So in one case you have a wife who fucks the pool boy, in the other you have a wife that wants to fuck the pool boy but doesn't since she is a great person. But in both cases you have a wife who is more sexually attracted to others than to you, you can live with that but it is sad for those people. Just like how old men tend to be more attracted to young women than their old wives, and that makes those wives sad even if those men never leave their wife or cheats, reality has a lot of sad facts like that.
      - Shugarl 4y ago
        You'll never be the most attractive person in the world though. Even if your SO think you're attractive, there's a huge amount of people they'd be more attracted to, if they had the chance to meet them.
  - msrenee 4y ago
    Are you basing your understanding of human sexuality and genetics off a bad movie trope? Or do you think all women are Anna Nicole Smith?
  - jimbob45 4y ago
    I think you’ve nailed the central point here: men get stuck in the friend zone where they can’t have sex with a woman. However, women have the opposite problem where they get stuck in the fuck zone where the man only wants casual sex and doesn’t care about a romantic, emotional, or cohabitative relationship. Just because you’re getting Tinder matches doesn’t mean you’re finding the type of relationship you want. I see a lot of men on /pol/ unable to see that things can be equally difficult in different ways on the female side.
    - usrn 4y ago
      I'm not convinced the friend zone is real, I think some women are just fine being friends with people they don't want to have sex with. I've gotten out of the "friend zone" with multiple women I know.
  - l33t2328 4y ago
    You’re implying chronic cheating is biologically ingrained in women? Jesus christ this place gets weird sometimes...
    - magicalist 4y ago
      Yes, this thread has brought out quite a few "I read an evo psych article once" experts.
  - oneoff786 4y ago
    > the data is quite clear. Please, share it with us then
- ayngg 4y ago
  There was a study on online dating habits that said that even someone who was 5'8 would need to earn ~138k more than the same 6'0 person to be considered equivalent, controlling for everything else [1]. Of course it is just one study and I havent looked into it fully but nonetheless. [1] https://home.uchicago.edu/~hortacsu/onlinedating.pdf https://home.uchicago.edu/~hortacsu/onlinedating.pdf table 5.5
  - chrischen 4y ago
    Online dating sucks because of its emphasis on quick and easily verifiable external traits. The mitigation is to avoid it.
- chroma 4y ago
  I'm a multimillionaire and every single woman I've dated has said, "I'm glad I took a chance on you even though you're so short." I'm 5'6". Women filter on height the same way that men filter on weight & age. If you don't pass that first filter, it doesn't matter what your advantages are.
  - aortega 4y ago
    I used to go out with a friend of mine, he's a multiple business owner, a miltimillionarie since he was 25, blonde, blue eyes, etc. Also he's very social, he was always the 'soul of the party' etc. Me, at that time I had a 10 years old car, but I'm 5'9 and he's 5'6. I always was the one that got the phone numbers, always.
    - chrischen 4y ago
      Well chroma is giving an anecdote not necessarily how about how women choose him despite being short, but about the women who did end up choosing him realizing that height ended up being an irrelevant factor given his other qualities.
- dwighteb 4y ago
  What is not so lucky for short people is how our modern society rewards tall people with more wealth. S&P 500 CEO’s have an average height of 6ft, compared to the average height of 5ft10in in the US. Also, 30 percent of SP500 CEO’s are 6ft2in or taller, compared to only 3.9 percent of the rest of the US population. These things matter across the board, not just in the top tier management positions. Each inch of height adds $789 of average yearly salary, which makes a huge difference between a 5ft5 in person compared to someone who is 6ft tall. https://www.premiumtimesng.com/entertainment/naija-fashion/203429-many-ceos-tall-people-height-matter-bisi-daniels.html https://www.premiumtimesng.com/entertainment/naija-fashion/2...
SemanticStrengh 4y ago
- aortega 4y ago
  Being tall had several competitive advantages in the past. Basically before guns were invented the bigger guy usually could kill smaller guys, and get more food for the family. Quite obvious that women would prefer the big guy, and instincts don't change that quickly.
  - chrischen 4y ago
    I think they actually change faster than most would think. While that specific reason for preferring big guys is out-dated, more recently malnutrition and destitution have been a black mark on short people. The reason I think societal trends move faster than we think is that I think it was only in the middle of the last century that we still preferred fatter bodies.
    - SemanticStrengh 4y ago
      > we still preferred fatter bodies how widepsread? And how much of it was physical attraction vs social reasons attraction?
  - SemanticStrengh 4y ago
    I perfectly agree it make sense evolutionarily speaking, I just wonder how that subjectively manifest in a woman mind. I don't think it's the same perceived stimulus vs the consensual sexy perception of a hypertrophied 6 pack.
  - robotresearcher 4y ago
    Height is an historically reliable signal of access to good nutrition, and hence wealth and security. It’s not so much that being bigger helps you get stuff, it’s that it’s unfakable proof that you’ve been getting stuff long term.
- chrischen 4y ago
paulcole 4y ago
> Except that in dating, women overwhelmingly prefer men over 6’ Is this actually true? > if you are short, you are very likely to die alone This also seems like nonsense.
- trophycase 4y ago
  Yes, height is the single biggest determining factor for attractiveness in men. This is obvious both in data, and if you've ever talked to women.
  - paulcole 4y ago
    I think you forgot to link the data that makes this obvious? And remember the point I think is nonsense is specifically, “women overwhelmingly prefer men over 6’”, not that height is the biggest determining factor for attractiveness in men.
    - deleted 4y ago
      [deleted]
  - Broken_Hippo 4y ago
