People

I’m pushing back on manspreading with a bit of womanspreading of my own

At 5ft 11in, I used to squash myself up against the window of public transport, but now I no longer make myself small

I’m done making myself small on public transport – and everywhere else. Photograph: iStock
I’m done making myself small on public transport – and everywhere else. Photograph: iStock
Niamh O'Reilly
Wed Nov 27 2024 - 06:00

Manspreading – the act of a man sitting, especially on public transport, with his legs spread wide apart, in a way that means that the people next to him have less space.

The Cambridge Dictionary has no corresponding definition for a woman taking up space in this way, but it’s about time they added one because, like many women, I’m sick of making myself feel small or apologising for taking up public space.

I didn’t always feel this way, however. At 5ft 11in, and with the average height of Irish women about 5ft 5in, and 5ft 10in for men, I’ve always been known as “the tall girl”. I’ve always physically stood out and always had my height commented upon. In the past, I’d squash myself up against the window of public transport, while members of the opposite sex happily did some manspreading beside me.

When I was what felt like 900 months pregnant in 2016 with my first child, I remember sitting on public transport unable to close my legs thanks to the crushing weight of an engaged baby’s head in my pelvic floor. Despite my situation, I still managed not to encroach on the seat beside me. Looking back maybe I should have, but up until recently, I’ve never felt comfortable taking up extra space.

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“How’s the air up there? Oh, she’s so tall for her age, isn’t she? The tallest girl in the class is the dimmest girl in the class. Ah, the jolly green giant!”

I’ve heard all the cracks about my height all my life. For boys, tallness made them feel seen, for me it made me want to disappear. For them, height was seen as an asset and something to be admired, they leaned into it and embraced it. For girls like me, tallness was rarely viewed in the same light. It put eyes on me from an early age. Double takes, second glances and endless comments. It was this undeniable thing that made me stand outside the norm. As a small child, I was the antithesis of the other five-year-olds who were called cute and sweet. I was always the tallest girl in the class, the angular, gangly one who didn’t quite physically fit in.

As I got older, and was allowed to take the bus down the town by myself on a Saturday afternoon, the driver used to question my age, asking if I was really 12 and eligible for a child fare or was I having him on? Clothes shopping was a nightmare. Jeans were never made long enough and finding shoes in a size eight or 8½ was often an impossible task. Some brands simply didn’t carry larger than a size seven or if they did, they only had a few pairs that often sold out in seconds or looked so comical in my size that it wasn’t worth wearing them.

“You could be a model or a basketball player,” I’d be told. I was certainly no Michael Jordan and so far outside the criteria for the catwalk, the remark always felt funny. This was the era of “heroin chic” and “nothing tastes as good as skinny feels.” The message was loud and clear. If you were a tall girl, you had to be an all-star athlete or extremely thin and both put extra pressure on how I felt about my body.

I gravitated towards sports. Hockey, trampoline, sprinting, cross-country running, shotput, horse-riding, soccer, netball, swimming. You name it, I played it. Sports became a haven for me and for the first time, offered me the chance to be grateful for my height and less at odds with my own body.

[ How to behave on public transport: Keep your calls short and avoid manspreading ]

There were some other advantages to being tall too. For one thing, I always looked older, which became coveted as I became a teenager. Add in heels, and at times, I’d be pushing 6ft 1in. Getting 18-certificate cinema tickets at age 14, being sent in to see if you could buy some Bacardi Breezer at 16, or maybe even a pack of cigarettes. Being tall became a sometime superpower I could tap into.

Nevertheless, as useful as it was, I still felt uncomfortable taking up space. Growing up in the 1990s, being the tall girl wasn’t the body-positive walk in the park it is now. That movement didn’t fully exist yet and anyone outside the narrow line of perceived perfection was lighted upon. Girls of my generation grew up being told Kate Winslet was fat in Titanic (1997). Nicole Kidman had to wear flats for the best part of a decade because she was taller than her husband Tom Cruise. Magazine covers were littered with women’s cellulite or tummies zoomed in on and commented upon negatively. In 1999, TV Host Chris Evans weighed Victoria Beckham just two months after giving birth to her first child. Instead of anyone objecting, it was viewed as a completely acceptable part of prime-time entertainment.

With that kind of narrative setting the scene for my formative years, it’s no wonder that I and so many women of my generation still have body issues to this day. Twenty years on, it’s a different story. Body diversity is an accepted part of our daily lives. We don’t pass comments on the mannequins that finally have life-size bodies or notice someone who sits outside what was once considered the physical norm. My height is nothing out of the ordinary these days. True, I’ll often get something like “I didn’t think you’d be so tall” when I meet someone in person that I’ve only interacted with on social media, but outside of that it’s a non-issue. Women continue to get taller, and I love to see young girls happily walking with confidence, taking up that space around them.

[ Men are deemed more masculine for taking up more space, women more feminine for taking up less ]

Living in the era of body positivity is welcome, but the one thing that’s healed me the most is motherhood. I often laugh at the irony of that. It’s only now that my body is anything but perfect, full of wobbly pancake skin, lines, scars and marks, do I really feel at ease with it.

These days, I no longer make myself small on public transport or anywhere else for that matter. I push back on manspreading with a bit of “womanspreading” of my own and at the ripe old age of 41, I’ve never felt happier about taking up space; even if I’m no longer “the tallest girl” in the class anymore.

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