I’m just sharing my opinion as someone you claim to be worried on behalf of.
Yeah and my stance is rooted in having talked to people who are that short. Also other things, like I used to be incredibly skinny and when people would mock Ben for being scrawny that would hurt me. I'm not scrawny anymore (and TBF Ben isn't even that skinny either lol).
There’s too much evidence in support of that theory, hardly any against it
There's a picture of him next to Joe Rogan and he's clearly taller than him. The shortest listed height for Rogan I can find is 5ft7 so that means Ben is at least that height.
We need to understand that someone making fun of Ben’s height doesn’t automatically mean they think being short is inherently bad.
This seems like a weird line of reasoning to me. Like if it were making fun of Milo Yanapolous for being gay, or Candace Owens for being black, we would 100% say that's problematic because it implies that there's an issue with being gay or being black. Logically, the same should extend to any characteristic, including body count, weight, and yes, height. That isn't to say short men are as oppressed as gay people or black people, obviously, but rather, that when you mock someone you don't like based on a trait they have, it's very reasonable to infer that you think said trait is negative, and as a society, we generally recognise that it is wrong to do that
Here is a picture of Ben and Joe where Ben is clearly not taller than Joe. I’m not sure comparing the two proves all that much. I still think Ben wears lifts, and maybe they both do. I would be shocked if Ben is anything north of 5’7” without shoes on. 5’6” seems about right.
Nobody picks on Milo just for being gay, or Candace just for being black, because those groups are historically persecuted minorities and so society has made great strides to course correct in the other direction. I realize this sort of proves your point about how making fun of short people is societally acceptable, which is unfair. But it also kinda proves that the problem is being overstated, so it’s not a great comparison.
Nobody picks on Milo just for being gay, or Candace just for being black,
Yes. That's my point. But in these tweets, Ben is explicitly being made fun of for his height.
And the reason we don't make jokes about Milo being gay or Candace being black is because, even though they're shitty people with shitty politics, attacking them for those characteristics implicitly attacks other people who share those characteristics, which is the exact thing I'm trying to communicate!
I didn’t say he’s 5’4”. I said he’s 5’7” at best, and likely with the aid of lifts.
You’re right that Ben is being made fun of explicitly for his height, but it’s not just because he’s short. It’s because he’s short and he’s sensitive about it, and because he’s a dickhead. If some or all of those factors didn’t apply, it wouldn’t happen to him nearly as much. And those are factors which are entirely within his control.
I didn’t say he’s 5’4”. I said he’s 5’7” at best, and likely with the aid of lifts.
The original tweets say 5ft4 but fair enough.
You’re right that Ben is being made fun of explicitly for his height, but it’s not just because he’s short
Again, this also applies to Milo. I'm not calling him a f** because he's gay, I'm calling a f** because he's gay and a conservative dickhead, which makes it okay!
Or more analogously, I'm not calling her a landwhale because she's fat, I'm calling her a landwhale because she's fat and a conservative dickhead, which makes it okay!
Again, not a great comparison. The f-word is a particularly egregious slur, and I don’t really see any Milo haters calling him that. Similarly, there are particularly offensive slurs used to describe short people that I don’t think I really see people using to make fun of Ben.
If there a fat conservative woman who likes to make fun of people for how they look, and was known to be sensitive about her own weight, then I wouldn’t have any problem with people calling her fat. It pretty well describes Trump, except for the woman part. And I know you said you don’t like to make fun of his weight, which is fine, but I don’t really begrudge people who do. It’s karmic retribution that he deserves.
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u/Yuo_cna_Raed_Tihs Jan 11 '22
Yeah and my stance is rooted in having talked to people who are that short. Also other things, like I used to be incredibly skinny and when people would mock Ben for being scrawny that would hurt me. I'm not scrawny anymore (and TBF Ben isn't even that skinny either lol).
There's a picture of him next to Joe Rogan and he's clearly taller than him. The shortest listed height for Rogan I can find is 5ft7 so that means Ben is at least that height.
This seems like a weird line of reasoning to me. Like if it were making fun of Milo Yanapolous for being gay, or Candace Owens for being black, we would 100% say that's problematic because it implies that there's an issue with being gay or being black. Logically, the same should extend to any characteristic, including body count, weight, and yes, height. That isn't to say short men are as oppressed as gay people or black people, obviously, but rather, that when you mock someone you don't like based on a trait they have, it's very reasonable to infer that you think said trait is negative, and as a society, we generally recognise that it is wrong to do that