The 'lifting stunts growth' claim didn't come out of nowhere. In the 1970s-80s a handful of youth growth-plate injury case reports came out, almost all from unsupervised settings with poor technique attempting single-rep maximal loads. Those anecdotes spread through media and parents, and gradually generalized into 'any kind of resistance training is dangerous'.
The modern evidence paints a different picture. Behringer 2010 in *Pediatrics* pooled 42 studies in a meta-analysis and confirmed that supervised pediatric resistance training reliably builds strength without any signal of elevated injury rate. Faigenbaum 2009, writing the NSCA position statement, emphasized technique-first progressive loading and called such training safe and beneficial for 5-18 year-olds. The AAP 2020 clinical report (Stricker et al.) tightened the language: compliant resistance training should be recommended, not discouraged.
The height question is more direct: adult stature is ~80-90% genetic; the rest is split among nutrition, endocrine factors, sleep, and overall health. Malina 2006 reviewed long-term follow-up data and reached a clear conclusion: supervised resistance training has no measurable negative effect on final adult height.