High heels were invented by a woman who had been kissed on the forehead.

Morley’s quip turns a fashion item into a comic theory of social psychology. The “kissed on the forehead” image implies condescension or a patronizing kind of affection—treating a woman as childlike or physically “below” the kisser. High heels, in this joking logic, become a symbolic countermeasure: a way to gain height, command attention, and renegotiate power in intimate and public encounters. The line also plays on the idea that style can be a response to social slights, converting a small humiliation into self-assertion. As with much epigrammatic humor, it is less a factual claim than a satirical insight about gender dynamics and the motives we project onto fashion.