    I don't know where you are getting your information from. I've talked to plenty of women. Heck, I am on of those. And I've talked to folks that aren't women, too. It isn't obvious. I've personally never considered height as a qualifier. I've known folks that prefer someone taller than themselves but they wouldn't turn down a shorter man. The preference isn't going to make someone pass, but more akin to preferring dark hair over light hair. You see, preferences don't always add up to action and most folks I've known wouldn't pass on someone because of height. But if you are only using information from dating apps, your information is going to be seriously skewed for everyone. I might not always care about height, but if you are giving me a list of attributes and I'm looking for casual sex - I'm probably going to choose depending on my whims at the time. Height can make some positions better or worse, after all. It is also possible that men think height is more important because they think height is important, much like overly muscled comic characters are overly muscled to appeal to men.
claytongulick 4y ago
I'm somewhere between 5' 7" and 5' 8". I've experienced the "filter" issue with online dating, but my conclusions are entirely different. I really don't mind it, in fact I appreciate it. Anyone who would filter me out over something as shallow as height would undoubtedly be an extraordinarily poor match for me. I prefer quality over quantity. As to the "die alone" thing - that seems a bit grim. I'm 46, since age 14 when I actively started dating the longest I've been single was for about 3 months after a bad break-up, and that was by choice. Sure, when you don't have a height advantage you have to make it up in other ways - personality, fitness level, professional success, etc... In general, I think my relatively modest stature has been a benefit to me. It forced me to be a better person, and to focus on qualities that matter, rather than superficial things.
- aortega 4y ago
  I knew there would be answers of the style 'I'm short and Im great with girls' yes, but you are only a data point. I'm talking here of statistics, and in general short guys have it bad, according to online dating sites. You can easily do an experiment with a fake profile and see it yourself.
  - claytongulick 4y ago
    Is that what I said? I acknowledge that there's a difference and that it needs to be made up for in other ways. Everyone has challenges. Tall people, minorities, gay people, short people, poor people, rich people... the list is endless. We all have challenges. We shouldn't measure ourselves by our challenges. We should measure ourselves by the effort we put in to overcome. When I see a handicapped person climb a mountain, the thing I find extraordinary isn't the handicap, it's the phenomenal effort to transcend. I don't have anything close to those problems. I'm just a bit vertically challenged. I'll be double damned if I'm going to let that hold me back, or bemoan how unlucky I am because of it.
  - ss108 4y ago
    You're missing the point; not all of those guys are engaging in the kinds of self-improvement and development that could help them have experiences similar to the person to whom you are responding. For an individual short guy, the quantitative info out there is only detrimental. At best, it's useless. They need a qualitative focus.
reverend_gonzo 4y ago
Sounds like a forever aloner. I know multiple tall, classically good looking men who, while they can can get dates, can not maintain them because they have zero relationship skills, and I know just as many short men who have a relationship whenever they want. While height might be an early filter, it is by no means the only source of attraction. Men would do well to build the rest of their personalities to stand themselves out rather than complain about something they have no control over.
- aortega 4y ago
  >Sounds like a forever aloner. This social disqualification is the reason the truth remains hidden. I'm only 5'9 and have a family, but this was way before social networks and online dating. The world is different now. >I know Yes I know many data points that fall outside the curve too. But I'm talking about the curve.
  - reverend_gonzo 4y ago
    I’m 5’8”, Asian, married to an American, and have a family, and I got all this after social networks and tinder, et al came along.
    - nosianu 4y ago
      Funny. After the parent commenter says > Yes I know many data points that fall outside the curve too. But I'm talking about the curve. you respond with a data sample of 1. I have no idea who is right - assuming country=US in any case, since most of the data and experiences are from there - but come on.
      - reverend_gonzo 4y ago
        > Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. This is his claim. I call bullshit.
throwaway515 4y ago
> Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. I'm 5'6, and after almost 15 years of dating sites to modern dating apps, I have indeed accepted that yes, I will very likely die alone. My therapist has even half-seriously suggested I try lying about my height, and qualms aside, from the studies I've read, any plausible-in-person exaggeration would gain me a couple of percentile points at most.
- abledon 4y ago
  google: "filipino average height" You might have some luck over there :)
- aortega 4y ago
  My theory is that if you stay in a city, you are very likely correct. In a city you have to compete with men much taller and attractive. And women have access to hundreds of those men 24/7 through their cell phones constantly hitting on them. You won't win, but in a smaller city/rural town, you have much more chances.
  - handmodel 4y ago
    I am a 5'6 man. I still think a city is much better as I assume the 5'6 man has standards, too. It's not like finding a partner who is willing to settle with you is difficult at all - it is finding one that you feel meets your level of fitness, intelligence, and social status which is considered high (other than your height). In a rural setting you are going to be very limited but a city definitely has options. I would say be patient. I think as you grow older it becomes less important. And even if 80% of women have fairly strong height preferences I think a solid 20% have close to no preference or would care but are very short themselves.
    - rayiner 4y ago
