Unlike the transgendered, short people still look for protection from discrimination in Massachusetts and beyond.

So today, I ran across this article from AOL Jobs, written by Donna Ballman (en employment lawyer) about how there are still legal ways you can be fired based on your appearance.  Believe it or not, you can be fired for being: too attractive, too thin, too fat (unless you are overweight enough to qualify for a disability), too ugly,  too young, improper attire and being too short (although if you are let go for being too short as a female it could fall under the heading of disparate impact, since females are protected under Title VII of the Civil Rights Act).   This never ceases to amaze me, how some groups get protection, while others are still treated unfairly and no recourse is offered.   Here is what Ms. Ballman had to say about short people's plight in the workplace:

Like attractive folks, tall people tend to make more money than short people. Minimum height requirements may have a disparate impact on women, so employers must be very careful in imposing height requirements. If your company tends to equally prefer taller men and women over shorter ones, you may be out of luck. If you're lucky enough to live in Michigan, or the cities of Santa Cruz, Binghamton or San Francisco height discrimination is expressly illegal there. Massachusetts has a similar bill pending in the legislature right now.

The bill in Massachusetts she is referring to is H1758:   http://www.malegislature.gov/Bills/188/House/H1758


Now, the state of Massachusetts has been trying (well Byron Rushing anyway), to get legislation passed to protect the short and overweight for at least ten years.  This bill hardly gets much support obviously from his colleagues there in the liberal, tolerant (or should I say "Tall" erant; meaning tolerance doesn't apply to short people) state of Massachusetts.

Yet, this same state passed a law in 2011 to ban discrimination against people based on them being transgendered or on their gender identity.  Now, even students have to share a bathroom with students of the opposite sex because they identify themselves as being female if they are male or vice versa.  So a male student can walk into a girl's bathroom at school saying that he is really a girl and if the girl objects to his presence, she can face punishment.  So, the Massachusetts Department of Education passes this directive on.  

But apparently, this same state thinks that passing a law to ban height discrimination is more ridiculous than allowing a male into a girls bathroom.   Massachusetts, you're ridiculous!

Two different heights: Two different outcomes

This past week, I am sure many have been inundated with these images of the ex-cop in Los Angeles who went on a killing spree but how many of you are aware that we had someone awarded the Medal of Honor also this past week?

Well, a staff sergeant by the name of Clinton Romesha was given this prestigious and rare award  for his bravery and courage back in 2009 in Afghanistan.  Yes, this man was a hero!  A true one!  Not one who  was glorified because he went on a killing spree in southern California in retaliation for being wronged by the LAPD and taking out innocent people.  If being wronged is justification for going on a violent murder spree, this country will be plunged into a war zone; lawlessness will be the order of the day.   There are many that have been placed in more adverse and unfair circumstances than this ex-cop.   Clinton Romesha was definitely in an adverse situation when he and his fifty fellow soldiers were faced with taking on over thee hundred Taliban members who were surrounding them.  Facing gunfire, grenades and who knows what else, he was able to survive along with some of his battalion;  he was injured after shrapnel was embedded in his body  and still decided that he wasn't going to leave his comrades behind to be killed.    He got them out of there!

All this coming from a man who had been described as "intense, short and wiry."  It is obvious when you take a look at Mr Romesha that he stands at about 5'6" or 5'7".  Not what a heightist, prejudice society would envision as a hero, much less a Medal of Honor recipient.   Yet, they would rather imagine a man of say 6'0"  and above, weighing 270 being the hero.  Well, that was the build of this ex-cop who has since expired.  And, sadly, we see who the media wants to portray as heroic.   No surprise here!

This is Staff Sergeant Romesha receiving his Medal of Honor!!

Of course there is heightism

This recent article is just stating the truth!  Too bad people are dismissive of this issue, as displayed in the comments.

http://www.thecord.ca/?p=14923

If you have the right to do something, does that mean you should do it?

Recently, The Journal News, a newspaper based out of Westchester (Putnam County) in New York, decided that it would publish the names of gun owners in its area.  Yes, they have a legal right to know who is legally carrying a firearm.  However, just because someone has the right to do something, does that mean they should do it?  Of course not!  Now, anyone can go and harass someone at their homes if they don't like them carrying a weapon.  Not only that, it makes targets of homes and their residents of people who don't have protection.  If people want to know who is carrying, I am sure there is a website they can access to find out the information.  A newspaper doesn't need to publish the personal information of these law abiding citizens.  Last time I checked, there are still incidents of identity theft in this country.   

Publishing someone's name and address, after they legally registered their firearm, will probably now deter people from doing just that!   I am guessing that the people who work at The Journal News don't carry weapons and, if they do, perhaps they aren't registered.

Not ashamed of my height, are you?

