Growing Pains

Friday night, I caught a segment of 20/20 dealing with teens who struggle with their height. From my own (continued) experience, I can sympathize with the overall dilemma. But, also from my own (continued) experience, I cannot support the way in which the two teens decided to deal with their situation. My lack of support comes partly because of the reasons provided by both the teens and their parents.

[Kaitlyn Christopherson] said the hardest part of being short is just feeling odd. "Feeling like you're different, like you're weird. You know, I want to be normal. I want what everybody else wants."[1]

[Ryan Hersch's] dad, Danny, says he fears Ryan might never grow past 5 feet. "Certain opportunities won't come his way. Out in the business world, dating girls."

To a (very small) degree, I can relate best to Kaitlyn's comments because that was my experience throughout high school. I had so many nicknames for my height that I honestly lost count. But here's the twofold deal:

1. that's just high school--and/or middle school. (Pre-)Teenage kids are simply vicious when it comes to acceptance and rejection. It's more of an exertion of assumed power and authority rather than statements of actual fact.
   
2. if Kaitlyn "feels" different or weird, then that's her choice. She can choose to ignore it, she can choose to stay away from people who make fun of her, she can choose to overcome the criticism[2], etc. But she didn't choose any of these options. She took the choice that only solved one problem: her height.

The problem that remained unsolved by Kaitlyn manifests itself in the struggles of Ryan. As before, (social) acceptance in the (pre-)teenage years is a troubling issue. What strikes me as odd is that the mentality of discriminatory acts by the "mean" kids are deemed ridiculous and childish. These mean kids just need to "grow up" and stop treating other kids the way they do. Yet, this same mentality apparently exists in the business world, which is ostensibly run by adults who have "grown up" and/or "grown out" of their childish ridiculousness.

The reporter covering this particular story responded to the comment made by Ryan's dad (noted above) in this way:

Studies show that tall men and women earn more money: A 6-foot-tall man earns on average almost $5,000 more than someone 5 feet 6 inches. In fact, each inch adds an average of almost $800 a year.[3]

He goes on to provide the following illustration:

Height even matters in elections. Twenty-one of the last 26 presidential elections were won by the taller candidate. President Bush was an exception, but even he's 6 feet tall. Bill Clinton was much taller than Bob Dole. The first President Bush was much taller than Michael Dukakis. Reagan, Nixon, and Eisenhower were all taller than their opponents. William McKinley in 1896 was the last president who was shorter than average.

The real problem is not that someone appears to be short. The problem is how people in society treat people who appear to be short. And, with respect to Kaitlyn and Ryan, this real problem is so seemingly insurmountable that the only solution is to inject a drug whose long-term effects are completely unknown. In fact, Ryan's mom was uncertain about whether or not the drug would cause cancer or affect his ability to have children. But, apparently, these concerns were secondary to Ryan's being picked on because of his height.

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[1] On a slightly ironic note, see a Good Morning America story, found here.
[2] See this story, which highlights the decision to overcome the social obstacles instead of trying to alter the physical ones.
[3] This quote comes from another site covering the same story, found here. This take on the story (thankfully) provides a good perspective to the whole dilemma (found at the end of p.3 and the start of p.4); though, it seemed to be included only as a side-note.