Many thanks to Mariah for this essay, and to Kara for posting it here. Footnote 1 alone was astounding. We really, really need to stop tampering with healthy biological development. It continues to be remarkable to me how many people cannot grasp this simple idea.
Hi Susan, Thanks so much. I found that research to be remarkable too, but wasn't sure about including it in a footnote, but now I'm glad I did. And heck yes, we need to stop giving healthy children medications and surgeries.
Thank you for telling your story, Mariah. What a damning record for patriarchy: Men must be strong, women weak, and there must be no exceptions and no overlap. I’m so glad you found your way around the rules, despite the odds.
Hi Lauren, How nice to hear. Thank you! Yes, I'm glad I found my way around those rules too - and even my body resisted, apparently. BTW my mother was a very strong, outspoken feminist - and an athlete herself, and we were close. Much of what I know about strength I learned from her. I didn't want to dilute the story with that context, but somehow your note gave me permission to (also) lift up and praise my dear mom.
Thanks, Ann! Yes: seems to often be sexism and homophobia masquerading as liberation. Strangely, the logic gets twisted, with trans advocates claiming to be the ones discarding sex role stereotypes - and some do, especially those who embrace an androgynous approach to behavior or dress -- but they lose me when they claim that such behavior or appearance magically transforms them into the other sex, or neither sex, or both -- and when they claim that behavior, appearance, or "identity" should grant them access to women's spaces and sports.
There will always be some doctors (and parents) who confuse the possible with the appropriate.
I'm glad the author has forgiven her mother. One thing the book demonstrates is how unable anyone is to predict the future: the mothers worried about their tall daughters not finding a husband couldn't not have possibly predicted how much the women's movement would change society.
Hi George, Ooh, how interesting to learn about that book. Thanks for sharing. It's about short boys too, I notice, and it reminds me that in college I teamed up with a short male dormmate and co-authored a research paper about how tall girls and short boys navigate sex-role stereotypes. (For that same great psych professor, the late Sandra Bem.) Overall, the tall girls felt freer to deviate from sex-role stereotypes, as I recall, and had higher self-confidence and self-esteem Anyway, yes, good point - no one can predict the future, and we sure do worry about the wrong things.
I read "Normal At Any Cost" a few months ago. The parallels with what's going on in gender "care" are striking. Tall girls given oestrogen to force them to start puberty in the hope it would stop them growing and short boys given puberty blockers to give more time for growth all based on poor evidence with drug companies making millions. Even John Money is mentioned in the book at one point.
Hi Barri, Interesting. I have not read it, but yes, it does seem to be based on the same philosophy: that drastic, human-engineering measures should be considered or taken if girls and boys do not fit sex-role stereotypes. In the process of studying gender ideology, I had that aha moment: Hey, come to think of it, I too was given "gender-affirming" hormones! Hence the article. Thanks for the comment.
Great article about some of the weird things that can happen if you are a girl in a tall family.
I'm also from a tall family and can relate to some of the items discussed.
Going against the grain a bit, however, not all tall people end up being athletes. My daughter is 5 foot 10 inches. She likes weightlifting as a hobby, but is not all that interested in competitive athletics.
Today, it is not all that uncommon for tall women to date or marry people who are slightly shorter or the same height, so I think that traditional stigma against being tall as a woman is more or less almost disappeared.
Professionally, I have found that being taller as a woman (5 foot 8) is a bit of an advantage.
My mother was 5 foot 9 and was a teenager in the 1950s. My maternal grandmother was also tall (5 foot 9). I think there was a bit of social stigma for them, but overall, I don't think it had a significant impact on their ability to socialize or form meaningful relationships.
In my own experience, having to deal with people who had trouble with me being taller helped me realize that you can't worry too much about what other people think. It helped me be more independent and able to ignore the trivialities that many people engage in.
I find the current gender role stereotyping of the trans movement to be an extraordinary regression to the most extreme forms of gender role stereotyping. For instance, why do most trans people who want to present as being a woman choose to have blond hair?
