Height And Metabolism (And Why It’s Good To Be Short, Maybe)
Damn, it’s already time for some more DYK?1DYK is sexually-suggestive shorthand for “Did You Know”.
Insatiable, aren’t we?!?!
It’s good for you that I like slinging this DYK as much as you apparently like receiving it!
*ahem*
As we know from reading my brilliant article about what the metabolism is, our basal metabolic rate (BMR) is a measure of how much energy the body needs to perform its basic metabolic functions and processes. Easier said, BMR is the amount of calories needed to keep you alive were you in a coma from watching the latest entry in the Alien series.2Like, really, how awful has that franchise become!!!
As we know from reading that article about what the metabolism is, taller people have a higher BMR than shorter people of the same weight.
And as we know from reading that article about what the metabolism is, larger individuals burn more calories than not so large individuals because they have more skin surface area, meaning they have more cells that need energy. And energy is what, folks? Yup, calories from food that the body burns as fuel!
But you know all of this because you read that article that I’ve mentioned a shitload of times already.
Now, because larger individuals include tall people, that means they burn more calories than shorter people.
So thanks to the relationship between height and metabolism, tall people have yet another upper hand over more diminutive folks.
Yes, another upper hand in addition to our ability to reach the top shelf without someone having to pick us up, as well as our being perceived as having more leadership material, power, strength, and intelligence, making us more professionally and socially desired.
Long live height supremacy!!!
*ahem*
With all of that said, did you know that while tall people burn more calories by simply existing as tall people, short people of equal weight burn more calories while actually doing stuff, like walking?
As superior as us tall folks are over our fellow not so tall folks, we should restrain ourselves from rounding them up in concentration camps…
…at least not on the grounds of calorie burning.
Why do we have to come up with a better justification for our grand plan?
Ummmmmmmm…because of the inconvenient fact that moving the identical amount of body mass across an identical distance will result in differing expenditures of energy.
Care to know what accounts for the difference?
Of course you do!
In a study published in the Journal of Experimental Biology, the pencil-neck dweeb Peter Weyand of Southern Methodist University and his fellow pencil-neck colleagues found that while everyone burns almost the same amount of calories per step regardless of height, walking has a higher energetic cost for short people than tall people because the vertically-challenged require more steps to cover the same ground as a result of their short, stubby legs.
Yup, when going from the same point A to point B, pocket-sized folks have to take more steps than their altitudinous brethren, which results in those short fucks using more energy, or burning more calories, than their towering counterparts.
Sure, people like you can’t reach the kitchen counter without a step stool and taller people like me kneel down to talk to you face-to-face, but at least you have that going for you that you can burn more calories walking at a time in history when people hardly walk anywhere.
As if that weren’t enough, lifting weights and packing on muscle is easier for short people because their smaller limbs means that they have to bench press, squat, curl, whatever, a much shorter distance than tall lifters.
As if that weren’t enough, 5 lbs of muscle is much more noticeable on a short person than someone who’s a few inches taller. That person would have to gain about double that amount of weight, which would require them having to eat more food and spend more time and energy in the gym.
Damn, who knew being short had so many advantages!
So I guess you know what to do the next time someone tells you to be the bigger person after having your physical condition made fun of for an entire post, right?
Yup, tell them to shove it…
…with me then telling you to kiss my ass, even though you wouldn’t be able to because I’m allllllllllll the waaaaaaayyyyyyy up here and you’re allllllllllll the waaaaaaayyyyyyy down there!