Body positivity is such a strange concept to me. There’s efforts to reclaim words while simultaneously calling them bad if used as an insult. Ideally, people wouldn’t be offended by someone describing their body with common descriptors, but socially there is so much value attributed to certain body types that it’s almost impossible to avoid having an emotional response of some kind to various descriptors.

For example, It’s not bad to be fat, but calling someone “fat” is almost universally considered a bad thing. The same definitely seems to go for the idea of being “short.”

I’m asking this question because I can’t put my finger on why but something seems to be different about the use of the term “short” from the use of the term “fat.” I think that part of it is how, to me at least, the term “fat” is so generic and hard to nail down to a discrete definition, implying that the word really doesn’t have a clear connection to reality. On the other hand, height is a single-dimensional number. You either are above a certain threshold, or you aren’t.

I recently learned that May 6th to May 10th is “short king week” because it’s 5’6" to 5’10" which then prompted me to search for the origins of “short king” and apparently the person most-credited with popularizing the term is Jaboukie Young-White who claims the term was meant to include all men under 6 feet tall. The average adult male height is 5’9" leaving men considered roughly average to be called “short” which is still considered an insult by many.

I dunno. As a term that was intended to champion body positivity compared with how the term is actually used, what do you think of “short king?”

    • @[email protected]
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      1 month ago

      What is? The lack of any differentiation on physical attraction between males?

      Are you sure you’re not just deluding yourself that that doesn’t exist since you don’t like the position you’d fall into?

      You’re saying there’s no difference in physical attractiveness between Brad Pitt and someone like this man?

      • Captain Aggravated
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        -51 month ago

        Brad Pitt isn’t a real attractive man, he only plays one in movies. I’m sure both Angelina Jolie and Jennifer Anniston both told him his dick was both huge and tiny depending on how mad they were at him, and both of them lied both times.

        You can believe in Russel’s Teapot as much as you want, even if it is true, which it obviously isn’t, it can’t possibly matter. Anyone who calls you handsome, who says they want to fuck you, who says they like you for who you are? They are lying to manipulate you. No one will ever like you for any reason. They will only pretend to like you so they can get money, things and chores from you. “That’s not true my wife genuinely loves me” Break your spine, lose your job and spend the rest of your life in a wheelchair, see how much longer she “loves you for who you are.”

        • @[email protected]
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          41 month ago

          So you’re saying there is ZERO DIFFERENCE in physical attractiveness between the two pictures I posted?

          Jesus you’re bitter. You should look into psychedelic assisted therapy.

          They will only pretend to like you so they can get money, things and chores from you.

          I’ve been offered money to have sex with women, several times.
          Weird how they’ve given me money, things and done my chores if they only want those things from me, huh?

          The reason you feel that way is that you’re a bitter misogynist who writes things like “that’s for ugly chicks”, while actively pretending attractiveness in men doesn’t exist so you don’t have to face being an “ugly chick” yourself.

          Yeah, it’s true golddiggers exist, but if you stop being such a massive cunt you might one who isn’t.

          But that’s all in your future, as I’m pretty positive I’m talking to a teenager who’s annoyed that his crush liked the boy with the more expensive phone or a newer vehicle of some sort, something to that effect.

          You’ll get over it.

          • Captain Aggravated
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            -11 month ago

            Give the second man the first man’s cosmetic surgery budget and they’d bear a striking resemblance. Or he could just pay people to call him whatever he wants to be called. I mean, Donald Trump has ever gotten laid. Whether attractiveness or repulsiveness in men exists, it doesn’t matter because no one uses it for anything.

            Women’s worth is based on their physical appearance. Ugly women are worth less as people than pretty women, which is why “body positivity” is only ever mentioned by lumpy misshapen women and corporate advertising firms who want to sell them cosmetics. Men are not worth anything in and of themselves; their value is found in that they own and control. That’s how the world actually works, and hippy bullshit like “all lives matter” will never change that. NO LIVES MATTER, least of all yours and mine.

            • @[email protected]
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              21 month ago

              Give the second man the first man’s cosmetic surgery budget and they’d bear a striking resemblance

              So you admit that there IS a difference in their physical attractiveness, which means that such a thing does exist, meaning you admit you said something you don’t actually believe in.

              My point exactly.

              Don’t worry, the bitterness of having crushed so hard on a person you didn’t even manage to talk to will fade when you grow up. Well, hopefully you do at some point at least. I don’t know how ugly you are, but it can’t be much uglier than your rhetoric. I suspect you keep reading some of the “tips” of others (internally and externally) ugly guys like whathisface who’s locked up in Romania.

