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After my divorce, I dove into the hetero online dating community and discovered that many men lie about their height in their online profile. This is more common among men because many women do in fact want a taller man. Similarly, men and women both often lie about their age in order to help their profile sneak around age filters used by others.

But the lying about height is pathetic and always backfires, often spectacularly, because the women can tell immediately when the guy shows up three or four inches shorter. So at that stage the problem is lying, not height, and it makes for a very awkward date if the date even continues.




> But the lying about height is pathetic and always backfires, often spectacularly, because the women can tell immediately when the guy shows up three or four inches shorter.

Most men show up 1 or 2 inches shorter. Even tall men.[1]

[1] https://www.gwern.net/docs/psychology/okcupid/thebigliespeop...


If an otherwise great guy, lies to get through your height filter and you go on a date and its great because you get along well. Is then the problem that he lied or his height? If the problem is that he lied, then consider his alternative: never tempting his luck and never getting to know you.


Why is it pathetic? Men have a smaller pool to date from unless they get out of the filter bubble. They're wagering they can still win despite the physical statistic.

It might create noise on the other end, but they are heavily incentivized to lie.


I've never used a dating app, but I can only imagine all the women showing up with measuring tapes and the men wearing inconspicuous platform shoes.




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