But there’s one that is rarely spoken about, or at least I rarely speak about, and that is strong.
Yes, physically, mentally, and emotionally strong.
Were there any times when someone asked you to help carry something heavy and they said, “Oh, you’re big and strong”? Or when you’re facing struggles, someone may say, “Oh, you can handle it, right?” Those are just a few examples of this “strong” stereotype.
Today, we’re going to dive deeper into this and how it affects how people speak to and act towards us, so make sure you tune in to this episode!
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[00:00:00] I'm sure you've heard of many of the doll girl stereotypes. We have masculine, intimidating, athlete, Amazon or Amazonian or whatever. And there's one that isn't really spoken about a lot or at least I haven't spoken about it a lot and it's the strong stereotype. Yes physically, mentally, and emotionally strong. Were there any times where someone has asked you to help carry something heavy and they say oh you're big and strong or when you're facing struggles someone may say oh you can handle it right? Those are just a few
[00:00:29] examples of the strong stereotype. So today we're gonna dive deeper into that and how this affects how people speak to and act towards us. So let's get into it.
[00:00:43] Good morning everybody. You are currently listening to A Tall Girls Podcast hosted by A Tall Girl Named India. I hope everyone who's tuning in today is doing super fantastic. Before I get into this episode I do want to say make sure you're following me on my socials at A Tall Girls Podcast on Instagram, TikTok and Pinterest so that you can stay up to date on all of the latest podcast episodes. And catch a glimpse of my everyday life. Also feel free to leave me a review and let me know how tall you are. I'm genuinely curious. I also have a monthly newsletter. Make sure you subscribe to that. Everything is going to be linked in the description.
[00:01:13] I hope y'all are doing great. I just want to give a quick little reminder to the Tall Girlies listening right now that you guys are awesome. Okay quick little story time. Um, if you didn't know I'm going to grad school and there was some welcome reception that I attended and there was this lady who works there who came up to our table and was just talking to a few of us.
[00:01:33] And after we introduced ourselves she straight up said oh my gosh I love because there were a couple tall girls standing at that table or I should say a couple girls who were taller than her standing at that table. She's like oh my gosh you guys are tall like I absolutely love tall girls. I was like period queen. I, I don't know. I feel like that would have been a good segue to be like by the way a tall girls podcast.
[00:01:59] Um, but I didn't. I don't know. She was just talking about how she loves, you know, tall people and how she's short, etc. But I just want to say that there are people out there who absolutely love and adore and admire us tall girlies. So I thought that was adorable and figured that I would bring that up on this podcast. Alright now that that's out the way let's talk about the strong stereotype. Question for the tall girlies. I recently saw a video that was titled tall girls aren't treated feminine or I guess in a feminine way.
[00:02:29] What are your thoughts on this? Do you agree with this? While you figure that out or comment or whatever I'm going to play a clip from the video. I wanted to make a video talking about general biases that women who are plus size, tall, black and just big in general get. I am 5'11". Um, I've always been plus size and I've always been tall my entire life.
[00:02:57] People view you like you're not, you're supposed to be able to handle the things that come to you because of your height, because of your weight, because of your, your race, etc. You're supposed to always be somebody's shoulder to cry on, the person to call for advice, the person who listens to everyone else's problems, all of that. Um, it's exhausting, frankly. It's very exhausting.
[00:03:27] But I've experienced this, um, particularly with like males, like male friends, male, whatever, co-workers, male, whatever, just males, um, just in general. And you, you, you get treated in a way where it's almost like you are too big to be a victim of anything.
[00:03:51] Uh, whether it be violence, whether it be, I don't know, harassment, bullying, etc., etc. That isn't real. Just because someone has an outward appearance of a certain way does not make them less feminine. It does not make them less intelligent. Um, it doesn't make them, you know, less of anything.
[00:04:18] Like sometimes a person who has been violated is the victim. And it's unfortunate that people do not view us as that. And I find it very interesting that she mentioned that a lot of these experiences occurred from men or men were involved in a lot of the experiences that she's had. And with that, it kind of seems like it rolls over into the dating world, maybe.
[00:04:47] I don't know. Let's listen to this example. Let's talk about dating while being a tall woman. For reference, I'm 5'10". Number one, men be thinking I'd be wanting to wrestle. Yes, I'm tall, but I don't want to wrestle you. Men be thinking I want to play, like, play them in basketball. I don't want to play basketball with you. Like, go play basketball with your homies. I don't want to play basketball with you. Dating men that are shorter and have little man syndrome. Like, there's little man syndrome.
[00:05:14] But then there's, like, you're a tall woman, so he got little man, little man syndrome. But it's not only men, okay? On Reddit, it seems like there are a lot of experiences with men, women, old, young, children, etc. Yeah, the tall girlies on Reddit are talking about how people and strangers have made passive-aggressive comments to them, called them rude names, gave them mean looks, etc. So these are just some examples of aggressive behaviors towards tall women.