chrischen 4y ago
This problem in online dating doesn't just apply to the single physical characteristic of height. It's a clusterfuck of ticking boxes and underdeveloped expectations. A 5 year old boy might tick "no girls", while a 14 year old boy might tick "big boobs", and a 30 year old man might tick "good education and stable job." It's as if we all go into it like ordering at a Burger King, except Have it your way (tm) comes out tasting like crap because we realize we aren't chefs. Online dating is how a bureaucrat decides to choose their life partner. The boxes you tick in online dating aren't important and are there just to pander to users.
- hackerfromthefu 4y ago
  Yeah where's the checkbox for stable, and for realistic expectations!
apetersonBFI 4y ago
I’m a 5’1 guy and I ended up marrying someone who was 5’3, I never expected to get results on a dating site though, I knew my wife from a social setting for months before we started dating.
ensan 4y ago
"Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future." You're being overly dramatic and don't have any to support your claim. It is not really necessary to date dozens of women before getting married. Dating many women in the first place is only the norm in a few western countries. Also, I believe the dating apps are mostly used for casual sex, so the statistics there are not really relevant in the end.
- ajwfew 4y ago
  Most couples in the US now meet online, where stats like height matter a lot https://qz.com/1546677/around-40-of-us-couples-now-first-meet-online/ https://qz.com/1546677/around-40-of-us-couples-now-first-mee...
- R0b0t1 4y ago
  They're relevant to all the men not having casual sex.
- guskel 4y ago
  Something like 50% of new couples are formed from meeting online.
rdiddly 4y ago
Pep talk: Everybody dies alone. Sorry, not very "peppy" perhaps. All right, how about this: Quantity of women (i.e. numbers who prefer tall guys on some app) is not the same as quality of women. It's kind of the opposite in fact, if humanity is anything like a bell curve. The mainstream, with its sheer numbers, is full of dullards. The most blindingly, boringly average people, from essentially the center of the gene pool in every way, are the ones we tend to find most attractive. Which is great for selecting for reproductive fitness for the species overall. Evolution will trick you into doing its bidding. But thanks to modernity, reproduction itself is really only relevant if you choose to make it so, and even then, only for like the first third or half of your life. Which is a time horizon that's hard to see when you're in it, but clear as day by the time you hit 40 or 50 and your kids are starting to be independent. So try to play the long game. You might meet your special someone later in life, who knows. Meanwhile in the short term, whoever doesn't appreciate you for what you are, look at it kind of like "well fuck 'em anyway," like they just self-selected out of your filter. Regardless, I'm 100% certain you won't be helping anything by trying to trick people into liking you. And I'm about 80% sure you won't even get anywhere by trying earnestly to be whatever stupid thing they want or think they want, or that some cost-free process of entering profile info on an app encourages them to blithely and carelessly say they want (because why not?). This goes not just for being short but for any human trait you do or don't possess. (And the only reason I allow 20% of hope there is because there's a possibility that through concerted effort you might actually manage to improve yourself in some way. But it should be something that came from you, something you yourself want to strive for, not something to please some fickle asshole and make them like and approve of you.) It's not about what they want. It's about who you are, and whoever is the "audience" for that, is who you should be focusing on. What does Slayer care about Ariana Grande fans? Maybe on some level they wish they had as many fans as she does, but I'm pretty sure they aren't out there trying to impress them or win them over by being more Ariana-Grande-like. (I don't even know if Slayer is still a band; I might be dating myself.) Editing to further bloviate: Who is going to mate with all the short women of the world? Tall guys? No, they're mostly looking for tall girlfriends. But short women need love too, and the ones who aren't so shallow and lacking in logistical foresight as to demand someone two full feet taller than themselves, are out there. Just a thought. One detail stuck out to me in this piece: The fact that this guy continues to read anti-short-people hate online, and still reflexively feels slighted, but then "remembers" that he got this surgery, kind of speaks to the fact that a big part of this is in his own head. Hear me out. I'm not suggesting people aren't being total douches about those of diminutive stature, because I've witnessed it and I'm quite sure they are. If someone is saying a sentence where if you put "black" let's say, in place of "short," there would be hell to pay, well then... there should be hell to pay. It's not right. At the same time, there is always evil shit out there being hurled at someone. Even tall white rich males. (Maybe especially them, lately.) Do you let that inside your head and make it your own thought that follows you around, day and night, far outside the reach of the douche who said it? It's difficult to practice the level of mental & emotional discipline it takes to cast such thoughts out, but it is an area where you have some degree of control over the situation.
BeFlatXIII 4y ago
That's why it's important to lie about height & income (at least until you're looking to settle down with a permanent trusting relationship). If you're not cheating, you're not trying.
screye 4y ago
200X more matches 200 x 0 = 0 ;( Jokes aside, percieved attractiveness privilege is by far the most prominent form of discrimination in society today. (After wealth) Watching good.looking people coast through hard things purely because doors mysteriously open for them, is one of those things that you'd never believe it unless you see it. Height is obviously the most prominent of those features among men. Sadly, it is tied to the most fundamental of social phenomenon (mating), and no amount of moralizing around it is going to change anything unless women change change their dating preferences. (Goes both ways, but women are generally the ones with hangups over height)
