IF ALL WOMEN SHRUNK…

[Tinkerbell’s Bf]

If all females shrunk to 5 inches tall, what would you personally do and what do you imagine society would be like?

[Prof Sai]

I'd be very angry and frustrated about not being able to do anything. And I might die of thirst before anyone found me.

[HHunter1]

Gah, the world would be in chaos.
If it was sudden the untold of deaths from drivers, caretakers, etc suddenly not able to reach the things they needed. The poor women suddenly underfoot to men uncertain what was happening. Then there would be the women in rooms, houses, and apartments that starve because someone didn't go check on them in time. The women outside that would be victims of nature. Really this is nightmarish.

Or over time. The need to find them shelter and care. The replacing them in jobs. The financial strain on society. The logistic issues. The rush to provide clothes, furniture, and more. Would there be the political sway to pull that all off when many can't agree who should and shouldn't get help now?

Yeah, I think I'll stick to the fantasy of one to a few at a time.

HH1

[Tinkerbell’s Bf]

Could be fun for a little bit though lol

A couple of naked women shrunken out of their clothes I could give a new home to

[DocRick]

Gah, the world would be in chaos.
If it was sudden the untold of deaths from drivers, caretakers, etc suddenly not able to reach the things they needed. The poor women suddenly underfoot to men uncertain what was happening. Then there would be the women in rooms, houses, and apartments that starve because someone didn't go check on them in time. The women outside that would be victims of nature. Really this is nightmarish.

Or over time. The need to find them shelter and care. The replacing them in jobs. The financial strain on society. The logistic issues. The rush to provide clothes, furniture, and more. Would there be the political sway to pull that all off when many can't agree who should and shouldn't get help now?

Yeah, I think I'll stick to the fantasy of one to a few at a time.

HH1

You forgot reproduction. Mankind would be extinct in 50 years at the most. And more importantly, WHO would make my sandwich ?!?!?!

[HHunter1]

I didn't think about reproduction to cover the immediate ideas that came to mind. But as for making sandwiches, I'm sure a group of 5 inch women could easily work together to make them for you. So, no more babies but you could still have sandwiches. So not all bad.

HH1

[DocRick]

I didn't think about reproduction to cover the immediate ideas that came to mind. But as for making sandwiches, I'm sure a group of 5 inch women could easily work together to make them for you. So, no more babies but you could still have sandwiches. So not all bad.

HH1

Having one woman in my life is difficult enough. When I tried having multiple relationships at the same time, I nearly went mad. I really don't know how cultures that permit multiple wives do it.

[HHunter1]

Depending on their new status they might be considered pets and not wives. Course that might be like owning a large grouping of cats.

HH1

[Dr.Minimizer]

We could probably think of ways to use science to get more babies (think artificial insemination). However...now take it one step further. What happens then?

If whatever it was that shrank every woman to 5 inches tall only works on women (including only female babies) then a tiny woman who gestated a male baby would be in big trouble. (sorry, couldn't resist that one.) So, for obvious reasons, the doctors doing the inseminating better make damn sure there only X chromosomes in those sperm cells. I'm sure this is a hurdle science could overcome, BUT it limits humanity to artificial reproduction forever unless either (a) a way to enlarge women is found or (b) a way to shrink men is discovered, in order to even out the sizes.

Now, how about the other theory: the shrinking was instantaneous and now everything proceeds normally, so that if a tiny woman has a male baby, he too is tiny. If this happened...well, in a few generations there would be no big people left, only tiny ones. So the giant men in that world better get started building infrastructure for the new, 10% scaled society to follow, or the forthcoming tiny civilization will have to contend with a natural world far in excess of what it's used to.

[DocRick]

Now, how about the other theory: the shrinking was instantaneous and now everything proceeds normally, so that if a tiny woman has a male baby, he too is tiny. If this happened...well, in a few generations there would be no big people left, only tiny ones. So the giant men in that world better get started building infrastructure for the new, 10% scaled society to follow, or the forthcoming tiny civilization will have to contend with a natural world far in excess of what it's used to.

Yeah, I didn't consider that part. There has to be a few hundred million pregnant females at any given moment. Miniature cities, walled or domed, would have to be constructed while the still normal sized men are left.

[waffs]

As far as "what would society look like" - who exactly is getting shrunk? People with XX chromosomes, people without Y chromosomes, people with or without various bits of anatomy, people who think of themselves as women... the list of things someone might mean by 'woman' is almost endless, and that's before getting into the questions of how people who are various kinds of genderqueer would navigate their identities after the incident.

I'm sure this is a hurdle science could overcome, BUT it limits humanity to artificial reproduction forever unless either (a) a way to enlarge women is found or (b) a way to shrink men is discovered, in order to even out the sizes.

I mean, speaking of hurdles science could overcome, there's no shortage of science fiction that chooses (c) artificial wombs or other ways to gestate a fetus externally.

[DocRick]

As far as "what would society look like" - who exactly is getting shrunk? People with XX chromosomes, people without Y chromosomes, people with or without various bits of anatomy, people who think of themselves as women... the list of things someone might mean by 'woman' is almost endless, and that's before getting into the questions of how people who are various kinds of genderqueer would navigate their identities after the incident.

I'm sure this is a hurdle science could overcome, BUT it limits humanity to artificial reproduction forever unless either (a) a way to enlarge women is found or (b) a way to shrink men is discovered, in order to even out the sizes.

I mean, speaking of hurdles science could overcome, there's no shortage of science fiction that chooses (c) artificial wombs or other ways to gestate a fetus externally.

