I am not one to bother the hairdresser much. Apart from a brief and exciting foray into pixie cuts as I turned 40, I have had the same longish, straightish hair all my life, and since I have also been a runner and cyclist all my life it’s usually tied back (that photo is just an attempt to hide what I can). I understand what people mean by a “bad hair day” but it’s not part of my experience, not because I have “good hair days” but because I rarely think about my hair at all. It’s not that I think it’s silly or trivial to care about hair – I care about clothes and shoes – it’s just not my thing.
All the same, I am not Rapunzel and sometimes I want a haircut. To be more precise, sometimes I will pay a reasonable sum for someone reasonably competent to cut a few centimetres off the ends in a reasonably straight line. I cut my own fringe when it starts to annoy me. I do not need another person to wash my hair, or blow dry it – I hate the noise and don’t own a hairdryer myself – or to comb it or put “products” on it. I very much do not want a head massage. I do not like to pay strangers to touch me. I recognise that hairdressing is a craft involving real skill and training, but to apply those skills and training to my hair is like having a Michelin-starred chef boil an egg for a small child who is more interested in the toast.
My friend, not a hairdresser but an amateur dressmaker perfectly competent with a pair of scissors, used to cut my hair, but like many of the best of us she’s gone to Australia. I asked my husband if he’d do it and he said he would if I really wanted but given the choice he’d rather not be responsible for the consequences, which seemed like a sensible answer after 25 years together.
So I looked up some local salons. I’m all in favour of fair pay and a living wage, but north of 50 quid for a job that used to take my friend all of five minutes dwarfs a writer’s hourly rate. I phoned a couple of places and tried to explain what I wanted. Be that as it may, they said, the rates for “ladies’ cuts” were the ones advertised. Right, I said, and what about gents’ cuts, could I maybe have one of those, what would they involve? Gents, obviously, was the answer, and it was apparently clear from my name and voice that I did not qualify, regardless of actual hairdressing requirements.
The prize for everyday sexism on the high street goes to hairdressing salons
Every piece of clothing I buy is matched by a parting: one in, one out. It focuses the mind
Jewellery might not always leave us with a clear conscience but it’s fun, and pleasure is not trivial
People trying to sell diets enrage me on good days. On bad days I feel inadequate
While in general I am in no way reluctant to be a pain in the backside in defence of feminism, the circumstances under which a person sounding English should be a pain in Irish backsides are very limited. They exclude trying to argue about gender politics with whichever poor young thing is answering the phone at the hairdresser today. I have worked in retail and I know how much it is possible to hate the customer. Still, I wondered afterwards, is there perhaps a non-binary haircut available, a price based on the service required rather than the customer’s gender? After all, the men I know have much more demanding haircuts than the one I want. Is there really a basis in law for charging women more than men regardless of what is requested and supplied, and on what basis does a hairdresser decide who is a Lady and who is a Gent?
I used to think toyshops were the most sexist, heteronormative places in town and possibly in the country. The flagship stores in London and Dublin used to have pink floors (fairy princess dresses, miniature kitchens, rather sadly all the arts and crafts supplies) and blue floors (superhero costumes, miniature weapons, rather sadly all the construction materials). Baby clothes used to advertise the infant’s gender, anxiously seeing off any confusion in the months before haircuts and shoes could do the job. There’s still a bit of that around – tiny pink T-shirts with butterflies and ice creams or camouflage with pictures of speeding cars and cartoon violence – but these days I’d say the prize for sexism on the high street goes to the salon. Can it be legal?