Hi Marnie, Great to hear from you. Thanks for sharing some of your story. I do feel camaraderie with other tall women -- though if I knew you, I'd probably tease you that you don't make the cutoff -- just joking!
(My wife is five-five and I DO tease her about "just making the cutoff.")
Might not sound hilarious, but humor is an effective coping strategy.
Anyway, woo hoo, I'm glad to hear things are improving nowadays, long after Mom told me she'd suffered as "the tallest person on the high school dance floor, male or female!" I especially love that you learned "you can't worry too much about what other people think." I have a thick skin too - being an outspoken feminist and basketball player helped me develop that skill -- but yes, good point, it's related to height, too. I'm used to be stared at, and asked how tall I am, and how I got to be so tall (?!), and more, and I noticed early on that it doesn't matter one whit.
As for your Mom, and her experience of being tall, it was definitely there in the 50s and even the 60s to comment negatively on a woman being tall. I get it that mothers worry for their daughters and don't want them to have to deal with social stigma. Still, I think that worrying about height is misplaced. I did worry for my daughter to some degree, but made up my mind to not dwell on this and instead remind her of the advantages of being tall. Frankly, there are real advantages, athletically and otherwise.
So glad to hear about your experience. Agree that in terms of personality, being able to adopt a persona that incorporates both "masculine" and "feminine" traits is the healthiest and most rewarding.
There have always been tall women. Julia Child, the chef and spy, was your height.
Hi Marnie, Good for you! And yes, I do get it about mothers worrying about and wanting what's best for their daughters. My mom also conveyed lots of "tall pride," and lessons on posture, which I absorbed as well. Yup, Julia Child and Geena Davis, Michelle Obama, Janet Reno... plus lots of great basketball players. We tall women need to stick together! :-)
How very telling. Thank you for this fresh perspective. I have also read about girls being told by the various people pushing transition that they will grow taller if they block their puberty and take testosterone. And as so many of our female beauty icons, models not least, are taller than average, I think this is also behind the radical rise in girls being conned into 'transitioning.'
Hi Terf vibes, Thank YOU for your kind comments about my work.
Interesting report and theory. I had not heard that.
What rings most true to me for the ROGD adolescent girls is that they're not so eager to become men (or attempt that); they're just "opting out of womanhood" (or trying to) because it looks and feels so unappealing, what with the lewd comments about their developing bodies, the obvious sexist system that's restrictive and scary, etc.
Explains some of the nonbinary phenomenon. No, we're not confused about being men - but we don't want to be women either. Can't recall where I first read that - maybe Abigail Shrier's excellent book, Irreversible Damage; probably also in Helen Joyce's excellent book, Trans.
Yes, I wish I could recall where I heard about this strategy of telling gender 'confused' girls that by suppressing their puberty (menstruation) and then taking testosterone they will grow taller, but when I did read it, as a short woman I could immediately see its potential power to persuade young girls down that path, possibly especially lesbian girls, many of whom do aspire to appear more masculine and men are generally taller. Whether the facts are true about the effects on growth is a different matter. I hope they are not true.
A hold your seats a moment - I read years ago that it was not uncommon in Sweden to give tall girls estrogen to halt growth. There is an epiphyseal “plate” near the end of long bones which grows and elongate long bones, and solidifies when the body has high estrogen levels. Girls grow earlier than boys but estrogen levels rise faster than in boys. In boys, estrogen sufficient for solidification doesn’t occur until there is substantial testosterone (which “aromatises” (converts) to estrogen; high steroid use by bodybuilders paradoxically creates very high testosterone levels, and breast tissue called “bitch tits”. In boys, steroid use literally stunts them via steroid-derived estrogen shutting down their growth plates.) Whew! The only approved use of puberty blockers is in pre-teens which have started puberty and would be extremely short if their body produced high estrogen too early.