- deleted 4y ago
  [deleted]
- midjji 4y ago
  And because changing your sexual preferences is notoriously easy, women can just do that...
colordrops 4y ago
We are on a website filled to the brim of people using their abnormal intellects to excel beyond the vast majority of society and amass wealth. I'd go so far as to say that double digits of posters here are part of the 1%. Stop whining about a superficial perceived inferiority that has no real impact on your ability to survive and thrive, and use your galaxy brains to figure out how the mating game works. I'm relatively short and not that attractive but spent a bit of effort on understanding others are looking for in a man and it paid off. There are billions of people out there.
- afr0ck 4y ago
  Could you please give more details so that frustrated youngsters like me can learn from your experience. What did you do to understand? And what are your conclusions?
  - inkblotuniverse 4y ago
    This is me spitballing. Take with salt. Men start off mostly worthless by default from a dating perspective, and gain attractiveness as they gain money and status. So, make money and gain prestige. Pretty-boys who peak in high school are the exception. Women peak in physical attractiveness to men as soon as they mature. Emotional maturity plays a role in attractiveness, and that generally improves over time, so peak overall attractiveness for your average woman is probably in her 20s. So, ignore women in your 20s and make lots of money, and then, when you're 30 and rich, marry a 20-year old.
    - afr0ck 4y ago
      This is one way, but I don't think it's the only way. I believe it is worth to explore other options and you get double benefits: the woman and any other attribute that helped you get the woman in the first place, being it confidence, humour, style, fitness, or any other thing. It's hard but I believe it's also good to give it a shot.
      - inkblotuniverse 4y ago
deleted 4y ago
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kaczordon 4y ago
This is not true. Women prefer men who are relatively taller than them. Obviously it’s better to be taller because that opens up more options. But the preference women have is for you to be taller than she is not that you have to hit some absolute value of 6’.
michaelmrose 4y ago
I went in this fully expecting you to be correct but drastically pessimistic in terms of hard numbers. Instead you were exactly wrong on the easiest point to check divorce rate. Short men tend to marry later on average but divorce at a substantially lower rate. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/link-between-mens-height-divorce-_n_5731688 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/link-between-mens-height-divo... The part about 200x the matches is both obviously pulled out of the air and grossly exaggerated. It looks like on average women tend to prefer men who are taller but not hugely different in height from themselves. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0054186 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal... If you are 5'6" you are most apt to be most attractive to women who are 5'4" or shorter which is helpfully 43% of women in the US. You say you are very likely to die alone based entirely on a malarkey stat you pulled from thin air. You don't need hundreds of matches in a dating app to find one person you want to spend your life with. You need to instead cultivate qualities that would inspire ONE of many potentially worthwhile mates out there to make time with you and then work on enriching your life and relationship. The problem with this fatalistic attitude is twofold. Firstly it spoils all hope of success to believe in yourself not one whit and second it holds that somehow MEN or at least yourself are rational whole mental and emotional creatures while somehow women are irrational animals who somehow cannot even see you. It's degrading to you and to hypothetical mates.
- aortega 4y ago
  >If you are 5'6" you are most apt to be most attractive to women who are 5'4" In which fantasy world that study was done? lets see. mmm 2012, the year Tinder was created, so it was basically in a different era, but let's continue. I see 'questionnaire based data' so it's self reported data! Of course you are going to report that you love 5'6' men. But you really don't. People say politically correct things, and then do a different thing, and this is specially true in dating. Look for studies based on Tinder or other recent online dating sites to have more accurate and real data.
  - pedrosorio 4y ago
    > Of course you are going to report that you love 5'6' men. This study is based on data about actual pairings (parents of recently born children in the UK). Nothing to do with "reported preferences".
lmarcos 4y ago
> Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. Maybe in America. Plenty of countries where the average height is lower than what the article mentions. Not to mention that most European countries are "ahead" regarding respect than America.
logicchains 4y ago
>Except that in dating, women overwhelmingly prefer men over 6', and very small differences like 5'7 vs 5'9 double or triple the matches in online dating sites. This is why you shouldn't put height in your dating profile, so you filter out a bunch of superficial people.
- cjbgkagh 4y ago
  Isn’t that a reason for putting in height if you’re short? You could even lie and pretend to be shorter and filter out even more superficial people.
  - chrischen 4y ago
    There’s definitely a lot of stories were person A recounts their meeting person B by saying “I almost didn’t meet your [father|mother] if it hadn’t been for…” where the meeting was almost blocked by some arbitrary prejudicial filter due yo inexperience. I think it can work to your advantage as a filter but given how poorly online dating works for anything but matching on superficialities you might practically end up filtering out everyone.
pastacacioepepe 4y ago
Everyone dies alone, no matter how much sex or love did they get in their lives.
feanaro 4y ago
> Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. Why would it only get worse? How do you know this? I'm puzzled by the certainty.