[00:05:42] And I've spoken about this in another episode where I discussed how people and adults even may have higher expectations of younger tall people or tall children. Because they're often seen as or perceived as older because of their height. Because usually, taller people are older, you know? I mean, I guess that is pretty straightforward, yeah. So they may be given more responsibility for their age. Or they may be expected to act more mature.
[00:06:10] Or do more things that, you know, older adults would do. Or even receive harsher criticism. Now, why is this the case? Why do some people act more aggressively towards tall women? Why are they expected to handle struggles and aggression more easily? Or aggressive behavior more easily? This is kind of where we go into the strong stereotype. It seems like there are people who treat tall women a bit harsher because height is often viewed as masculine.
[00:06:36] So to them, the taller you are or the more height you have, the more you should be able to handle. Now let's hear more about this height equaling masculinity type of experience. The first time I was ever called manly or masculine was when I was 10 years old. One time I went to the movies with my dad and my mom and an uncle. And then we went to get Chinese food. And I had an uncle tell me, Wow, Aisha, you're just like your dad. You look just like a man. I was 10.
[00:07:07] I have never in my life been called a man. I had never in my life been told something so unwarranted by someone that I was supposed to be inspired by or look up to. And I still remember how it made me feel when he told me that. I remember bursting out into tears, crying. And my mom talked to him. My mom talked to him and he eventually apologized. And now that I'm older, I make social media content.
[00:07:35] I've gone viral on Twitter, Instagram, TikTok, YouTube. And I have been the subject of so much transphobia. So much masculinization of tall women, black women. I have had death threats. I have had disgusting things said about me and my femininity. And if I was a girl or a guy. And so many things that honestly at this point I've developed dissociative amnesia to forget the things that have been said to me. In order to just feel okay as I am now.
[00:08:04] But height gets associated with power. So in a society that views height as masculine, dominant, and authoritative. When a woman is tall it kind of disrupts people's idea of what femininity is supposed to look like. Because you know women are quote unquote supposed to be feminine. But tall is masculine. So it's like huh? Like what's going on here? So because we're tall people just automatically assume we're strong. That's the association.
[00:08:29] So because of that we are in their eyes supposed to be able to deal with more struggles. And more harsh hardship and more harshness even. We should be able to handle quote unquote criticism or rude names. Or just brush things off. We're expected to be able to handle more. To lead even. Etc. So it really isn't necessarily. I mean it could be. But it's not always necessarily about being tall.
[00:08:55] It's just about what being tall or height represents to other people. And how they think we should behave because of it. Leading to them not necessarily caring about our feelings. And listen nobody's really obligated to care about our feelings. I mean you kind of expect loved ones, closer ones to you, friends, family, significant others to care about your feelings. But strangers they're not really obligated to. But I mean I feel like as a human being in general in society.
[00:09:24] There's like slight expectation to a certain degree to have some type of respect for a person. I did run a poll over on Instagram. And I'm gonna do just a quick little plug here. Make sure you follow me on Instagram at a tall girls podcast. So you can participate in these polls. And have your opinions heard on these episodes. But I did run a poll asking you guys. Do you think people treat tall women more harshly because of their height? And I will say the answers, the responses or whatever.
[00:09:53] It was like I wouldn't say super duper even. But it was pretty close. 40% of you guys said yes. 27% of you guys said not really. And 33% said maybe every once in a while. So um but obviously the most being yes or every once in a while. So I mean that just goes to show that stuff like this does actually happen. Like some of us actually feel this way. And some of us tall women have actually experienced this.
[00:10:21] So I found it very interesting that it was pretty mixed. But for the most part tall women feel as though we're treated harshly because of our height. Whether it's from time to time or often or whatever it may be. But in their minds it's kind of like oh if I say this or or do this to them or give them a rude look or whatever. They'll be fine. They can brush it off. They can handle it. Because height is associated with being strong. Being masculine. Being able to handle harder things.
[00:10:50] And while we're talking about comments and rude names and stuff. Now as a tall person in general when people act rudely towards you. Or call you mean names. Or give you backhanded comments. What's your response? Like what's your go-to ultimate comeback? Let me know because I'm trying to take notes. Now I kind of want to go back to the man thing that the lady was talking about earlier. When she said that a lot of the aggression and the aggressive behaviors and the rudeness comes a lot from men.
[00:11:20] Or male co-workers or just males in general. Listen I'm not hating on men. I know this is not all men. Okay I'm just throwing that out there. I'm not hating on men. But there's another layer to this. As to why people treat tall. Why some people I should say. Treat tall women the way that they do. And with that I mean in an aggressive manner and so forth. And that is insecurity. As we know height is seen as masculine. So when a woman is let's say around a man. And that woman is around their height.