Boys who were castrated to be singers in the 18th and 19th century grew extraordinarily tall because there was almost no testosterone (adrenal glands only) to become estrogen to suppress growth.
Girls who take testosterone will still have plenty of estrogen; their bodies convert excess testosterone to estrogen which regulates growth. Estrogen also controls bone mineralization. Shutting down all estrogen ruins growing bones. It also shuts down developing sexual neural structures. They will not become sexually responsive.
Boys who take estrogen will be stunted, same logic. They will not grown to natural height. If their testosterone is shut down they will not develop any sexually mature neural structures, which activate with testosterone.
The only way to control the side-effects or testosterone is with aromatisé inhibitors, but now you’re in the world of shutting down the entire endocrine structure of a child and replacing it with something totally synthetic, not knowing what the required levels are to grow and function.
Wow, that was quite an exposition on hormones. (Have you read T: The Hormone That Dominates and Divides Us, by Carole Hooven? Excellent book and really interesting author, BTW - at least for lay ppl. Sounds like you already know all of that.)
Anyway, thanks for that comment. I only knew a small portion of it. But yes, that's my understanding re: the plates at the end of the long bones fusing. And yes re: bones and estrogen: that's why estrogen-suppressed girls who think they're boys or want to be boys or want to be "nonbinary" or whatever are developing osteoporosis while still in their teens. Horror indeed.
You also touched on a couple of hormonal effects that I had to consider when recently evaluating, for the sake of this article, what happened to me. I looked up the side effects of estrogen when given in situations like mine. Turns out there's a long list of side effects (of course - since all drugs have side effects.) I happen to have some of those conditions now, at 67, but they were likely triggered by other factors (genetics, aging, random chance, etc) since I was only "treated" for a short time. Or so I choose to believe, since there's no way to know.
Carole Hoovers book is superb! I do recommend it. I read everything and have a good memory, and can see connections most people are unaware of.
Aristotle wrote about it 1500 BCE “ All animals, if operated on when they are young, become bigger and better looking than their unmutilated fellows; … As a general rule, mutilated animals grow to a greater length than the unmutilated.” - animals include humans.
Males castrated before puberty tend to develop severe “kyphosis” or spine curvature which is mainly only known in women with severe osteoporosis. It’s entirely avoidable now in women, but diagnosis in men who have has hormones manipulated is problematic.
Manipulation of hormone levels in girls and women is a late 20-th century phenomenon and there is little medical
Data. For men, data on castrati and eunuchs goes back some time.
If you’re curious you can read about the Skoptzy in Russia, which believed that Christ would come when there were 144,000 men castrated.
My gut feeling is that you would suffer no lifelong term ill side effects from amplifying normal estrogen levels in a developing girl. It’s the suppression that causes issues.
Thanks for the read!
And I meant to write “paradoxical state of high estrogen in bodybuilders causing breast tissue growth”, not high testosterone.
OMG, I just read about Skoptsy on Wikipedia - complete w photos. You are a font of interesting info. Meanwhile, speaking of eunuchs, just saw a mention on Twitter that eunuch is now included in the long list of "gender identities." Alas.
Sylvia Plath once said she married Ted Hughes because he was the only man she fell in love with who was taller than she was. (There were other reasons, but that one was significant enough to her to mention it in her journal.)
Hi Eleganta, Yes. Did not know that about Sylvia, but seems to me that was the general expectation - that "of course" women "had to" marry taller men, and that men "had to" marry shorter women. Looking around at the general public, it looks to me as if it's still largely true. Of course, men are on average taller, so it's hard to tell what's going on. But seems very rare to me to see a woman who's more than an inch or two taller than her male partner. I love it when I do.
Many thanks to Mariah for this essay, and to Kara for posting it here. Footnote 1 alone was astounding. We really, really need to stop tampering with healthy biological development. It continues to be remarkable to me how many people cannot grasp this simple idea.