              • Captain Aggravated
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                -11 month ago

                I’m 36 years old, I’ve been around long enough to see the shame in people’s eyes when asked “What exactly do you want from me?” One man is more visibly damaged than the other. Vaginal wetness because of facial symmetry isn’t real. Vaginal wetness because a movie star’s pay means mansions and limousines is real. There aren’t legends of men so beautiful that women destroyed civilizations to be with him, because that’s not what men are valued for.

                Teaching young men that they can be liked for who they are is just…harmful. To everyone outside of himself, a man is only as valuable as what you can get out of him. If you can’t get much out of him, he will be treated VERY badly, even worse if he dares to have needs of his own.

                • @[email protected]
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                  1 month ago

                  Well, I guess there’s really no hope for you anymore. Well, with PAT it would be probably possible, but I seriously doubt it at that point.

                  “More visibly damaged”

                  Ah, so because I pointed out that you actually admitted to there being a difference, you’re now eating your words and saying “there’s no difference in physical attractiveness”.

                  Either you’re lying to keep up the pretense you need to (because of your own level of attractiveness), or you literally have brain damage. You don’t want to see the ugly truth that ugly people are at a disadvantage, both male and female. :)

                  https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2003-05637-007 https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1975-01055-001 https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2007-01479-006

                  “Vaginal wetness because of facial symmetry isn’t real.”

                  Weird way to try to say that “I don’t want to admit that women have the capacity to be sexually attracted to how someone looks, despite that being an objective and incontrovertible fact, because I’ve never had that happen to me, so it can’t be real, because I don’t want to admit what an uggo I myself am”.

                  You know what definitely is real though? Vaginal dryness after hearing sentences like “vaginal wetness because of facial symmetry”. Such incel comments. You’re trying to objectify women to the extent that you don’t even want to think about there being an actual person who gets aroused because of something they see, so you don’t even talk of arousal, you talk of “vaginal wetness”. Would you ever write “penile stiffness” when talking about getting hard?

                  I can see after this conversation why you’d need those delusions to be true, because with the rhetorical output of a teenage incel, you’re definitely never gonna induce “vaginal wetness” in anyone.

                  Weird how pretty much every relationship I’ve been in as a man has been me getting money and chores out of the women, instead of the other way around. So I guess you’re also gonna pretend that you don’t understand the sterotype of the extremely good looking guy who goes around banging the wives of the less-than-attractive men while they’re at work? What exactly is the woman getting out the guy she’s fucking in secret?

                  Teaching young men that they can be liked for who they are is just…harmful.

                  Wrong. It’s the exact way we avoid them turning out like you, a delusional guy saying “ugly chicks” and “vaginal wetness” while being on the lowest ladder of male attractiveness.

                  The good point is that even people like you can improve. Just stop with the crazy misogyny, go to therapy, hit the gym and take care of your skin. Facial features don’t matter as much as your facial expressions. So there’s hope for you yet, but only after you fix yourself up, psyche and all.

                  • Captain Aggravated
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                    -21 month ago

                    Would you ever write “penile stiffness” when talking about getting hard?

                    I probably would, yeah. That sounds like how I talk, though on reflection I’d probably use the word “hardness.”

                    What exactly is the woman getting out the guy she’s fucking in secret?

                    So I’m the misogynist while you’re over here like “Have you considered that women are shallow cheating sluts?” And why is said cheating slut still involved with her “less-than-attractive” husband? Yeah, she sounds like a great person who I should…put a lot of work into myself to be worthy to be around. Sign me right the fuck up.

                    even people like you can improve

                    I’m not the problem here. I live in a world where most employers would pay you in company scrip rather than USD if, nay, when they’re allowed to get away with it again. I live in a world where 100% of the phone calls I get are scams or reminders of doctor’s appointments. I live in a world where packages of food labeled 12 ounces have 9 ounces of food in them. Everyone is out to scam you. EVERYONE. What method they choose to use is at least partially a factor of who they are to you. Are they an employer, a retailer, a banker, a young blonde? NONE of them care about your well being. None of them will call you an ambulance unless it would reflect badly on them not to.

                    Repeat after me: No, they don’t love you. They don’t like you for who you are as a person. You did not win the Spanish lottery. Your car does not have an extended warranty. We are not like a family here.

                • @[email protected]
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                  -21 month ago

                  Thank you for telling the truth. It’s good to see someone doing that instead of trying to spin feel-good bullshit.

                  • @[email protected]
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                    21 month ago

                    Oh another delusional person.

                    You seriously think there’s no such thing as physical attractiveness? If you seriously believe that, you’re most likely suffering from actual brain damage. What is more likely is you’re pretending it doesn’t, so you don’t have to feel bad about not being in the attractive group. Too bad. ;P