#47 Though She Be But Little

I've lived most of my life blind to heightism. Now I can't unsee it.

Hello, internet friends!

Welcome to my most speculative piece yet! I hope you think of the dear shorties in your life and, to quote Robert Reich, “inundate them with affection.” ♡

With my Very Tall American Friend from our summer program in Paris (2015) | Guestimate my height?

“I’m 5’8”, my friend Riggs answered. “Why are you asking?”

I converted it on Google: 172.72 cm.

He’d be roughly the same height as the guy I was talking to on Bumble.

Not bad, I thought. I never wear footwear without at least two-inch heels anyway, so the height difference wouldn’t be too awkward. (I’ve been affectionately dubbed by my oldest friends as Team Takong — “Team Heels” — ever since they discovered that even my flip-flops gave me a little boost.)

I told Riggs that I was using him as a reference, explaining how, in the dating app, users have the option to display their height on their profile.

He turned to me, an eyebrow raised, and asked, “What did you put in yours?”

See, I’m a Very Short Person. Shorter than the average Filipino woman.

It was around fifth grade when I stopped growing in height, which I never cared for because, in almost every other aspect, I soared. For most of my academic years, I was a student-athlete-leader who excelled in all three fronts. I was a lakwatsera (a social butterfly who likes to be out and about) who got along with everybody and their grandmother. I had two boyfriends from high school to college (not at the same time, just to be clear), boys who stood no shorter than Riggs. By the time I graduated from university, I’d come to see myself as a well-rounded individual capable of achieving anything I set my mind to.

Fortunately, none of those aspirations included becoming a flight attendant.

I recognize now more sharply than ever how incredible a privilege it is to be able to say all of that. To have been reared in an environment with solid infrastructure, unconditional support, and an abundance of opportunities that nurtured my self-belief and shrouded me in what felt like a force field of self-esteem — a barrier that, as I’ll share later on, wasn’t as impenetrable as I thought it would be.

So when Riggs eventually asked me if my shortness had ever bothered me, I said, of course not, as if it were common sense. Save for literally being held in line at the club as the bouncer triple-checks my ID, my height has never held me back in life.

Which is to say, I’ve lived most of my life unaware of the concept of heightism. Of the possibility that someone might be at a disadvantage because of something as trivial as stature.

Not once did it occur to me that there was such a thing as “height premium”, that there would be a correlation between greater height and greater pay (possibly 1.3% more per year for each additional centimeter, based on this study conducted in China), that stature might influence promotion opportunities, and that, with other things equal, the taller candidate is more likely to be awarded the job than the shorter one.

Apparently, our cognitively efficient brains have been trained (or tricked?) to associate height with confidence, competence, and a host of other positive traits. A programming so inconspicuous that it permeates our everyday language: Don’t we all “stand tall” with confidence? And “fall short” when we don’t meet expectations?

As I researched more about heightism to write this piece, I felt increasingly naive about my ignorance, especially since I’d read about the bias a few years back: It was the pandemic, a once-unknown video-conferencing application became our lifeline overnight, and a certain fellow Asian writer and Very Short Person — though still taller than me — called Li Charmaine Anne wrote a piece on Medium titled “Short People in the Era of Zoom”.

The headline caught my eye, and I wondered, What the hell does Zoom have to do with being short?

My first job out of college, way back in the Office Age — a time in history when it was widely believed that humans can only operate reliably if they report to the office five days a week — was with an international brand that had just set up shop in the Philippines. A startup of sorts, we had a lean team and a small office. We also had an open office plan. (Yes, it was also that era. A time when we thought forgoing the cubicles and desk dividers and, by extension, our privacy and ability to focus at work, was the most productive and inventive idea ever.)

This meant that, unlike in bigger organizations, our C-suite was highly accessible and visible to us.

Not that you’d miss them in the office.

Our managing director was French, while our sales director was Dutch. Two figures who stood out not mainly by their complexion and defined nose bridges, but because they visibly protruded from a sea of Filipinos. Two figures who, from my vantage point, might as well have been the Twin Towers.