Hi Susan, Thanks so much. I found that research to be remarkable too, but wasn't sure about including it in a footnote, but now I'm glad I did. And heck yes, we need to stop giving healthy children medications and surgeries.
Thank you for telling your story, Mariah. What a damning record for patriarchy: Men must be strong, women weak, and there must be no exceptions and no overlap. I’m so glad you found your way around the rules, despite the odds.
Hi Lauren, How nice to hear. Thank you! Yes, I'm glad I found my way around those rules too - and even my body resisted, apparently. BTW my mother was a very strong, outspoken feminist - and an athlete herself, and we were close. Much of what I know about strength I learned from her. I didn't want to dilute the story with that context, but somehow your note gave me permission to (also) lift up and praise my dear mom.
Excellent. Without sexism and homophobia, without stultifying sex roles and stereotypes, the trans phenomenon wouldn’t even exist.
Thanks, Ann! Yes: seems to often be sexism and homophobia masquerading as liberation. Strangely, the logic gets twisted, with trans advocates claiming to be the ones discarding sex role stereotypes - and some do, especially those who embrace an androgynous approach to behavior or dress -- but they lose me when they claim that such behavior or appearance magically transforms them into the other sex, or neither sex, or both -- and when they claim that behavior, appearance, or "identity" should grant them access to women's spaces and sports.
There's an entire book about this earlier medical scandal https://www.amazon.com/Normal-Any-Cost-Industrys-toManipulate/dp/1585426830?ref=d6k_applink_bb_dls&dplnkId=f1f5a59c-0320-4418-aa48-ac0f56c45e23, it's fascinating.
There will always be some doctors (and parents) who confuse the possible with the appropriate.
I'm glad the author has forgiven her mother. One thing the book demonstrates is how unable anyone is to predict the future: the mothers worried about their tall daughters not finding a husband couldn't not have possibly predicted how much the women's movement would change society.
So often we worry about the wrong thing...
Hi George, Ooh, how interesting to learn about that book. Thanks for sharing. It's about short boys too, I notice, and it reminds me that in college I teamed up with a short male dormmate and co-authored a research paper about how tall girls and short boys navigate sex-role stereotypes. (For that same great psych professor, the late Sandra Bem.) Overall, the tall girls felt freer to deviate from sex-role stereotypes, as I recall, and had higher self-confidence and self-esteem Anyway, yes, good point - no one can predict the future, and we sure do worry about the wrong things.
I read "Normal At Any Cost" a few months ago. The parallels with what's going on in gender "care" are striking. Tall girls given oestrogen to force them to start puberty in the hope it would stop them growing and short boys given puberty blockers to give more time for growth all based on poor evidence with drug companies making millions. Even John Money is mentioned in the book at one point.
Hi Barri, Interesting. I have not read it, but yes, it does seem to be based on the same philosophy: that drastic, human-engineering measures should be considered or taken if girls and boys do not fit sex-role stereotypes. In the process of studying gender ideology, I had that aha moment: Hey, come to think of it, I too was given "gender-affirming" hormones! Hence the article. Thanks for the comment.
Great article about some of the weird things that can happen if you are a girl in a tall family.
I'm also from a tall family and can relate to some of the items discussed.
Going against the grain a bit, however, not all tall people end up being athletes. My daughter is 5 foot 10 inches. She likes weightlifting as a hobby, but is not all that interested in competitive athletics.
Today, it is not all that uncommon for tall women to date or marry people who are slightly shorter or the same height, so I think that traditional stigma against being tall as a woman is more or less almost disappeared.
Professionally, I have found that being taller as a woman (5 foot 8) is a bit of an advantage.
My mother was 5 foot 9 and was a teenager in the 1950s. My maternal grandmother was also tall (5 foot 9). I think there was a bit of social stigma for them, but overall, I don't think it had a significant impact on their ability to socialize or form meaningful relationships.
In my own experience, having to deal with people who had trouble with me being taller helped me realize that you can't worry too much about what other people think. It helped me be more independent and able to ignore the trivialities that many people engage in.
