A Maltese man who is described in the newspapers as ‘short’ finds himself at the centre of a storm of controversy as to whether short people should be described on television as disabled.

I am flummoxed. I can see that a person who is, say, four foot nine (and before anyone pounces on me for disparaging small people, my maternal grandmother was about that height, though she more than compensated with her personality) would be at a serious disadvantage in the Swedish hinterland, where short people start at five foot nine. But surely even that doesn’t make for classification as ‘disabled’.

There is something else that flummoxes me. On an island of really short people where putting on weight means that you end up as wide as you are tall, how do you define shortness in relation to – well – more shortness? In Malta, how short is short?

I know that the general Maltese definition of short is different to what it is elsewhere because when I describe my youngest sister, for example, as “the small one” (I can do so here because she is away today and doesn’t read newspapers on the internet when London is so much fun), people say “Oh, she’s not small! She’s just not as tall as you are.”

Given that the difference in height is of seven inches at least, that should make me a ruddy giant. But here’s the thing: I’m not even tall. I’m pretty average on a pan-European scale, and when I go north, I’m short. Yet back home, when I am out and about in the sorts of shoes that most women enjoy wearing and of which I feel so deprived, I find that people back off at parties and adopt the sort of body language that tells me they’re feeling threatened. So I spend my life in flip-flops and tennis-shoes whereas most Maltese women consider high heels to be part of their body and are never seen in public without them, and that tends to make things worse because when I do put on some high heels for parties, the impression received by familiars is that I have shot up overnight while everyone else has stayed the same. And so I get remarks like, “What happened? You’re looking very tall today”, to which I am tempted to reply, “Yes, it’s all those growth hormones I’ve been taking, and has nothing to do with my decision to leave the flip-flops at home for once.”

So in Malta, where a man of five feet five is described as tall, and a woman who is five feet or thereabouts is not short but just like everyone else, exactly what constitutes short? I am at pains to discover, but the newspapers are being very discreet about it all. My curiosity was piqued further when an association which campaigns for the rights of the disabled weighed in with comments that “dwarfs” should not be classified as disabled people. My first thought on the matter was: since when does this association regard ‘disabled’ as an insult or a pejorative term? I thought its purpose was to persuade us of the opposite.

My second thought was: is this man a dwarf or is he just short even by Maltese standards (which would make him – what? – four foot seven?). Dwarfs are not short people. They are people with a congenital condition that affects their entire physical being, including their facial features and their limbs. Extreme shortness is one aspect of dwarfism, but it is not the defining aspect.

The man himself has not helped matters by describing his stature as “not the same height as everyone else”. Well, I’m not the same height as everyone else, either, and nor are you. We’re not the same height as everyone else because everyone else is not the same height, but of varying heights. We can only be the same height as some people. This man, when he was described as “disabled” by the Broadcasting Authority in a complaint to the producers of a show in which he competed with the ‘ugly’ team against the ‘beautiful’ team (the gist of the authority’s argument being that “disabled” people should not be classed as ugly) was extremely offended. He was even more offended when he was described as a dwarf, though we have yet to discover whether he really is one or not).

He said that he volunteered for the ‘ugly team’ and wasn’t shoved into it against his will – obviously, given that he participated in the programme willingly and not at gunpoint – and so the Broadcasting Authority is making a fuss on his behalf for nothing.

The Broadcasting Authority’s chief executive told the press that it had received no complaints from viewers and that it took the initiative in complaining to the producers that “seemed to be saying that because the man is short then he is ugly”. The man himself, who comes across as pretty easy-going, self-assured and in no need of any kind of protection from well-meaning but patronising others, gave his own comments to the newspapers. “I don’t think I’m ugly,” he said. “I just did it to have a laugh with my friends and got lots of positive feedback. I definitely don’t feel disabled. I can do the same things as everyone else. And if I am ugly, it’s not because I’m short.”

The programme’s producer pointed out the essentially farcical nature of the dispute. “What were we supposed to do,” she said, “tell him that he can’t play with the ugly team because people will be offended that he calls himself ugly? Or should we have put him with the beautiful team so as not to upset anyone?”

Ah, that political correctness – it’s a tough one. We might as well go the whole hog and stop describing people as anything at all. One member of the Broadcasting Authority appears to have gone down this road already, saying that the term “disabled” should be replaced with “people with differences”. Oh dear, what thrills lie in store.

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