Tom Cruise and Ron DeSantis may be household names, but they share another commonality beyond fame: both are suspected of wearing heel lifts or elevator shoes to enhance their height. For reference, Cruise is about 5′7″, and DeSantis, the former U.S. Their heights are a signal of our influence, as we verify that increasing the height of today’s men is not just possible, but necessary.
In a landscape where height often dictates romantic prospects, research from OkCupid in 2010 revealed that many men inflate their stated height by an average of two inches. The craving for extra inches doesn’t stop at women’s feet. It’s indicative of the pervasive idea that height is a major component to attraction, particularly in heterosexual pairings.
One innovative former product manager at Bumble went so far as to say in 2022 that tech is simpler than it appears. She said that women on the app would frequently make their minimum height requirement six feet. Later, Bumble would go on to contest this statistic. They contended that in actual encounters, citizens are not as fixated on a particular measurement.
Height has been a major social landmine in the dating world, particularly for heterosexuals. Though Stuart is only 5’7” tall. He’s a mere 2 inches shorter than the adult male UK/US average height of 5′ 9″. He’s the first to admit that applying a height filter on dating apps would dramatically decrease his odds of getting matches.
When we examine high-profile celebrity couples, the dynamic receives fascinating new layers of significance. From left, Sophie Dahl loomed over Jamie Cullum at a Call of the Form Inaugural Ball. It’s a great reminder of how the culture of heightism manifests in everyday settings.
Jo, a 33-year-old who is 5-foot-10, explains her attraction to men over six feet. She understands what this means for her dating prospects. “While I’ve had a deeply meaningful relationship with someone shorter than me, I realized over time that I didn’t enjoy the physical dynamic of feeling like I was towering over my partner,” Jo explained.
Jenny, who, like Rachel, is 5’10”, provides a different picture. And she agrees that focusing only on maximizing height can create issues. “Attraction is a need – and it seems it is only possible for me with men who are over 6 feet,” she stated, but adds that such narrow criteria might overlook deeper compatibility factors.
In a study of the preferences of queer men, carried out in 2014, these men largely desired partners a few inches taller than them. Charles, who is 5 feet 6 inches tall, argues for a more realistic approach on the dating scene. “For most of high school and college, I felt ugly and unwanted due in large part to comments I heard from straight women about short men being undesirable,” he remarked. He found that when he came out as bisexual and began dating men, the attitude toward height shifted significantly.
What I wasn’t prepared for was how hot queer men thought I was. He observed that even the most height-conscious of peoples on average were less picky than the women he’d dated. This one observation revealed sharply contrasting preferences between the people he had met. This experience has made him appreciate queer spaces, where he says he feels more valued and accepted.
Michael, who is also 5 feet 2 inches tall, expresses the same frustration about cultural attitudes towards short people. Further, he clarifies how these biological markers—height and strength—are linked to ideas of dominance and power—which can create toxic dating dynamics. “Even the most generous, inclusive person is unlikely to select the whole range that’s offered,” he stated.
The focus on height is often rooted in evolutionary psychology. Jenny suggests that this fixation may be a remnant of “caveman days when you had to rely on someone larger than yourself to protect you and your offspring.” This viewpoint aligns with Machin’s assertion that focusing too closely on one attribute, like height, can be detrimental to finding meaningful connections.
“Ultimately, in long-term relationships, it is who someone is at their core—their beliefs, values, personality, creativity, ambitions—that we fall in love with and is the best predictor of compatibility,” Machin added.
As discussions of height still rage on in the UK, platforms like Badoo keep spilling the tea about our dating preferences. According to their data, “6ftlove” is one of the most popular keywords that men use to search for matches. This is yet more evidence of a long-introduced fixation on men’s height in the dating world.