I distinctly remember walking up to the Dutchman’s desk to consult on something, his laptop perched on a platform, keyboard slanting at no less than 45 degrees. We talked at eye level — only he was seated and I was standing on three-inch pumps. Then, in the board room, I’d watch the Frenchman take his seat upfront, his body filling up the entire conference chair, head surpassing the headrest. Meanwhile, seeing me sit on the same chair, you’d think I was perched on the Iron Throne.

For the first time in my life, there was no forgetting the fact of my height.

Or the significant lack thereof.

And yet! I was still oblivious to the possibility that that might be people’s first impression of me: Oh wow. She’s short.

Or perhaps: Did this little girl get lost on her way to school?

That’s why Charmaine found reprieve entering the Zoom Era. It was “the day when I no longer had to walk into a room and have my height be the first thing people notice about me.”

And now she wonders: “Am I respected more now that people don’t see my height?”

A little over a year into my first job, I got promoted vertically and laterally.

Then, I floundered.

It was a combination of things: Within a year of my promotion, the head of our team left — a position that stayed vacant for the next two years — and shortly after, my line manager took a maternity leave and appointed me as OIC. I proudly accepted without thinking at all about the fact that these were tremendous shoes to fill. And I shop for footwear in the kids’ section.

So there I was amidst the stormy seas of a startup, practically a corporate fetus who was now tasked to help build the ship and navigate and convince the crew that this is the way to go and row the damn boat myself, all while plugging the holes. But the most damning of all was this: I had no idea how to ask for support. Or guidance. Or how to say no.

With the way I mismanaged the job, I’m pretty sure some people dreamed at night of throwing me overboard.

But during the day, some of them merely gave me flak for it.

“You went to a top university, right?”, a coworker asked as we rode the elevator with our colleagues. I nodded. “Well, just goes to show that a degree doesn’t really prove much.” I could swear the elevator and everyone in it swelled right before my eyes.

Lucky for me, the condescension wasn’t always explicit. Sometimes they came in smirks and whispers. Or snotty exchanged stares. (Even those who weren’t remarkably tall seemed to act like they were ten feet tall beside me). Or plain sarcasm.

And while I know the criticism wasn’t unfounded, today I can’t help but ponder the same question as Charmaine’s: Would have I been treated with a little more respect if they didn’t know my height?

Would have I been spared the belittlement if I wasn’t, well, little?

I know — it’s wild conjecture.

Writing this piece has been such a strange experience because I’ve had to straddle two possibilities: Am I finally seeing and connecting the dots? Or are these dots as believable as Santa Claus?

That’s the thing about heightism: It’s hard to confirm because it’s an implicit bias. “One we may subconsciously harbour or, indeed, internalise, without realising it”, writes Aysha Imtiaz on BBC. “For example, a manager may have no inkling that the way they perceive a particular employee – and the employee’s prospects – is in any way linked to their height.”

So, unfortunately, we can’t ascertain if my colleagues’ treatment of me was influenced by my size.

But there are some things I know for certain.

I know that, during my trip to Mexico a few years back, I was called “pequena pero guapa”. Short but attractive. And while I’m flattered by the latter adjective, the conjunction used speaks a lot to what kind of people whom we think the word “attractive” fits.

I also know that, a year after starting my second job remotely during the pandemic, when my colleagues finally had the chance to see me in real life, they were surprised to learn just how short I am. By that time, I had already established my credibility using nothing but the caliber of my work, the confidence of my tone, my cooperative spirit, and — occasionally, when I’d taken a shower — my pixelated face and shoulders.

Seeing me in the flesh for the first time, one of them uttered, “Hindi halata [na ganyan ka kaliit]!” (“I wouldn’t have thought you were that small!”)

This person didn’t mean any harm, and I took no offense. But again, it’s a telling remark: That kind of aplomb in someone my height? A square peg in a round hole.

I’ll admit: Such comments have boosted my ego. But with the lens of heightism, it now tickles my brain to realize that, for some people, I’m beating the odds merely for being short.

