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Small-Scale Question Sunday for April 23, 2023

Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?

This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.

Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.

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Why do we expect and encourage the unattractive to have relationships? Yes. Disabled and ugly people deserve a shot at happiness. But there's a hell of a lot of suffering and tragedy that goes on there, and it may well be imprudent to bring children into that. If you're a dude who is 5'4" the least-bad outcome you can reasonably expect is marrying a woman twice your weight and watching her wind up in a nursing home age 44 because she sprained her ankle and couldn't take care of herself after that. And it only gets worse from there: I've known short guys who were with women that were child abusers. Serious shit - as in 'attempted murder' serious. It's no better for unattractive women: there's rapists and abusers and shitbags aplenty. Single motherhood isn't nice either.

I honestly don't get it: if you're unattractive as hell, whether that's partially in your control or not, dating and relationships will suck for you unless you are genuinely exceptional. The only short guy I knew that did OK with dating was a neurosurgery resident with enough charisma for a career in politics. The autistic woman I'm friends with - an emergency-medicine resident in California - wound up enduring a couple relationships with predatory, abusive shitbags before finding a decent guy. Shit fucking sucks, and there's a good chance that the best you're going to get is going to be straight up tragic.

  • -15

How is this pint-size family remarkable? It is unusual as hell that these people are so small (I am slightly curious about their ethnicity, and where they are currently living). It is also unusual that they have found average partners. Like...are they all cultivating exceptional personalities starting in elementary school, mentored by their unusually charismatic pint-size parents? Who knows - maybe if these people were magically a foot taller they ought to start running for office and being a political family...honestly. I wonder if any of them are making a living off of being charismatic and really goddamn good at networking.

I would also honestly not be surprised if there was a no-bullshit genetic disorder - a mild one - running in their family. Hypochondroplasia or growth hormone deficiency or something like that.

I also wonder if there are some pint-sized guys in your extended family that are always single, and "focusing on their careers" or something like that...guys that weren't quite able to gain a politician's charisma and skill at networking. Maybe some mediocre-but-competent guys inherited their fathers' or uncles' networks and were able to find partners that way...guys who without that would've been single for life or nurses and purses.