216
‘Being short is a curse’: the men paying thousands to get their legs broken – and lengthened
(www.theguardian.com)
this post was submitted on 17 Aug 2025
216 points (95.8% liked)
Health - Resources and discussion for everything health-related
3433 readers
74 users here now
Health: physical and mental, individual and public.
Discussions, issues, resources, news, everything.
See the pinned post for a long list of other communities dedicated to health or specific diagnoses. The list is continuously updated.
Nothing here shall be taken as medical or any other kind of professional advice.
Commercial advertising is considered spam and not allowed. If you're not sure, contact mods to ask beforehand.
Linked videos without original description context by OP to initiate healthy, constructive discussions will be removed.
Regular rules of lemmy.world apply. Be civil.
founded 2 years ago
MODERATORS
you are viewing a single comment's thread
view the rest of the comments
view the rest of the comments
isn't this just body dysmorphia?
also, men are also vulnerable to body image issues, and we're also given unrealistic body standards in the media.
There are people liking dead bods and bald heads. There is hope 🤞
Keep the typo
Dead bods represent 💪
The is a good example of gender affirming surgery too.
This is a terrible example of gender affirming surgery.
How? These men believe that being tall is masculine, and they are uncomfortable emough in their bodies to literally get painful surgery for some extra height so they can feel more masculine.
it's a good example in the sense that it is a perfect example of gender affirming surgery.
not good as in the procedure is good, but as in a good fit for gender affirming
I'm going to directly compare this to top surgery or bottom surgery in trans people because i believe those are the best examples of gender affirming care but this also applies to hrt. I'm not trans and im not a pysc so take this with a grain of salt.
These men dont feel Dysphoria over their height what they are feeling is Body Dysmorphia. Body dysmophia is obsessive-compulsive disorder over a body part being 'wrong' or defective. An extra inch or two of height is not associated with being male. They will still be recognized as male before and after. They feel like they are male both before and after the surgery and gender never comes into the equation. They are obessing over height because of a mental health condition causing them to hyper fixate on this 'issue' that might not even be real. There are men who are like 6'1 getting height surgery.
Now if we look at top surgery for a comparison. Gender Dysphoria is described as an psychological distress where they identify with a gender other than the biological gender they were assigned at birth. FTM trans men might feel dysphoria from having breasts and top surgery directly addresses the root cause of the dysphoria. Breasts are a primary sex characteristic so this makes sense, something like botox would not be considered gender affirming care I believe.
It gets blurred because a lot of trans people also suffer from body dysomorphia and hyper fixate on body parts but there seems to be a clear distinction between the two conditions and height lengthening surgery doesn't fit the criteria for gender affirming care.
These men get gender euphoria from being tall and had gender dysphoria from being short. They believed being short was not masculine. They got surgery to feel more masculine. This is an example of gender affirming care, just like breast implants and hair plugs.
I cant see anything that links this to feelings of gender discomfort or euphoria and it doesnt make sense that this would be gender related. Its body dysmorphia and the treatment is therapy.
Do you want me to try and explain this to you again with even smaller words?
Being taller = man being short = women. Yeah youve already given me your idiotic take.
Do you think men don't see being tall as being more masculine?
Yes. Height is not a primary sex characteristic. People do not look at a 5'8 man as more feminine than a 5'10 man. If a man views himself as needing to be taller to be a man there is something else going on and its not gender dysphoira.
You seem to consider gender affirming care to be anything that increases confidence. Buying a cool jacket would be gender affirming care to you. I hate this because it waters down the topic to pointlessness. The world health organisation definition of the word includes "when it conflicts with the gender they were assigned at birth" which I agree is nessesary.
These men are conflating hight with masculinity.
These men are seeking medical care to affirm their gender.
You don't need to be trans to participate in gender affirming activities.
Gender is not a trans specific phenomenon.
Associating stuff with gender is not a trans specific phenomenon.
People doing the stuff they associate with their gender, to feel more confident and comfortable within their gender, is gender affirming activity.
Apparently yeah, I was only aware of the delusional variant (where the obsessed on flaw is not present).
I'm seeing dysmorphia run fucking rampant in men over the past several years. It was initially mostly noticeable with incels, but it's gotten much more noticably widespread.
No.
sorry to go back to this topic, but even if it's they social pressure or romance related it still disphoria, as long as you're uncomfortable in your own body.
the previous snippet conversation was overly snippy, I'm asking if you're ok?
you're just explaining the causes of body dysmorphia in men.
Claiming it's (just) body dysmorphia implies that the problems those people experience are just in their heads or at least exaggerated.
But as the article states this is not the case. Being a short man leads to lots of disadvantages and probably the most important one being having far fewer chances finding a partner. So there may be different ways of coping with the problem like acceptance but trying to change your appearance is not irrational - even though I wouldn't opt for that. But then again I don't have that problem - fortunately....