chrischen 4y ago

Lucky for short people, height is a lot less of a factor in modern society. Wealth is a much bigger factor. And what's the best path to wealth? Software. Even more lucky for them, software and internet doesn't care about height.

ummonk 4y ago
You've got that backwards. Wealth was a far bigger factor in traditional society than in modern society.
aortega 4y ago
- bigfudge 4y ago
  Is that really why humans are getting taller? Most increase in height has happened in the last 70 years and linked to increases in nutrition. Selective pressure seems implausible as an explanation for any measurable increases in height in historical time.
  - Salgat 4y ago
    What if better nutrition has allowed for better selection of taller genes? Back when everyone was more nutrient deficient and had stunted growth, I imagine it would be much harder to select for a suppressed trait.
    - t-3 4y ago
      There was never really a time when everyone was nutrient deficient, unless you specify by region and economic class.
  - astrange 4y ago
    The selective pressure is actually for shorter people as all the taller people were killed in WW1.
    - doubleunplussed 4y ago
      It's the opposite [1]: "taller soldiers are more likely to survive battle and that taller parents are more likely to have sons". This was based on his research of British Army records from the First World War, which showed that "surviving soldiers were on average more than one inch (3.33 cm) taller than fallen soldiers" [1] https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Returning_soldier_effect https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Returning_soldier_effect
      - astrange 4y ago
        I was thinking that the taller men were recruited to the army first, while the rest didn't leave home at all. But eventually everyone would've joined I suppose.
  - chrischen 4y ago
    Yep, and studies show after 1980 people have actually been getting shorter (at least in Japan, which can be considered almost a post-modern society when compared to the US) [1]. [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/science-health/average-height-japanese-born-1980-later-declining-study-finds/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/scienc...
- chrischen 4y ago
  I think the stats you are referencing about humans getting taller are from improvements in childhood nutrition. I don't think genetically we've been selecting for taller people, as that is harder to conclude (plus, even if woman select for taller men, men do not necessarily select for taller woman, and woman are part of this too let's not forget). > Women usually marry the millionaire, but have sex with the pool boy. This dual-mating strategy is instinctive. Yea and the man has concubines, and the prenup? Pretty sure the woman usually doesn't have the pool boy's children in these stories. EDIT: See here for a study showing after 1980 people have actually been getting shorter (at least in Japan, which can be considered almost a post-modern society when compared to the US) [1]. [1] https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/science-health/average-height-japanese-born-1980-later-declining-study-finds/ https://www.japantimes.co.jp/news/2018/02/12/national/scienc...
  - aortega 4y ago
    >Pretty sure the woman usually doesn't have the pool boy's children You'd be surprised.
    - lupire 4y ago
      Pool boys barely even exist in real life.
      - to1y 4y ago
        In this context it's: Any attractive available man she spends enough time alone with.
        magicalist 4y ago
        Really it's a made up story from "data" that hasn't been shared from someone who is apparently happily married and learned about online dating at least second hand but seemingly just from tropes they've heard in online forums, so I'm not too worked up about the situation.
  - 4y ago
- LAC-Tech 4y ago
  I am sure there are some women for which that's true, but do you really think it's that strong of a universal? IDK, whenever men write stuff like that I always think to myself "you need to hang around better people". Like you can absolutely 100% find women that cold and calculating and dishonest. But acting like all women are that impulsive is really strange to me. That's like saying all men will beat you up and rob you because it makes sense in evolutionary terms.
  - Jensson 4y ago
    We are talking about attractiveness here, you can't choose who you are attracted to. So in one case you have a wife who fucks the pool boy, in the other you have a wife that wants to fuck the pool boy but doesn't since she is a great person. But in both cases you have a wife who is more sexually attracted to others than to you, you can live with that but it is sad for those people. Just like how old men tend to be more attracted to young women than their old wives, and that makes those wives sad even if those men never leave their wife or cheats, reality has a lot of sad facts like that.
    - Shugarl 4y ago
      You'll never be the most attractive person in the world though. Even if your SO think you're attractive, there's a huge amount of people they'd be more attracted to, if they had the chance to meet them.
- msrenee 4y ago
  Are you basing your understanding of human sexuality and genetics off a bad movie trope? Or do you think all women are Anna Nicole Smith?
- jimbob45 4y ago
  I think you’ve nailed the central point here: men get stuck in the friend zone where they can’t have sex with a woman. However, women have the opposite problem where they get stuck in the fuck zone where the man only wants casual sex and doesn’t care about a romantic, emotional, or cohabitative relationship. Just because you’re getting Tinder matches doesn’t mean you’re finding the type of relationship you want. I see a lot of men on /pol/ unable to see that things can be equally difficult in different ways on the female side.
  - usrn 4y ago
    I'm not convinced the friend zone is real, I think some women are just fine being friends with people they don't want to have sex with. I've gotten out of the "friend zone" with multiple women I know.
- l33t2328 4y ago
  You’re implying chronic cheating is biologically ingrained in women? Jesus christ this place gets weird sometimes...
  - magicalist 4y ago
    Yes, this thread has brought out quite a few "I read an evo psych article once" experts.
- oneoff786 4y ago
  > the data is quite clear. Please, share it with us then
ayngg 4y ago
There was a study on online dating habits that said that even someone who was 5'8 would need to earn ~138k more than the same 6'0 person to be considered equivalent, controlling for everything else [1]. Of course it is just one study and I havent looked into it fully but nonetheless. [1] https://home.uchicago.edu/~hortacsu/onlinedating.pdf https://home.uchicago.edu/~hortacsu/onlinedating.pdf table 5.5
- chrischen 4y ago
  Online dating sucks because of its emphasis on quick and easily verifiable external traits. The mitigation is to avoid it.
chroma 4y ago
I'm a multimillionaire and every single woman I've dated has said, "I'm glad I took a chance on you even though you're so short." I'm 5'6". Women filter on height the same way that men filter on weight & age. If you don't pass that first filter, it doesn't matter what your advantages are.
- aortega 4y ago
  I used to go out with a friend of mine, he's a multiple business owner, a miltimillionarie since he was 25, blonde, blue eyes, etc. Also he's very social, he was always the 'soul of the party' etc. Me, at that time I had a 10 years old car, but I'm 5'9 and he's 5'6. I always was the one that got the phone numbers, always.
  - chrischen 4y ago
    Well chroma is giving an anecdote not necessarily how about how women choose him despite being short, but about the women who did end up choosing him realizing that height ended up being an irrelevant factor given his other qualities.
dwighteb 4y ago
What is not so lucky for short people is how our modern society rewards tall people with more wealth. S&P 500 CEO’s have an average height of 6ft, compared to the average height of 5ft10in in the US. Also, 30 percent of SP500 CEO’s are 6ft2in or taller, compared to only 3.9 percent of the rest of the US population. These things matter across the board, not just in the top tier management positions. Each inch of height adds $789 of average yearly salary, which makes a huge difference between a 5ft5 in person compared to someone who is 6ft tall. https://www.premiumtimesng.com/entertainment/naija-fashion/203429-many-ceos-tall-people-height-matter-bisi-daniels.html https://www.premiumtimesng.com/entertainment/naija-fashion/2...

