Goal: My final goal is to make a difference in the community and help every individual that lacks self confidence. I want people to change their perception towards others or make early judgements as a lot of times we underestimate the willpower of an individual. Beauty & Geek can go together. Fashion world can include models with brains and geeks can be models. Heightism should not exist and audition doors should not be shut for a person’ not fitting in the height criteria. Through my platform #SayNoToHeightism, I want World level pageants and fashion designers to eradicate heightism from its roots.

#SayNoToHeightism

Over the past 12 years, I worked for several non-profit orgs such as CRY, Hopes & smiles for Children. In the year 2017, I started work on creating my own non profit platform called ‘Say No To Heightism’. I my opinion, Heightism is like Racism. It exists but no one is talking about it. This campaign ‘SayNoToHeightism’ is very close to my heart since I have experienced height discrimination since the age of 16 when I first entered the world of Fashion. I spoke about it on various occasions from 2008 onward but my cause did not gain momentum. I decided to not give up and felt the need to create awareness on a larger scale and with social media in power, I thought to leverage the platform to get more support. Currently, I have a group of 600 like minded individuals who agree that Fashion world needs to remove height eligibility criteria and along with these individuals, I have been interviewing with TV channels & radio stations to bring more light to this issue. Through social media, in 24 hours I was able to reach to 9834 people who liked the hashtag #SayNoToHeightism.

Why am I speaking up on this issue now?
Well actually, I have been speaking about this since the age of 21. During my university days, I started a campaign to cast girls of all shapes, body type and height for State level Fashion competitions. I started discussing about this issue with several designers I worked with and also with other fashion industry folks and I noticed that no one really has a logical answer on ‘Why they have a height restriction in prestigious pageants and fashion weeks’? In some cases, I did get an answer stating, “These are industry standards set”. But when I cross questioned on who set them, no one really knew the answer. An international designer mentioned that he prefers taller and slim models because he has to spend less on their clothing material. But in reality, the target consumer market may be anywhere between a petite size and shorter height individuals to an exceptionally taller body frame. So shouldn’t a designer consider designing clothes that covers the whole spectrum of height range and body type? How would a consumer whose height falls in the average or below average range imagine whether a particular outfit will suit him/her by viewing it on a body type that is not similar to theirs?
One of the major reasons, I am bringing this issue up again is because now with the power of social media, I think we can get answers to some of these questions and may be work towards a solution that allows every talented person to get an equal opportunity. Several shows do not even allow male and female models to audition if they do not meet a certain height requirement thus discouraging talented folks to even apply to showcase their talent.

What is my suggestion?
Since Fashion weeks and beauty pageants inspire people and act as youth icons, it is important for them to stop promoting Heightism and instead have mandatory allotments where 50% spots in shows are reserved for  models that fall in petite and average/ below average height range and remainder 50% are reserved for models above the average height. In my opinion, this will allow a wide spectrum of talent to audition as well as open the doors for female and male models that feel less confident or shy away from auditioning due to being short in height as per the industry standards.

How can you be involved?
I cannot run this campaign alone and I believe our voice is stronger when we speak as a team. So over the last few months, I have been working on expanding this group and have been adding as many petite and short in height female/male models that are interested to run this campaign. I have been fortunate that several international designers and other fashion leaders have joined the group and will actively support me. I have also seen interest from taller models who believe in the fact that models that do not fit the height criteria lose out on opportunities mainly because of height restrictions. Over the next few months, these voices will become the champions to bring the change at higher level.