If you want to keep it simple and look at science fiction/fantasy from a purely scientific aspect (science as we know now at this time), I would say the biological at conception chromosomes difference would determine who shrinks. In this scenario, something in the Y that is not present in the X chromosome would prevent the shrinking or something missing in the XY that is present in the XX chromosomes allows the shrinkage. I'm not getting into the rare chromosome configurations that results in a person with both sex organs, incomplete or no sex organs such as Klinefelter or Turner syndrome because it would clutter up the story with unnecessary details. This would give me too much of a headache and fantasy is for fun, not stress. But, hey, this is fantasy so it could be whatever the writer wants it to be.

[Josh the Cyborg]

Yeah, things like what has been Mentioned here are why if I fantasized about this Scenario I would always Set in Space Age so like it only happened to Earth or Women on a Fully Colonized World, the Earth Scenario Often Ended with either Mars figuring out how to Prevent it in the Women and Send them Over to Help Fix Earth or Mars being Infected... as a Mental Exorsize this is a Nightmare, which is why I either used such a Copout or Ignore the Realistic side of the Scenario.
Speaking of in the Pure Fantas side of the idea I always used the Excuse of the Perfect Clones but the Caveot Being that no matter how Genes were spliced together to Create a New Human they did not have Viable DNA Samples from Long before all the Women Shrank...(though in that Scenario. Either the Women out Clone the Men or Vice Versa and the Utilitarians would eventually Start Disposing of the Unnecessary Genetic Material, there is no way to Logical think about this without Involving the Evil that is Eugenics. Anyway back to the Pure Fantasy Side.).
Probably Start a Collection and or Dollhouse Appartment Complex.

[eddiegiantman]

Reminds me of the Sky Turned Pink story.

[Tinkerbell’s Bf]

I would seek out a bunch of female celebrities, my female friends and other tiny girls and women are have them live in my house and create a protective colony in my house where I’d feed, bathe, and care for them

[I am Nobody]

If all of them were to shrink it would be an extinction level event. A better scenario is a sickness or magical fog were to shrink only say 15% of healthy women and girls in every country. There would be a lot of missing person reports for sure, and a lot of pissed off men and boys wondering where their moms, wives, girlfriends, daughters and granddaughters went.

[DocRick]

If all of them were to shrink it would be an extinction level event. A better scenario is a sickness or magical fog were to shrink only say 15% of healthy women and girls in every country. There would be a lot of missing person reports for sure, and a lot of pissed off men and boys wondering where their moms, wives, girlfriends, daughters and granddaughters went.

Women with certain genotypes were the ones affected........genotypes of women from Sweden or Scandanavia.

[I am Nobody]

Hell yes! Germans, Swedes, Russians, polish women, Scottish, Irish, American women of those heritages. Crap, my daughters fall into that category. On second thought.

[I am Nobody]

A bunch of tiny women that look like Chloe Grace Moritz, Sadie Sink, or Reese Witherspoon. I can live with that.

[Rapsta09]

Oh I love the sound of this I guess I get have my boss hahaha
But would they get registered or would it be a free for all?

[Raso719]

So I actually had a story idea a while back where, like, the UN forcibly dissolved North Korea and due to the extreme brainwashing and fact that poor nutrition, limited livable area and chemicals had reduced the entire female population to an average height of 3'6" that these North Korean women are basically sold off as as pets... I mean the public story is they were sent to live on foster services to be rehabilitated but that's not what happened.

Anyway the story would have focused on a pair of sisters, each closer to the 3' range, who were kept by a wealth man and his trophy wife as toys.... I was never really certain if I wanted them to shrink more or not....

The idea of a NWO shrinking event is pretty exciting. I know When the Peaches Fell was a story on here I was very invested in. There have also been some stories where it's just normal for women to shrink. I recall one I read back on a Yahoo group where women shrank to different sizes due to their fertility cycle. This story was named after the numerical classification of the specific type of condition where the women shrinking down microscopic when they become fertile. I've never been able to find it since.....

[Prof Sai]

In terms of story potential, if you make the shrinking an extinction level event, I'd think that would kill all the fun of the premise. Also, starving North Korean women seems "too real" for an audience looking for escapism.

Having men and women shrinking to all different sizes has more potential. And added cuteness because cute.

Maybe the shrinking that seems like a curse is secretly a blessing: If only honest and honorable people shrink, and mostly to 4 ft or so, then the littles will be able to trust each other and work together in ways that the bigs can't.

[Raso719]

Yeah I ditched that story idea s long time ago when I realized how problematic it was. Their was an article suggesting the women of NK were shrinking due to nutritional and ober crowding and that and average height would be around 4 feet in a few decades.
Probably propagandist bullshit in retrospect. Really obviously so in fact.

[DocRick]

I watched a documentary about an island in the South Pacific where they found humanoid skeletons, the largest being around 3 feet tall. Though the race died out before evolving to a homosapiens type being, the scientists surmised that without any predators or enemies on the island, and a diet limited in protein, the race never had to get any bigger. Had they survived, they may have evolved into 3 to 4 foot tall humans. Also, 500 years ago, the average height of a human male was around 5 feet tall. Diet is supposed to have an affect on why we are much taller now. On a trip to England, we saw an actual suit of armor that would have fit my ex, who is 5'-3".

[Prof Sai]

Yeah I ditched that story idea s long time ago when I realized how problematic it was. Their was an article suggesting the women of NK were shrinking due to nutritional and ober crowding and that and average height would be around 4 feet in a few decades.
Probably propagandist bullshit in retrospect. Really obviously so in fact.

I agree. It's not really "shrinking" if the women were born that way and have never been taller. It is just sort of grim and sad.