On the Obsession with Height
It's not the tall girls who are overly concerned about male height
I think Lacey just couldn’t resist the joke here. In case it wasn’t obvious to you, this little sub-series was conceived and written by her; from time to time she likes to take the wheel and I always encourage her to do so as I think it’s interesting to see her articulate her sense of humor rather than limit it to illustration.
But it’s true that while women prefer taller men, the taller a woman is, the more open she usually is to dating a man who is shorter than her, mostly because her options are so much more limited than those of a shorter woman. Back in the day, I dated several women who were taller than me, and if I recall correctly, there was not a single taller woman who, when asked out, ever shot me down.
I suspect men who refrain from asking out taller women solely on the basis of their height disadvantage are probably making a mistake based on their false assumptions about female preferences. Sure, all things being equal, a 5’11” woman would prefer the same thing every single one of her shorter rivals prefers, which is a man who is at least 6 feet tall. But her preferences will likely be influenced by the awareness, however subsconcious, that she will be limiting her options to the most-sought-after one-fifth of the available men.
In other words, while women are attracted to male height and have a strong preference for it, any obsession with male-female height differences is more likely on the part of the shorter man.
In general, women are (mostly unconsciously) looking to breed with men who will give them children that are average (across all traits) and healthy. The main reason a tall women would be accepting of a short man is because she already has the height genes to give to their children, who would would likely turn out to be of average height. Presumably the short man with whom she chooses to have kids would be above-average in traits she is deficient in. Short women are the ones who will really be ready to fight to lock down a tall man with whom to have kids.
I see a lot of videos on social media in which the women are talking about ideal height for a man. Almost all of these women are very short and overweight, and would be a 6/10 even if they weren't obese.
Vox recently wrote that many women are innumerate and I think this extends their notional height preferences - they pick a number that sounds good to them but have no actual conception of what that means in reality. If the average woman's parallel parking skills are anything to go by, they definitely lack spatial awareness.