[00:11:50] Or at the same height as them. Or even taller. They're like a woman? Taller than me? The same height as me? More masculine maybe? She looks more masculine because she's taller than me? Or maybe they feel like oh this woman may have a sense of power over me because she's taller? And by the way these are insecure men. But they may not know how to process that. They may not know how to name that feeling. Or why they even feel that way. They may not even know how to seek help for it.
[00:12:19] So they take it out on the person that makes them feel that way. The people that makes it feel that way. And in that case that's tall women. Instead of admitting to themselves or maybe to other people about their insecurity or uncomfortability. They feel the need to lash out and act aggressively towards them. A. To maybe make that tall woman feel less than. So they feel like oh I put fear in this person's heart. And that makes them feel better. Or to make it seem as though oh they're tough. They're bigger. They're better.
[00:12:49] They're stronger. Either way it's kind of like a sick twisted way of making them feel better about their height or themselves. And or making the other person the tall woman feel less than. So that they can kind of I don't want to say kind of get a kick out of that. But okay if I feel bad about myself I'm going to make that tall woman feel bad about herself. Yeah essentially that. They'd rather try to scare us or make us feel uncomfortable. Or make us feel as though there's something wrong with our height. Listen to this clip really quickly.
[00:13:20] I'm six feet tall so I know I'm tall for anyone but like particularly for a girl. Today while I'm out on a walk this man comes out taps me on the shoulder. And goes I just want to let you know I think you're too tall. Would you like me to slouch? Would that make you feel like less emasculated? Do you want me to walk on my knees? Like what would make you feel comfortable? Like as if I'm walking around here not knowing that I'm tall. Like I woke up one day I'm like the ground's really far away. I just don't get what it is with people in height. Like no one would ever come up to you and be like wow your hair is really brown.
[00:13:50] Men. I did want to pull over on Instagram asking you guys do you think some men feel threatened by your height? A whopping 90% of people said oh yeah I've noticed that. And only 10% said hmm not really. 90% okay I did expect it to be a high number because a lot of the tall women that follow me on social media are in fact over six feet are probably over like 6'1", 6'2". They're like 6'2", 6'3", 6'4".
[00:14:19] There's even one woman who's 6'8 who actually hit me up to respond to this survey or poll and she said it's not a tall girl problem if weak men feel threatened. And you know that's basically the entire point. They feel threatened because of their insecurity. That doesn't mean that they have every right to lash out at us or act aggressively towards us or be rude to us and so forth and so on but it does go to show that hey like there
[00:14:48] are some men out there who feel threatened because we're around their height because we're taller maybe and then this kind of serves as to why they act the way they do towards us. They shouldn't though. You should treat everybody with respect I will say that but you know the poll speaks for itself. 90% of you guys feel like some men feel threatened because of our height. So very interesting. Tall women deserve respect without being viewed as or called intimidating.
[00:15:17] To be seen as beautiful without being sexualized. To just exist without being made to feel as though our height is a problem. Because it's not. Our height is not a problem. Other people's insecurities and society's views and stereotypes are the problem. Okay? Our height shouldn't affect the way other people treat us. Our actions should. And our feelings most definitely should not be dismissed. Okay? We may be tall but we got feelings too. We are human beings you know. We have emotions and we should be treated as women.
[00:15:46] As any other woman would be treated. Of course with respect and all of that. Anyways thank you so so much for tuning in. I really appreciate it and I appreciate you. Of course as always feel free to hit me up on my socials at a tall girls podcast. And let me know what you thought about this episode. Do you agree that this strong stereotype kind of plays a role into how people treat us? How people see us? How people talk to us and all of that? I'm genuinely curious. And I thought that it was very interesting to explore this topic a little bit more. Because I don't think I don't know.
[00:16:14] I don't know if this is necessarily like a stereotype. The strong stereotype. But I mean I've heard it with like the strong black woman for example. And yes I definitely do think that race and skin color and etc. Does play a part in that. But I also do think that height plays a part into it too. Because as I said before height equals masculinity. So I want to know do you think that height plays a part in the strong stereotype?
[00:16:40] Do you think that height plays a part in why some people may feel the need to lash out at us? Or disrespect us? Or be rude to us? Or even act aggressively towards us? I want to know. And if you have any experiences of course. Feel free to share in the comments where you're tuning into this episode. Or even just shoot me a DM on my socials. Going to be linked in the description. I'm up for a conversation. I love talking to you guys. Of course when it's respectful and within reason.
[00:17:09] But if you want to feel free to hit me up and let me know. And until then I'll catch y'all in the next one. Good night and goodbye.