Why Men Hate Short Hair

"But why did she do it?" a male family friend asked my mum, his face the picture of confusion. "Well, people take her more seriously now," was the rather defensive answer my mother gave in return.

The "it" that they happened to be discussing in detail — and in front of me — was my new haircut.

After weeks of Pinterest curating, I had chopped my almost waist-length hair to a short, blunt bob.

It was a choice that felt innocuous enough, but to those around me it seemed to act as a kind of personal or political statement — and interestingly, most of the comments about it came from men.

Walking into work the day after my trim, I felt confident. I looked cooler, edgier, and more sophisticated.

But after silently surveying me, a male colleague declared: "I prefer long hair on girls."

One man I met told me that he’d scrolled through my Facebook pictures and that I looked more beautiful with long hair.

Male friends and acquaintances pointedly declared that they "just prefer longer-haired women" when the topic came up in conversation.

One upside was that the catcalls in the street dropped significantly, but being constantly asked to justify my decision felt like emotional labor.

As it turns out, I got off lightly. Some women had it way worse...

Before cutting her auburn hair into a pixie cut, 26-year-old Jasmine Ricketts was warned by male friends that it was the most attractive part of her.

Afterwards, she was told she looked like a "weird boy" and called a lesbian by men in the street.

Kailing Fu, a Chinese-Singaporean theatre performer, shaved off her knee-length hair and faced abuse from strangers.

Some put their hands together and bowed at her. Others asked if she had cancer.

**Twenty-five-year-old Eva* was working as a stockbroker when she cut her hair from hip- to bob-length in a bid to be taken more seriously in male-dominated board meetings.**

Instead, male coworkers made lewd jokes and even asked if she had sought her boyfriend’s permission beforehand. "They made it clear that while they preferred long hair, mine wasn’t too bad because it was still 'grabbable,'" she says.

What is it about short hair that riles men?

I decided to find out. Swipe up to read what I discovered, and how I dealt with it all. READ READ

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