SemanticStrengh 4y ago

aortega 4y ago
Being tall had several competitive advantages in the past. Basically before guns were invented the bigger guy usually could kill smaller guys, and get more food for the family. Quite obvious that women would prefer the big guy, and instincts don't change that quickly.
- chrischen 4y ago
  I think they actually change faster than most would think. While that specific reason for preferring big guys is out-dated, more recently malnutrition and destitution have been a black mark on short people. The reason I think societal trends move faster than we think is that I think it was only in the middle of the last century that we still preferred fatter bodies.
  - SemanticStrengh 4y ago
    > we still preferred fatter bodies how widepsread? And how much of it was physical attraction vs social reasons attraction?
- SemanticStrengh 4y ago
  I perfectly agree it make sense evolutionarily speaking, I just wonder how that subjectively manifest in a woman mind. I don't think it's the same perceived stimulus vs the consensual sexy perception of a hypertrophied 6 pack.
- robotresearcher 4y ago
  Height is an historically reliable signal of access to good nutrition, and hence wealth and security. It’s not so much that being bigger helps you get stuff, it’s that it’s unfakable proof that you’ve been getting stuff long term.
chrischen 4y ago

paulcole 4y ago

> Except that in dating, women overwhelmingly prefer men over 6’ Is this actually true? > if you are short, you are very likely to die alone This also seems like nonsense.

trophycase 4y ago
Yes, height is the single biggest determining factor for attractiveness in men. This is obvious both in data, and if you've ever talked to women.
- paulcole 4y ago
  I think you forgot to link the data that makes this obvious? And remember the point I think is nonsense is specifically, “women overwhelmingly prefer men over 6’”, not that height is the biggest determining factor for attractiveness in men.
  - deleted 4y ago
    [deleted]
- Broken_Hippo 4y ago
  I don't know where you are getting your information from. I've talked to plenty of women. Heck, I am on of those. And I've talked to folks that aren't women, too. It isn't obvious. I've personally never considered height as a qualifier. I've known folks that prefer someone taller than themselves but they wouldn't turn down a shorter man. The preference isn't going to make someone pass, but more akin to preferring dark hair over light hair. You see, preferences don't always add up to action and most folks I've known wouldn't pass on someone because of height. But if you are only using information from dating apps, your information is going to be seriously skewed for everyone. I might not always care about height, but if you are giving me a list of attributes and I'm looking for casual sex - I'm probably going to choose depending on my whims at the time. Height can make some positions better or worse, after all. It is also possible that men think height is more important because they think height is important, much like overly muscled comic characters are overly muscled to appeal to men.

claytongulick 4y ago

I'm somewhere between 5' 7" and 5' 8". I've experienced the "filter" issue with online dating, but my conclusions are entirely different. I really don't mind it, in fact I appreciate it. Anyone who would filter me out over something as shallow as height would undoubtedly be an extraordinarily poor match for me. I prefer quality over quantity. As to the "die alone" thing - that seems a bit grim. I'm 46, since age 14 when I actively started dating the longest I've been single was for about 3 months after a bad break-up, and that was by choice. Sure, when you don't have a height advantage you have to make it up in other ways - personality, fitness level, professional success, etc... In general, I think my relatively modest stature has been a benefit to me. It forced me to be a better person, and to focus on qualities that matter, rather than superficial things.

aortega 4y ago
I knew there would be answers of the style 'I'm short and Im great with girls' yes, but you are only a data point. I'm talking here of statistics, and in general short guys have it bad, according to online dating sites. You can easily do an experiment with a fake profile and see it yourself.
- claytongulick 4y ago
  Is that what I said? I acknowledge that there's a difference and that it needs to be made up for in other ways. Everyone has challenges. Tall people, minorities, gay people, short people, poor people, rich people... the list is endless. We all have challenges. We shouldn't measure ourselves by our challenges. We should measure ourselves by the effort we put in to overcome. When I see a handicapped person climb a mountain, the thing I find extraordinary isn't the handicap, it's the phenomenal effort to transcend. I don't have anything close to those problems. I'm just a bit vertically challenged. I'll be double damned if I'm going to let that hold me back, or bemoan how unlucky I am because of it.
- ss108 4y ago
  You're missing the point; not all of those guys are engaging in the kinds of self-improvement and development that could help them have experiences similar to the person to whom you are responding. For an individual short guy, the quantitative info out there is only detrimental. At best, it's useless. They need a qualitative focus.

reverend_gonzo 4y ago

Sounds like a forever aloner. I know multiple tall, classically good looking men who, while they can can get dates, can not maintain them because they have zero relationship skills, and I know just as many short men who have a relationship whenever they want. While height might be an early filter, it is by no means the only source of attraction. Men would do well to build the rest of their personalities to stand themselves out rather than complain about something they have no control over.

aortega 4y ago
>Sounds like a forever aloner. This social disqualification is the reason the truth remains hidden. I'm only 5'9 and have a family, but this was way before social networks and online dating. The world is different now. >I know Yes I know many data points that fall outside the curve too. But I'm talking about the curve.
- reverend_gonzo 4y ago
  I’m 5’8”, Asian, married to an American, and have a family, and I got all this after social networks and tinder, et al came along.
  - nosianu 4y ago
    Funny. After the parent commenter says > Yes I know many data points that fall outside the curve too. But I'm talking about the curve. you respond with a data sample of 1. I have no idea who is right - assuming country=US in any case, since most of the data and experiences are from there - but come on.
    - reverend_gonzo 4y ago
      > Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. This is his claim. I call bullshit.