Here is a post from twitter the other day:

QUEEEN.‏@ChynaSafriah_

Lol this nigga got in his instagram bio '5'5 like that's something a grown man should be advertising 😔

So this woman, like so many others, thinks a short man should be ashamed of his height.  I guess they still don't have enough brains to realize that height is out of our control and that they probably shouldn't be judging people on their appearances when they don't want to be judged on theirs. 

So...I am going to advertise it!!!

Gay slur on Twitter = 50k fine. Short men bashing: acceptable

   Well, the latest story of some groups getting protection on Twitter, while short people continue to get trashed and threatened in the same manner, involves Amare Stoudemire of the New York Knicks.  

   A few days ago, a fan sent Mr Stoudemire a tweet apparently criticizing his play and Mr Stoudemire responded by using some offensive language towards the gay community.  These were direct messages and the fan then revealed the Knick forward's comments.  When the NBA found out about this,  he was fined $50,000.  The NBA has come down hard on comments against members of the gay community;  Kobe Bryant was fined $100,000 for his gay slur.

   However, how many of us have seen similar comments directed at  the short statured and people, I am sure, are anything but vigilant in reprimanding the perpetrators of those hateful comments.  Let's see:  Would you say "Short men should be lynched!" is hateful?  How about "Short people should be stepping stools!",  "I hate short people",  "I will stomp on short men", "Men should spend a year in prison for every inch under 5'9" they are."  "Short men should be illegal."?   The scary thing is, these could be people we work with or even our bosses, friends or family (hiding through anonymity).

  I find it sickening how society is constantly preaching tolerance and equality for all but then turns around and joins in the fun as they engage in their hypocritical hatred of short people! 

North Korea wanted to rid itself of short people

A couple of weeks ago, I stumbled across some rather troubling information involving the treatment of short people in North Korea during Kim Jong Il's tumultuous reign.  While it didn't surprise me, it was and is still disturbing to think about.

A portion of a memoir about Kim Jong Il was included in Foreign Policy Magazine dated September 1st of 2008; a story which was penned by his former tutor Professor Kim Hyun Sik. 

Back in 1989, a few months after the Olympics were held in South Korea in 1988, the government of North Korea had decided to get rid of its "substandard" people.  They moved them out of the capital and even shipped the shorter ones off to uninhabited islands so that they couldn't reproduce and spread their "undesirable" genes. 

Here is a portion of the memoir:

All of which is bad news for those who don't fit into Kim Jong Il's ideal of a healthy, vital citizenry. In the people's paradise that is North Korea, disabled -- even short -- people are considered subhuman. In 1989, Pyongyang hosted the World Festival of Youth and Students. In preparing for the international gathering, the entire nation was encouraged to outdo South Korea's hosting of the Summer Olympic Games the year before. Pyongyang's event had to be bigger and more glamorous. One such method was to purify the revolutionary capital of Pyongyang of disabled people.
Six months before the festival, the government rounded up all disabled residents of Pyongyang and sent them away from the capital to remote villages. The majority were clockmakers, seal engravers, locksmiths, and cobblers who made their living in the city. Overnight, they were forcibly deprived of the lives they had known.
I saw this policy of "purification" up close. I have an old friend who, upon graduation from the Pyongyang University of Medicine, built a career in the state Academy of Medical Science. We were classmates at Heungnam High School and fought together in the Korean War. We were like brothers. One day during May 1989, he visited me at home looking deeply upset.
"What's troubling you? You look very distressed," I said to my friend.
"Well, I'm OK, I guess... but I've done a terrible thing. An abhorrent thing."
"What do you mean? You aren't a bad person."
His eyes welled with tears.
"I have made cripples out of normal, healthy people and sent them away for good," he said. "It is inhumane, what I have done. I shall never be able to hold my head up again."
My friend, a well-connected physician at the time, told me that he had been ordered by the Communist Party to pick out the shortest residents of Pyongyang and South Pyongan province. Against his conscience, he went out to those areas and had local party representatives distribute propaganda pamphlets. They claimed that the state had developed a drug that could raise a person's height and was recruiting people to receive the new treatment. In just two days, thousands gathered to take the new drug.
My friend explained how he picked out the shortest among the large group. He told the crowd that the drug would best take effect when consumed regularly in an environment with clean air. The people willingly, and without the slightest suspicion, hopped aboard two ships -- women in one, men in the other. Separately, they were sent away to different uninhabited islands in an attempt to end their "substandard" genes from repeating in a new generation. Left for dead, none of the people made it back home. They were forced to spend the rest of their lives separated from their families and far from civilization.

A very troubling revelation.  This was a blatant act of genocide! North Korea didn't want short people around so it got rid of them.  Anyone wonder if the United Nations intervened?  Obviously not.

Believe it, many feel this way about us shorter people that we are all "substandard".  If twitter is any indication, they would like nothing more than to have us removed from society.  Yet, they will, at the same time, claim that they are the most tolerant and open minded people to ever exist.