Thinking that women would benefit if they were more open minded about height in a potential partner…

[Moonfishstar]

… and not write off the majority of men who are under 6 foot (85%).

Women seem to be fighting for a small proportion of men - with the disappointment that will inevitably bring to the many who inevitably won’t succeed. Of course, it’s even crapper for the good,
but short, men out there.

Of course, we all fancy who we fancy, and I’m not saying we should date shorter (or even average!) men out of pity or a “sense of fairness”, but how much of women’s desire to bag a tall guy is actually societal, and down to how they think other women will view them?

He will struggle a little on OLD, but it’s already been said lots of times that men are overlooked on OLD for being short but wouldn’t necessarily in real life, it’s not ‘fair’ but it is what it is, OLD is superficial at best, toxic at worst, where men and women are being completely ruled out for lots of reasons, hair colour, height, weight, whether they already have ‘baggage’, they could be the perfect person for you in every single way but are already in the trash pile.. it’s just the ‘revolving door’ nature of OLD, there’s always a ‘NEXT!!!’

Ironically there will be shorter women on there though who would quite happily date a man who is that height.. so it depends how superficial he is as to what preset criteria he will accept in a potential partner as to how successful he will be, if he himself is superficial, he can’t really complain or blame women for doing the exact same thing.

Im horrified that the only reason he’s not left his marriage is because he thinks online dating would be unfairly skewed to him and women wouldn’t give him a chance, i really hate that people have to tee up the next one before calling time on an unhappy relationship, that says more about him to me then any physical attribute would!

It just gets more and more convincing!

(If the sexes were actually reversed, a website that was initially concerned mainly with parenting issues would be called Dadsnet, full of men living in a female-oriented world, and would get a load of female users coming in to complain that it's not centring them and demanding that they justify not wanting to date overweight women.)

Agreed, shocking and blatant misandry…

Not really because a woman who has been worn down in an awful relationship would usually be writing posts about their self doubt and how they'll leave the relationship for their own health and wellbeing. Women wanting to leave awful relationships often do for themselves and/or for their children's wellbeing.

This thread is all about wahhh! Mean women don't like dating short men. They shouldn't rule out short men. Women should examine their prejudices. But some women marry "up". Actually it's about my friend. He's unhappy in his marriage but he's reluctant to leave his marriage because he's concerned there's not a huge dating pool for him. Basically whether he stays or leaves is hinging on whether he thinks there'll be enough women queuing up to sleep with him.

I can't recall the last time, if ever, I've seen a thread on Mumsnet from a woman in an unhappy marriage whose stay/go decision was based on whether other men would want to date her.

But you did actually say that he's staying in his marriage because he thinks he'll not find anyone else due to his height.

Presumably then if he were 6'+ he'd be ditching the wife for a better model, rather than "working on his marriage" out of necessity/ need for sex.

Apparently, a very real reason why there are far more women than men who defect from North Korea is because the men are painfully aware that their short height will make it hard to date or get married in South Korea (or anywhere else, basically). North Koreans are inches shorter than their southern counterparts, but of course it doesn't matter much for women.

I do feel for the 5'4" husband mentioned upthread. It sounds like a difficult situation.

And this is why he's unappealing, not his height. He's willing to string a woman along to meet his own needs, because he thinks he might not be able to replace her. I'd hate a man to use and treat me like that.

The sexes aren't reversed though are they? Men often do sabotage the self- confidence of their wives. There is no indication whatsoever the OPs friends wife has caused him to be 5' 4".

One of the biggest issues with OLD I think is that people tend to pick people that they think are attractive, without any thought of whether or not the other person might think they are similarly attractive - hence the high number of rejections. I think in real life encounters people tend to aim very much more at their own level.

Obviously if you want to only select 6ft3 Brad Pitt lookalikes then you are free to do so and who knows you might get lucky, but then complaining that OLD is no good because none of them are interested in you seems a bit idiotic.

I don't particularly think looking at OLD stats are a very good way to gauge what women actually want. You have to narrow the field somehow so looks (including height for men and probably weight/youth for women) end up being more important initially. You can't date everyone and you may as well filter based on attraction then filter again (via a first date) to see who you actually get on with/click with.

If he's a great guy, I think your friend, if he ends up single, would be better to do speed dating, joining clubs and expanding ways to meet women irl rather than OLD. In fact, if I ended up single and wanting to meet someone again, I'd go down that route rather than OLD I think (having had a 2 year period of OLD in my 30s - not sure I'd be as successful in my mid 40s!).

I find remarks about looks are much more tolerated when they’re from women to men than the reverse.