I find the current gender role stereotyping of the trans movement to be an extraordinary regression to the most extreme forms of gender role stereotyping. For instance, why do most trans people who want to present as being a woman choose to have blond hair?
Hi Marnie, Great to hear from you. Thanks for sharing some of your story. I do feel camaraderie with other tall women -- though if I knew you, I'd probably tease you that you don't make the cutoff -- just joking!
(My wife is five-five and I DO tease her about "just making the cutoff.")
Might not sound hilarious, but humor is an effective coping strategy.
Anyway, woo hoo, I'm glad to hear things are improving nowadays, long after Mom told me she'd suffered as "the tallest person on the high school dance floor, male or female!" I especially love that you learned "you can't worry too much about what other people think." I have a thick skin too - being an outspoken feminist and basketball player helped me develop that skill -- but yes, good point, it's related to height, too. I'm used to be stared at, and asked how tall I am, and how I got to be so tall (?!), and more, and I noticed early on that it doesn't matter one whit.
Thanks Mariah.
As for your Mom, and her experience of being tall, it was definitely there in the 50s and even the 60s to comment negatively on a woman being tall. I get it that mothers worry for their daughters and don't want them to have to deal with social stigma. Still, I think that worrying about height is misplaced. I did worry for my daughter to some degree, but made up my mind to not dwell on this and instead remind her of the advantages of being tall. Frankly, there are real advantages, athletically and otherwise.
So glad to hear about your experience. Agree that in terms of personality, being able to adopt a persona that incorporates both "masculine" and "feminine" traits is the healthiest and most rewarding.
There have always been tall women. Julia Child, the chef and spy, was your height.
I looked up your website. Looks interesting!
Hi Marnie, Good for you! And yes, I do get it about mothers worrying about and wanting what's best for their daughters. My mom also conveyed lots of "tall pride," and lessons on posture, which I absorbed as well. Yup, Julia Child and Geena Davis, Michelle Obama, Janet Reno... plus lots of great basketball players. We tall women need to stick together! :-)
How very telling. Thank you for this fresh perspective. I have also read about girls being told by the various people pushing transition that they will grow taller if they block their puberty and take testosterone. And as so many of our female beauty icons, models not least, are taller than average, I think this is also behind the radical rise in girls being conned into 'transitioning.'
Hi Terf vibes, Thank YOU for your kind comments about my work.
Interesting report and theory. I had not heard that.
What rings most true to me for the ROGD adolescent girls is that they're not so eager to become men (or attempt that); they're just "opting out of womanhood" (or trying to) because it looks and feels so unappealing, what with the lewd comments about their developing bodies, the obvious sexist system that's restrictive and scary, etc.
Explains some of the nonbinary phenomenon. No, we're not confused about being men - but we don't want to be women either. Can't recall where I first read that - maybe Abigail Shrier's excellent book, Irreversible Damage; probably also in Helen Joyce's excellent book, Trans.
Yes, I wish I could recall where I heard about this strategy of telling gender 'confused' girls that by suppressing their puberty (menstruation) and then taking testosterone they will grow taller, but when I did read it, as a short woman I could immediately see its potential power to persuade young girls down that path, possibly especially lesbian girls, many of whom do aspire to appear more masculine and men are generally taller. Whether the facts are true about the effects on growth is a different matter. I hope they are not true.
A hold your seats a moment - I read years ago that it was not uncommon in Sweden to give tall girls estrogen to halt growth. There is an epiphyseal “plate” near the end of long bones which grows and elongate long bones, and solidifies when the body has high estrogen levels. Girls grow earlier than boys but estrogen levels rise faster than in boys. In boys, estrogen sufficient for solidification doesn’t occur until there is substantial testosterone (which “aromatises” (converts) to estrogen; high steroid use by bodybuilders paradoxically creates very high testosterone levels, and breast tissue called “bitch tits”. In boys, steroid use literally stunts them via steroid-derived estrogen shutting down their growth plates.) Whew! The only approved use of puberty blockers is in pre-teens which have started puberty and would be extremely short if their body produced high estrogen too early.
