Monday, 20 February 2017

Insulting a Man By Claiming He's Short "On the Inside"

As we all know, a common way to insult a male is by calling him a "little man." It's the opposite of "be the bigger man."

Recently, I've seen this being taken a step further using derogatory height stereotypes, like "Short Man Syndrome/Napoleon Complex." People will insult any man they dislike using these labels, regardless of his actual size, most noticeably with those who dislike Donald Trump (who's 6'3"). They claim he has Napoleon Complex (a few examples), or they photoshop him as a little person. When people dislike tall or average height men, they still use short men as the scapegoat. Guess who socially pays for it when this happens? Tall men who have "short man syndrome" on the inside, or actual short men? If being short on the inside is bad, surely an actual short man must be worse.

It's the other side of praising a short man by saying he's tall on the inside. People also like to excuse this by claiming it's about being portrayed as childlike, or it's about hand/penis size rather than height (as if that makes it better), but it's not like society hasn't been doing this since the Napoleon days, or with Kim Jong Un. The mods who run the TinyTrumps forum (self-explanatory) even admit it's about height in a message they send when someone breaks a rule:

"Thanks for submitting to /r/TinyTrumps. You most likely know that were all about making trump look short for laughs. But with this ideal, comes some rules we need to follow." - Source

Trump gets bothered by insults about small hands because he actually has small hands. Why would he care if shortness is used as an insult when he isn't remotely short? It's like insulting a skinny person by saying they're fat. Unless they have mental illness like body dysphoria, they'll just laugh at the ridiculousness. "Trump thinks shortness is an insult, so let's join in and also portray shortness as bad, that'll show him!" I'm sure he's shivering in his boots. Maybe if he's 5'9 or something it might mess with his head, but he's so objectively far above the average that I'd be amazed if he suddenly goes to bed shook if he saw this. Even if his height was fake, he's at least 6'1. He has nothing to worry about in this regard. Might as well photoshop him as a hobo too, that'll really ruin him.

Fact of the matter is that only short men have official-sounding syndromes and complexes, and nobody insults a 6'3 man by making him 7'3. It's all "just a prank bro" anyways, or one of the other countless excuses people use to justify this (especially the self-proclaimed tolerant types). My favorite part is when this behavior comes from the type of people who get offended when fat or flat women are mocked. Stay politically correct, kids.

1 comment:

  1. This is a video is a great parody on female obsession over height, too bad you will never see something like this on comedy central. This is worth watching.