The theory that short men end up as more aggressive than taller ones has been dismissed by a scientific study. The University of Central Lancashire research for the BBC found taller men were more likely to lose their temper.
Men of different heights dueled with wooden sticks but one of the subjects deliberately provoked the other by rapping them across the knuckles. Heart monitors revealed it was the taller men who flew off the handle more quickly and hit back. - BBC News
Too bad there are a dozen more studies claiming short men are more aggressive, paranoid, etc. Most of these studies are conducted on wild animals or women, then later used to disparage short men, like how this website claims "Short man syndrome really does exist, Oxford University finds."
No men were actually studied in that experiment, let alone short men. This study took several women with a history of paranoia, and gave them virtual reality goggles that made their point of view 10 inches shorter than in everyday life. Afterwards, the women reported increased anxiety. This was apparently enough for these websites to slander short men in their headlines. Not to mention how a real short person would be used to their height, rather than someone being shrunk down 10 inches out of the blue. The women in this study would have to be daft to not realize something seemed off. Essentially, this experiment only had one outcome from the get-go.
This site adds:
"Though only women were included in the Oxford study about how paranoid short people are, researchers predict the results in a study on males would be even more striking, since men tend to place greater social importance on height."May I then ask why they didn't just study short men in the first place? This convoluted Oxford experiment is the one that gets linked everywhere, yet the more precise BBC News study has faded into obscurity. I often see people labelling those who discuss heightism with a "victim complex." The irony here is that it's seemingly society that feels victimised, desperately and constantly trying to prove how short men are out to get them.
Here's another mainstream site that claims "scientists confirm smaller blokes act more aggressively to make up for height," yet the actual experiment didn't even test for aggression. This new study tried to see whether short or tall men hoarded more tokens, then used the results to interpret jealousy, which then somehow translated into aggressiveness. I guess they're trying to say short men are aggressively greedy. What's funny is that if tall men had kept more of the tokens, these researchers would probably say something like, "since prehistoric days, tall men were meant to gather resources," rather than claim tall guys have a complex. More discussion on this here, where I quote, "Here's the kicker. If the short men would've been more generous with their tokens, they would've assumed that the short men were trying to "show off" by throwing their money around, thus, that would be used as evidence of short man syndrome."
I'd go as far as to say, if we lived in a reality where tall men were regarded as angrier, I doubt it'd be viewed as a negative. People would say something like, "tall men had to be aggressive in order to hunt prey and protect women." It's not the action itself that's the issue, but who's doing it. For instance, there's another study where they found that short referees hand out more yellow cards in lower league football, while tall refs hand out more red cards in higher leagues. Of course, the headlines only focus on what the short men do. Or take a look here, where tall men were found to cheat on women twice as much as short men do. The reason? "It is not known why this is the case, but experts have said that so-called 'small man syndrome' may mean that shorter guys are not as confident with women." You read that right. When tall men cheat more, it's not because they have more options available, it's because of small man syndrome yet again. But had they discovered that short men cheat more, that too would be used as an example of the Napoleon Complex, where short guys are out to prove something by trying to sleep with as many women as possible. And apparently, keeping secrets from your partner is a sign of confidence. So much for "women don't care about height, they care about personality."
We also all know how the average person only reads the headline, as seen in this reddit thread about "new research" proving short people are angrier, which got over 400 upvotes. Fortunately, a website dedicated to exposing fake news later called this out, however one can see how the damage has already been done. Many people who saw the initial, blatantly false headline will never see the article countering these claims. A few months later, some other sites decided they wanted a piece of the propaganda pie, as they made the same unsubstantiated claims here and here. People easily believe bogus when it makes short men look bad, yet many of these same people turn into picky skeptics when presented with actual research highlighting height bias.
Now let's talk about why society is so obsessed with labeling short men with a complex in the first place. There's a reason why the "if your boyfriend is short, he's your minion" meme exists. Jokes like this are made because stature is linked with authority. A short man is expected to behave himself more than everyone else. It's called overcompensating because you must not overstep the boundaries. You must, and I quote, "act your height." We can't have a thin, short guy talking to everyone as if he was Wladimir Klitschko.
It's also a way to make it seem like a short man's reaction to prejudice is the problem, rather than the prejudice itself. For example, if a woman got angry about body shaming, or claimed it made her more driven, people are told by society to take her side. However, if a short man becomes angry or more ambitious due to height discrimination, it's portrayed negatively.
People simply don't believe short men are allowed to display traditionally masculine traits, or in this case, even human traits (because who doesn't get angry once in a while?). Often, a short man actually has reason to be indignant. He's just not allowed to be.
More discussion on fake news about short man syndrome here: http://archive.is/md9B8