Boys who were castrated to be singers in the 18th and 19th century grew extraordinarily tall because there was almost no testosterone (adrenal glands only) to become estrogen to suppress growth.
Girls who take testosterone will still have plenty of estrogen; their bodies convert excess testosterone to estrogen which regulates growth. Estrogen also controls bone mineralization. Shutting down all estrogen ruins growing bones. It also shuts down developing sexual neural structures. They will not become sexually responsive.
Boys who take estrogen will be stunted, same logic. They will not grown to natural height. If their testosterone is shut down they will not develop any sexually mature neural structures, which activate with testosterone.
The only way to control the side-effects or testosterone is with aromatisé inhibitors, but now you’re in the world of shutting down the entire endocrine structure of a child and replacing it with something totally synthetic, not knowing what the required levels are to grow and function.
Experimental is polite word for this horror.
Hi Sufeitzy,
Wow, that was quite an exposition on hormones. (Have you read T: The Hormone That Dominates and Divides Us, by Carole Hooven? Excellent book and really interesting author, BTW - at least for lay ppl. Sounds like you already know all of that.)
Anyway, thanks for that comment. I only knew a small portion of it. But yes, that's my understanding re: the plates at the end of the long bones fusing. And yes re: bones and estrogen: that's why estrogen-suppressed girls who think they're boys or want to be boys or want to be "nonbinary" or whatever are developing osteoporosis while still in their teens. Horror indeed.
You also touched on a couple of hormonal effects that I had to consider when recently evaluating, for the sake of this article, what happened to me. I looked up the side effects of estrogen when given in situations like mine. Turns out there's a long list of side effects (of course - since all drugs have side effects.) I happen to have some of those conditions now, at 67, but they were likely triggered by other factors (genetics, aging, random chance, etc) since I was only "treated" for a short time. Or so I choose to believe, since there's no way to know.
Carole Hoovers book is superb! I do recommend it. I read everything and have a good memory, and can see connections most people are unaware of.
Aristotle wrote about it 1500 BCE “ All animals, if operated on when they are young, become bigger and better looking than their unmutilated fellows; … As a general rule, mutilated animals grow to a greater length than the unmutilated.” - animals include humans.
Males castrated before puberty tend to develop severe “kyphosis” or spine curvature which is mainly only known in women with severe osteoporosis. It’s entirely avoidable now in women, but diagnosis in men who have has hormones manipulated is problematic.
Manipulation of hormone levels in girls and women is a late 20-th century phenomenon and there is little medical
Data. For men, data on castrati and eunuchs goes back some time.
If you’re curious you can read about the Skoptzy in Russia, which believed that Christ would come when there were 144,000 men castrated.
My gut feeling is that you would suffer no lifelong term ill side effects from amplifying normal estrogen levels in a developing girl. It’s the suppression that causes issues.
Thanks for the read!
And I meant to write “paradoxical state of high estrogen in bodybuilders causing breast tissue growth”, not high testosterone.
OMG, I just read about Skoptsy on Wikipedia - complete w photos. You are a font of interesting info. Meanwhile, speaking of eunuchs, just saw a mention on Twitter that eunuch is now included in the long list of "gender identities." Alas.
Sylvia Plath once said she married Ted Hughes because he was the only man she fell in love with who was taller than she was. (There were other reasons, but that one was significant enough to her to mention it in her journal.)
Hi Eleganta, Yes. Did not know that about Sylvia, but seems to me that was the general expectation - that "of course" women "had to" marry taller men, and that men "had to" marry shorter women. Looking around at the general public, it looks to me as if it's still largely true. Of course, men are on average taller, so it's hard to tell what's going on. But seems very rare to me to see a woman who's more than an inch or two taller than her male partner. I love it when I do.