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Original poster

Is going grey a feminist statement?

77 replies

MedusaIsHavingABadHairDay · 19/02/2012 01:22

I'm 44 and over the last year my hair has really started to go ..I have a 'mallen streak ' at the front and the top is peppered with random white hairs.
I don't mind and actually rather like my streak (it makes interesting stripes in my long hair)..it feels like the next stage of ME. However the number of comments I have received makes me wonder whether I'm being seen as 'abnormal' for not going down the 'female youth and beauty' norm?

I have had it implied that I should be colouring it for my husband (who is bald on top with a nifty short VERY grey beard that I love!) Other women..colleagues have been the worst. Personally I feel empowered by NOT being a slave to hair dye (I have coloured in the past and it was a drag). I never wear makeup or heels, and happy and confident in my 40s... but somehow allowing my hair to go grey seems to be a taboo subject!

If it IS a statement it's a good one as far as I am concerned Grin but just wondered what others have experienced!

OP posts:
Dustinthewind · 19/02/2012 06:18

I'm grey, got my Mallen streak in my twenties.
The only people that fuss about it and comment about dyes and colouring are female, and usually those that are very focused on their own appearance.
Having been at an all-female boarding school for a few years I am impervious to that kind of conformist pressure.
I don't see it as Feminist, I see it as me being comfortable with my choices despite the pressure from other women to be part of the anti-ageing flock. Because a lot of the women commenting about my grey hair probably feel they are feminists too. They are colleagues, working parents of the children I teach and probably a lot of other silent judges who don't actually say anything (Unless they are on a website)

MitchieInge · 19/02/2012 03:14

I quite like my grey hairs too, apart from anything else I have earned every one of them. I came by them honestly through surviving many stressful things! They were not cheap. And I like what you say about the next stage of ME, I feel stupid for enjoying the changes that come with ageing when all around me is mock and quite real horror.

But everyone always says 'you need to dye your hair' so I just do sometimes. Even though i hate the way it looks and the colour is always wrong. They never say I should wear make up or heels but somehow the grey hair is important enough to comment on.