In our workplace several women tease the men for being fat, bald or for their fashion choices. If the men teased the women for being fat, ugly or wearing bad clothes they would be hauled before HR in 5 seconds flat.

Not wanting to be alone and then face the dating game isn’t an unusual feeling, and it certainly doesn’t make somebody an ‘arsehole’. There is a small number of frankly demented posters on here who truly are misandrists, and I consider myself a feminist who tbh has a dim view of men in general.

I've seen threads from women in unhappy relationships who are worried they won't find anyone else because they're over 40 or over a size 12. They're not wrong to think a preference exists in men for younger, slimmer women, although of course this doesn't mean that only young, slim women find partners.

What I don't think I've seen is such women seeking out well-known, male-oriented sites to tell men their preference is wrong and makes them bad people and they would benefit from dating older or bigger women, and then accusing them all of misogyny when they respond.

Don't be silly. 'Shocking and blatant misandry' would be women inciting other women to oppress and hurt men. Sexually assaulting those they felt entitled to, attacking and murdering them in their hatred. If you're going to throw out a term as a parallel to misogyny, describing it as 'shocking' you should make sure it really is its equal opposite. Otherwise you are as guilty of the 'theatrics' you agreed others showed.

And how many women post ‘I can’t leave him because nobody else will want me’ with the replies ‘awww hun, he sounds a total twat and has clearly ground you down over the years’.

Literally nobody would call her an arsehole or accuse her of using him for sex.

Why is it beyond your imagination that he’s staying for companionship, shared lifestyle and commitment to their family life?

To be fair a lot of things are called misogyny on here that aren’t as extremes as threats or inciting hatred.

You have to be prepared to make your arguments from a logical and well reasoned place, not just an unshakeable stance of ‘women ALWAYS right men ALWAYS wrong’

And women don’t do that ?. I know at least three.

I don't get this and never understand why we get told to compromise/lower our criteria/that we're searching for a unicorn, we are attracted to who we find attractive.

I never think about height (my joke about taller than me in heels still stands though) if I find someone attractive then I find them attractive. They could be 5ft10 or 6ft7 for all I care.

I'm not going to date someone over 6ft that I don't find attractive but again if someone is under 6ft and i find them attractive I'm not going to turn them down.

They don't have to be perfect but they have to be perfect for you.

I’ve done it. Stuck with someone for a few years because I didn’t want to be on my own. Eventually dumped him.

Doesn’t sound like his marriage is in that good of a place if he brought this up with you. You say that it was one of his reasons yet not mention what the others were. Was this the reason that was most important to him or the one that caught your attention the most?

NonPlayerCharacter
I take your point. Some apprehension about what the dating scene will look like is understandable when leaving a long term relationship, for men and women. It's a period of transition and a leap into the unknown.

Making the decision on staying or leaving a marriage based based on whether people would be queuing up to date you is an attitude from a certain type of man. Complaining that you might not be everyone's type is also an attitude from a certain type of man. These attitudes are most likely to be a bigger barrier in the dating scene than how tall a man is.

There's lots of perfectly nice men who aren't 6 foot tall in happy, healthy relationships, or single and enjoying the dating scene.

Also he’s the sort you would match with on OLD and even if you didn’t care about it he’d be telling you you couldn’t wear heels or some such nonsense. Or keep on questioning why you are with him or what your motives are. Confidence is sexy, he sounds insecure which is always going to be a massive turn off.

So yes I agree he’ll struggle OLD, but not for the reasons he thinks

Oh christ, are you friends with my younger brother?

Don't fall for it if so. He's had one relationship after another, including at least one affair during this marriage. The issue isn't height. Depth, possibly.

All depends on priorities really i think

Almost all of my friends and women I know are married to or dating men under 6'. I am just under 5'10" so it's easy for me to tell who is taller. I have dated men my height and a little shorter but actually most men don't want to date women who are taller than them so there's a prejudice that way too.

'HR' doesn't typically roam the office on the look out for insults so they can haul men in for disciplinary action for insulting women, while excusing women for insulting men. People are disciplined if inappropriate comments are reported, and confirmed, with men and women equally protected under law.
If men are failing to report the offensive remarks made about men, then they need to start doing so, and it would stop being tolerated. I struggle to imagine an office so entirely controlled by women, with the men so undermined and cowed that they are unable to speak up, take action and defend themselves. After all, they are statically likely to be in the better paid, higher status power positions, perfectly placed to stamp out any mistreatment of their own sex. If they can't be bothered, it suggests they're not that bothered. So why should we be on their behalf?

Honestly, preach to the men on OLD as I'm not sure how many of them are prioritising a woman's character over her looks.