throwaway515 4y ago

> Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. I'm 5'6, and after almost 15 years of dating sites to modern dating apps, I have indeed accepted that yes, I will very likely die alone. My therapist has even half-seriously suggested I try lying about my height, and qualms aside, from the studies I've read, any plausible-in-person exaggeration would gain me a couple of percentile points at most.

abledon 4y ago
google: "filipino average height" You might have some luck over there :)
aortega 4y ago
My theory is that if you stay in a city, you are very likely correct. In a city you have to compete with men much taller and attractive. And women have access to hundreds of those men 24/7 through their cell phones constantly hitting on them. You won't win, but in a smaller city/rural town, you have much more chances.
- handmodel 4y ago
  I am a 5'6 man. I still think a city is much better as I assume the 5'6 man has standards, too. It's not like finding a partner who is willing to settle with you is difficult at all - it is finding one that you feel meets your level of fitness, intelligence, and social status which is considered high (other than your height). In a rural setting you are going to be very limited but a city definitely has options. I would say be patient. I think as you grow older it becomes less important. And even if 80% of women have fairly strong height preferences I think a solid 20% have close to no preference or would care but are very short themselves.
  - rayiner 4y ago

chrischen 4y ago

This problem in online dating doesn't just apply to the single physical characteristic of height. It's a clusterfuck of ticking boxes and underdeveloped expectations. A 5 year old boy might tick "no girls", while a 14 year old boy might tick "big boobs", and a 30 year old man might tick "good education and stable job." It's as if we all go into it like ordering at a Burger King, except Have it your way (tm) comes out tasting like crap because we realize we aren't chefs. Online dating is how a bureaucrat decides to choose their life partner. The boxes you tick in online dating aren't important and are there just to pander to users.

hackerfromthefu 4y ago
Yeah where's the checkbox for stable, and for realistic expectations!

apetersonBFI 4y ago

I’m a 5’1 guy and I ended up marrying someone who was 5’3, I never expected to get results on a dating site though, I knew my wife from a social setting for months before we started dating.

ensan 4y ago

"Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future." You're being overly dramatic and don't have any to support your claim. It is not really necessary to date dozens of women before getting married. Dating many women in the first place is only the norm in a few western countries. Also, I believe the dating apps are mostly used for casual sex, so the statistics there are not really relevant in the end.

ajwfew 4y ago
Most couples in the US now meet online, where stats like height matter a lot https://qz.com/1546677/around-40-of-us-couples-now-first-meet-online/ https://qz.com/1546677/around-40-of-us-couples-now-first-mee...
R0b0t1 4y ago
They're relevant to all the men not having casual sex.
guskel 4y ago
Something like 50% of new couples are formed from meeting online.

rdiddly 4y ago

Pep talk: Everybody dies alone. Sorry, not very "peppy" perhaps. All right, how about this: Quantity of women (i.e. numbers who prefer tall guys on some app) is not the same as quality of women. It's kind of the opposite in fact, if humanity is anything like a bell curve. The mainstream, with its sheer numbers, is full of dullards. The most blindingly, boringly average people, from essentially the center of the gene pool in every way, are the ones we tend to find most attractive. Which is great for selecting for reproductive fitness for the species overall. Evolution will trick you into doing its bidding. But thanks to modernity, reproduction itself is really only relevant if you choose to make it so, and even then, only for like the first third or half of your life. Which is a time horizon that's hard to see when you're in it, but clear as day by the time you hit 40 or 50 and your kids are starting to be independent. So try to play the long game. You might meet your special someone later in life, who knows. Meanwhile in the short term, whoever doesn't appreciate you for what you are, look at it kind of like "well fuck 'em anyway," like they just self-selected out of your filter. Regardless, I'm 100% certain you won't be helping anything by trying to trick people into liking you. And I'm about 80% sure you won't even get anywhere by trying earnestly to be whatever stupid thing they want or think they want, or that some cost-free process of entering profile info on an app encourages them to blithely and carelessly say they want (because why not?). This goes not just for being short but for any human trait you do or don't possess. (And the only reason I allow 20% of hope there is because there's a possibility that through concerted effort you might actually manage to improve yourself in some way. But it should be something that came from you, something you yourself want to strive for, not something to please some fickle asshole and make them like and approve of you.) It's not about what they want. It's about who you are, and whoever is the "audience" for that, is who you should be focusing on. What does Slayer care about Ariana Grande fans? Maybe on some level they wish they had as many fans as she does, but I'm pretty sure they aren't out there trying to impress them or win them over by being more Ariana-Grande-like. (I don't even know if Slayer is still a band; I might be dating myself.) Editing to further bloviate: Who is going to mate with all the short women of the world? Tall guys? No, they're mostly looking for tall girlfriends. But short women need love too, and the ones who aren't so shallow and lacking in logistical foresight as to demand someone two full feet taller than themselves, are out there. Just a thought. One detail stuck out to me in this piece: The fact that this guy continues to read anti-short-people hate online, and still reflexively feels slighted, but then "remembers" that he got this surgery, kind of speaks to the fact that a big part of this is in his own head. Hear me out. I'm not suggesting people aren't being total douches about those of diminutive stature, because I've witnessed it and I'm quite sure they are. If someone is saying a sentence where if you put "black" let's say, in place of "short," there would be hell to pay, well then... there should be hell to pay. It's not right. At the same time, there is always evil shit out there being hurled at someone. Even tall white rich males. (Maybe especially them, lately.) Do you let that inside your head and make it your own thought that follows you around, day and night, far outside the reach of the douche who said it? It's difficult to practice the level of mental & emotional discipline it takes to cast such thoughts out, but it is an area where you have some degree of control over the situation.

