The struggles of getting a haircut as a non-binary person

@BickerinBrattle I think the woke teens and20-somethings just cannot Be bothered to learn about women’s history and the history of feminism.

So they are hugely disrespectful to the struggles and battles fought FOR them so they can now arse about being non-binary. Because presumably good old lesbianism is just soooo last season.

And who lives in a Scottish city.

Her haircut is exactly the same as the haircut the lesbian daughter of friends of mine has had since she was 15.

You know, many of the women who actually smashed through the sex-divide are still alive: the first woman firefighter, the first woman plumber, the first woman jet pilot, the first woman neurosurgeon, etc etc.

This complaint about the sex-divide and sex-role stereotypes regarding something as easily obtained as a haircut, to use the terms of the woke, erases all the efforts and hardship those women engaged in to smash through very hard barriers in that sex-divide.

Again I ask: has this poet ever heard of the second wave, has she ever read any of their work?

The solution to sex-role stereotypes (ie gender) ISN’T declaring oneself not of either sex (since that is, fundamentally, a lie) — the solution is more and better actual feminism.

tbf, I'd quite like to pay £10 for my haircut (shaved undercut and basic trim, due primarily to menopausal hot flushes) in a barbers instead of 60 quid in a salon. It is a bit sexist and unfair, to 1000s and 1000s of women. Lets fix that first.

Also, there are regularly men getting haircuts in my salon and the barbers I take my boys to have pictures of women getting haircuts in them.

I doubt its that hard to get a haircut in a barbers as a woman if you live anywhere near a big city.

LadyMadderRose
It's interesting about the decision-making. I've always known people like this, who couldn't bear to make a decision because of the losing out on one option, but I think there were fewer of them.

It's a state of mind that'sbeen having the piss taken of it since forever, I reckon. Was it Aesop who told the story of the donkey who starved to death between two piles of hay because it couldn't decide which to choose? and he was 2500 years ago.

I think the word snowflake is overused and sometimes lazily misused - but the video/poem really is the ultimate definition of it. In fact it's more like a satire of snowflakiness, it's so OTT.

Nobody actually cares. The safest thing is this is the battle they have chosen and literally no one gives a shit. Hey what cut you want, where you want. Most salons are unisex- but that's not good enough for the poet snowflake. Gotta find oppression everywhere you can...

I suppose it's fine if the person really is OK with dealing with things like that. But bottling up / denying can also lead to people self-medicating, alcoholism/addiction, depression, or being angry, controlling or violent, or ultimately suicide.

I do think we've swung too far in the other direction so there are now loads people around who can't tolerate the slightest difficulty.

I also think deciding to be "trans" itself is hugely linked to that. Don't feel comfortable in yourself, don't like yourself, hate your body – identifying as something other and special is like a ready-made offer to just stop being the self you got lumped with and have a "whole new you". With being praised (and platformed, even if you have nothing much to say) for being stunning and brave thrown in, and everyone from the medical profession to the media, schools and arts organisations encouraging you. Of course it won't work but it's not surprising people go for it.

stiff upper lip and repressing/bottling up emotions is NOT good for us and it is good that people are better at talking about feelings, etc.

I'm not too sure about this. From the brief discussions we had, my parents had some horrendous experiences during the war eg my father dug young children out from a local school who had died from blast damage. Perfect in every way except dead.

Their generation seemed to take the view "least said, soonest mended". They compartmentalised grief and bad memories and shut the proverbial door on them. However, they both were well adjusted and lived life to the full, without worrying about hairdressers. They cut their own hair!

Pauline at Cuts 'n' Curls might struggle to deviate from a nice bouncy blow wave but there are literally thousands of trendy salons around. They'll do whatever you ask for!

I really hate the trope of using a specific name to identify a group of people who aren't knowledgeable enough or cool enough or clever enough to understand something.

Grace Dent (a woman whose success truly mystifies me) does this. Her restaurant review in yesterday's Guardian features "your Aunt Brenda" who isn't cool enough (unlike Grace) to appreciate a pretentious dish made of offal.

It's interesting about the decision-making. I've always known people like this, who couldn't bear to make a decision because of the losing out on one option, but I think there were fewer of them.

About the robustness - yes, it's a weird thing. My DC school have a big thing about "resilience" and have assemblies telling them all to be resilient, but it isn't going to work if you are generally brought up to believe it's a disaster if you ever experience a negative feeling.

I'd almost call it stoicism except that makes me sound about 250 years old. It's subtle, because stiff upper lip and repressing/bottling up emotions is NOT good for us and it is good that people are better at talking about feelings, etc.

It's more that they often don't have the ability to see that finding something difficult, being upset or having a shit day is part of life. You shouldn't pretend everything's fine and bottle it up, but you could just realise that something like feeling awkward in the hairdressers, or someone offending you by having a different opinion, is not a big deal in the scheme of things. You could even laugh it off.

I feel really sorry for today's youth, even simple decision making seems to be beyond them.

But apparently this woman is 28? I'm only 4 years older than she is. That's weird.

I feel like there's a certain level of, well, robustness that we should be encouraging young people to develop

I was in a yellow wood this morning, and where the path diverged, there was a young man just standing there, dithering. He was wailing because he wanted to take BOTH paths and so he couldn't make up his mind! I couldn't believe it, a fully grown man this was. In my day, we just took a path, even an overgrown one or with broken glass and didn't make a fuss. I feel really sorry for today's youth, even simple decision making seems to be beyond them.

Granted that part of what's going on there is the self absorption of youth, but I feel like there's a certain level of, well, robustness that we should be encouraging young people to develop and that that's not currently happening, which is having all sort of knock on effects.

I was told that this "young person" is actually in her late 20s and having watched it again with the sound off I'd concur. Really think someone of this age should have worked out how to get the haircut she wants by now.

In my considered opinion, the video and contents thereof are a pile of wank. Just get your fucking haircut, love.

IME it's typical of a lot of less professional "spoken word" and slam poetry - basically just slightly stylised oversimplified political complaining, delivered in a smug or shouty way. In fact it's better than a lot of it. Not that that makes it poetry in my book but in those circles it would be considered brilliant.

Thank you FloralBunting

Political polemic pondering is the new poetry

sums it up beautifully, as well as being such precise and perfectly put alliteration.

Political polemic pondering is the new poetry.

If that was intended to be a poem then the poet's writing and performance skills need a lot of work.

It's really not a terribly good poem....

I understand from some on Twitter that this is a poem and should be judged as such, rather than a simple complaint against today's unfriendly society. Today's "I wandered lonely as a cloud etc

With respect to the wisdom of Twitter, if this was just the BBC posting a spoken word poem, then they should be delighted that it has engendered such a thorough examination of the worldview, assumptions, stereotypes, prejudices baked into what the poet gave us, and the language used.

I understand from some on Twitter that this is a poem and should be judged as such, rather than a simple complaint against today's unfriendly society. Today's "I wandered lonely as a cloud etc...."

Oh, we wore our jeans to be Individuals! We did all sorts of things to make them Individual, like fraying round the bottoms of the legs or putting patches where there were no holes or embroidering things onto them (usually flowers or curlicues) or letting triangles of patterned cloth into the seams below the legs -- but the effect was as uniform as all the Individual hair was later. (Blue was difficult and more unusual, wasn't it? I seem to remember people having trouble finding a blue hair-dye that was fast.)

What I meant was that the teens dyed their hair to celebrate being individual (as was told to me by several of my acquaintance) not to be part of a movement to be different from their parents by following a trend. I did put it clumsily though. I will admit.