Allow me to give another speculative heightism-coded instance: Recently, in the office, I walked past a director who was curious about my age. But instead of the typical question, she asked, “How… young are you?”

Again, instinctively, I was flattered by the flip in the script. It’s not lost on me that, in the broader society, this is probably the best thing you can ask any woman in her thirties and beyond. I know I’m lucky to look so young — but the truth is that that holds less water in places that prize experience and tenure. Age is a heuristic for credibility. To be assumed as young is to be assumed as inexperienced.

I’m a senior in my role. Now I wonder how much of the director’s curiosity came from a place of dissonance: Either Ria is as young as she looks. Or she just looks too young for her rank.

I told her I was already 30 years old.

A theory about height bias that struck me was from the psychologist Timothy A. Judge, PhD, where he posits that one’s physical perspective may translate psychologically:

The process of literally “looking down on others” may cause one to be more confident. Similarly, having others “looking up to us” may instill in tall people more self-confidence.

Obviously, I have no idea how this feels, but it made me think a lot about the opposite: Could the experience of “looking up” to others and being “looked down on” by others affect one’s self-confidence?

I think about all the moments when my confidence wavered, when my voice trembled in a meeting, when I shied away from expressing my convictions, or did so but timidly. It was always in the presence of someone bigger than me — in height and personality.

Even now, with an outsized increase in my confidence since it was shot in my first job, I sometimes still find myself shrinking in the face of stronger personalities. But I’ve gotten better at it. A part of me wants to thank hybrid remote work for that, for giving me no choice but to plant my self-esteem on more fertile soil: my work ethic, my ideas, the way I conduct myself toward others. The intrinsics, instead of the optics.

But, of course, it’s a work in progress.

I still think about the kind of person I’ve always aspired to become. The person who sways the room with their energy, who can make their case, have their audience immediately buy into it, and be seen as someone who can rally others. Then I think about all those kinds of people I’ve encountered, in all those board rooms and business conferences and sales rallies, and I realize most of them look the part: They’re tall.

This isn’t just about heightism possibly being the last socially acceptable prejudice. It’s also the reality that, per the late economist John Kenneth Galbraith, as quoted by

Robert Reich

, favoring the tall is still “one of the most blatant and forgiven prejudices in our society.”

Height aside, these figures are also typically men or women who exhibit masculine energy.

I look forward to the day when leadership, authority, and credibility will be granted to those who look, sound, and behave differently.

But until then, I realize that I have to compensate for my “packaging”. I have to power dress, wear makeup, speak with extra gravitas, perhaps even lower my pitch. And yet, I know that’s the easy part.

The harder work is this: To refuse to act like my height, be overlooked, undermined.

To take more space than I do.

And to remember that whether someone finds that jarring or acceptable is none of my concern.

It’s a strange place — wondering if I’ve been a victim of heightism. And I think that’s another reason why the concept has eluded me for so long. I have no interest in playing the victim, but I realize now that my perception of myself and what I’m capable of was never the point. Glass ceilings aren’t installed by the people they trap.

But while the jury’s still out, what with the thin literature on the bias and, understandably, other forms of discrimination to fight, I’ve found solidarity and perspective in reading other short people’s feelings and experiences.

But more importantly, I’ve found power in discovering that my size has made me the person I am today: A woman who can take a joke (because I’ve heard every height joke in the book). A woman who can make others laugh with her self-deprecating humor, who wrote “Fun-Sized Filipina Writer” on her bio as her unique proposition. A woman so inured to wearing heels that she can walk 36,000 steps in two-inch-high booties and join a heels dance class off the cuff. A woman learning to fashion her own style of influence — one that amplifies who she is instead of compensating for what she’s not.

“Though she be but little”, Shakespeare warned the audience of Hermia in A Midsummer Night’s Dream, “she is fierce.”

And that’s the reason I didn’t feel the need to declare my height on Bumble.

But you know what? I’ve changed my mind.

Let’s just put the damn stat.

144.78 cm.

You can do the math.