BeFlatXIII 4y ago

That's why it's important to lie about height & income (at least until you're looking to settle down with a permanent trusting relationship). If you're not cheating, you're not trying.

screye 4y ago

200X more matches 200 x 0 = 0 ;( Jokes aside, percieved attractiveness privilege is by far the most prominent form of discrimination in society today. (After wealth) Watching good.looking people coast through hard things purely because doors mysteriously open for them, is one of those things that you'd never believe it unless you see it. Height is obviously the most prominent of those features among men. Sadly, it is tied to the most fundamental of social phenomenon (mating), and no amount of moralizing around it is going to change anything unless women change change their dating preferences. (Goes both ways, but women are generally the ones with hangups over height)

deleted 4y ago
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midjji 4y ago
And because changing your sexual preferences is notoriously easy, women can just do that...

colordrops 4y ago

We are on a website filled to the brim of people using their abnormal intellects to excel beyond the vast majority of society and amass wealth. I'd go so far as to say that double digits of posters here are part of the 1%. Stop whining about a superficial perceived inferiority that has no real impact on your ability to survive and thrive, and use your galaxy brains to figure out how the mating game works. I'm relatively short and not that attractive but spent a bit of effort on understanding others are looking for in a man and it paid off. There are billions of people out there.

afr0ck 4y ago
Could you please give more details so that frustrated youngsters like me can learn from your experience. What did you do to understand? And what are your conclusions?
- inkblotuniverse 4y ago
  This is me spitballing. Take with salt. Men start off mostly worthless by default from a dating perspective, and gain attractiveness as they gain money and status. So, make money and gain prestige. Pretty-boys who peak in high school are the exception. Women peak in physical attractiveness to men as soon as they mature. Emotional maturity plays a role in attractiveness, and that generally improves over time, so peak overall attractiveness for your average woman is probably in her 20s. So, ignore women in your 20s and make lots of money, and then, when you're 30 and rich, marry a 20-year old.
  - afr0ck 4y ago
    This is one way, but I don't think it's the only way. I believe it is worth to explore other options and you get double benefits: the woman and any other attribute that helped you get the woman in the first place, being it confidence, humour, style, fitness, or any other thing. It's hard but I believe it's also good to give it a shot.
    - inkblotuniverse 4y ago

deleted 4y ago

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kaczordon 4y ago

This is not true. Women prefer men who are relatively taller than them. Obviously it’s better to be taller because that opens up more options. But the preference women have is for you to be taller than she is not that you have to hit some absolute value of 6’.

michaelmrose 4y ago

I went in this fully expecting you to be correct but drastically pessimistic in terms of hard numbers. Instead you were exactly wrong on the easiest point to check divorce rate. Short men tend to marry later on average but divorce at a substantially lower rate. https://www.huffpost.com/entry/link-between-mens-height-divorce-_n_5731688 https://www.huffpost.com/entry/link-between-mens-height-divo... The part about 200x the matches is both obviously pulled out of the air and grossly exaggerated. It looks like on average women tend to prefer men who are taller but not hugely different in height from themselves. https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0054186 https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal... If you are 5'6" you are most apt to be most attractive to women who are 5'4" or shorter which is helpfully 43% of women in the US. You say you are very likely to die alone based entirely on a malarkey stat you pulled from thin air. You don't need hundreds of matches in a dating app to find one person you want to spend your life with. You need to instead cultivate qualities that would inspire ONE of many potentially worthwhile mates out there to make time with you and then work on enriching your life and relationship. The problem with this fatalistic attitude is twofold. Firstly it spoils all hope of success to believe in yourself not one whit and second it holds that somehow MEN or at least yourself are rational whole mental and emotional creatures while somehow women are irrational animals who somehow cannot even see you. It's degrading to you and to hypothetical mates.

aortega 4y ago
>If you are 5'6" you are most apt to be most attractive to women who are 5'4" In which fantasy world that study was done? lets see. mmm 2012, the year Tinder was created, so it was basically in a different era, but let's continue. I see 'questionnaire based data' so it's self reported data! Of course you are going to report that you love 5'6' men. But you really don't. People say politically correct things, and then do a different thing, and this is specially true in dating. Look for studies based on Tinder or other recent online dating sites to have more accurate and real data.
- pedrosorio 4y ago
  > Of course you are going to report that you love 5'6' men. This study is based on data about actual pairings (parents of recently born children in the UK). Nothing to do with "reported preferences".

lmarcos 4y ago

> Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. Maybe in America. Plenty of countries where the average height is lower than what the article mentions. Not to mention that most European countries are "ahead" regarding respect than America.

logicchains 4y ago

>Except that in dating, women overwhelmingly prefer men over 6', and very small differences like 5'7 vs 5'9 double or triple the matches in online dating sites. This is why you shouldn't put height in your dating profile, so you filter out a bunch of superficial people.

cjbgkagh 4y ago
Isn’t that a reason for putting in height if you’re short? You could even lie and pretend to be shorter and filter out even more superficial people.
- chrischen 4y ago
  There’s definitely a lot of stories were person A recounts their meeting person B by saying “I almost didn’t meet your [father|mother] if it hadn’t been for…” where the meeting was almost blocked by some arbitrary prejudicial filter due yo inexperience. I think it can work to your advantage as a filter but given how poorly online dating works for anything but matching on superficialities you might practically end up filtering out everyone.

pastacacioepepe 4y ago

Everyone dies alone, no matter how much sex or love did they get in their lives.

feanaro 4y ago

> Basically this means that in modern dating, if you are short, you are very likely to die alone and this trend will only get worse in the future. Why would it only get worse? How do you know this? I'm puzzled by the certainty.