QuoteReplyTopic: How far is too far for hair? Posted: April 16 2005 at 9:30am
Ladies,
A friend of mine recently had a full head of indian temple hair
installed and swears that she now has nightmares of a small indian
girl buried in a forest. This got me thinking ..
My question is, does anyone think that there are lines
regarding the whole Hair extesnion game that should not be
crossed?
Many Jewish women are adviced not to wear temple hair as it is hair
given as part of a religious ceremony.
Is hair given as part of an offering to God acceptable to use for
extensions?
Do you think that in poorer parts of the worl women are being
harmed/killed for their hair?
I've bought so much human hair in my lifetime and through it away
after only one wear ... I'm sure I am the reason demand in human
hair has increased.
What do you ladies think?
Syren123
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Those are questions that can only be answered by an individual - no right or wrong answers here. It depends on your belief system and world view, don'tcha think?
First of all, there's some misinformation about temple hair and I don't know where it came from. It's not the hair that is the offering to the gods; it's the act of cutting the hair that's the gift, not the hair itself. The hair is considered waste once it's cut - even by the women whose hair it was. The temples sell the hair to support themselves - there are some very elaborate ones and some that offer services to the poor, etc. that are funded by sales of hair. If there weren't a world hair market, they'd just dispose of it like they have for 1000 years.
Funny about your friend having nighmares with her new hair in - that used to happen to me years ago, as well as weird 'flashes' about other people - hard to explain. I always thought it had to do with having another person's hair attached to my head, but that's just me.
My advice is not to make yourself wrong about hair you have or had. If you don't want to wear hh as a personal stand against exploitation of women in the world, go ahead. But corruption and the exploitation of women is normal behaviour in the 3rd world and it will continue regardless of our stand on human hair. To use it or not is more a personal thing.
And that concludes my soapbox performance for today.
Kalika
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"A friend of mine recently had a full head of indian temple hair installed and swears that she now has nightmares of a small indian girl buried in a forest."
I think your friends a nut.
delin
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I wear synthetic hair and I have nightmares involving plastic milk containers. Just kiddin'. I'm not belittleing your friend; actually, there have been studies done on people who've had organ transplants and then developed characteristics of the individuals who were the donors.
I don't think it's fair to call her a nut. She was really having very bad
nighmares which only stopped when she took out the hair. It may
have been in her mind and nothing to do with the hair ... but the
dreams were really effecting her.
My bad ... next time I'll just stick to hair application topics
I think this is a perfectly appropriate topic. We've discussed the
ethics of human hair many times before. You may be interested in
reading Sara's perspective on human hair (I'll paste it below). I can't
say I've had any bad dreams about using human hair, or anything like
what your friend is describing, but wearing human hair does bother me
for several reasons. This is not to judge anyone who uses HH at all,
because God knows, I've bought and worn enough of it myself. But from
the very first time I wore it, I did find it somewhat troubling.
First off, I doubt that women are actually killed or physically harmed
for their hair (although I don't know this for sure, of course). I
actually think that most extensions hair on the market is collected
from women's brushes, not cut in ponytails, and regarding the Indian
hair, I've heard both POVs: that the women realize it is being used to
support the temples, and that they don't (unfortunately, I don't know
enough about the culture to even guess). Now, where the rest of the
hair comes from, I have no idea, but I wouldn't be suprised if hair
being collected from Siberia or the Ukraine is, in fact, coming from
prisoners. Of course, this represents a very small fraction of the hair
on the market.
In general though, I do think the human-hair trade is super-sleazy, and
I feel better not supporting it. I wore HH for about two years, and
beyond all the problems I had with the actual hair--inconsistency,
price, lack of longevity and quality, etc.--the way the industry
functions bothers me. On the most fundamental level, there's no
regulation when it comes to hair, so vendors can, and do, make every
conceivable claim that their hair is Remy, or unprocessed, or
full-cuticle, etc. It makes it so hard to separate the quality products
from the crap. You really have no idea where the hair comes from or how
it was collected because there's no one regulating the trade.
And beyond all that, yeah, as a White American woman, I'm bothered by
the whole idea of buying hair from the Third World. Of course, many,
many of the products I--and most of us--buy are steeped in the same
kind of exploitation, and you'd have to be a very vigilant consumer to
only buy products that are made under fair work conditions, etc. But
somehow, when it's someone's actual hair you're wearing, the gross
disparities of wealth in the world really hit home. Some would argue
that these women are making money off their hair, and we do them more
good than harm by at least supporting the industry, which is a
reasonable perspective, too. Unfortunately, I'm doubting these women
get paid much for it; it's the middlemen who are making the real money.
I'd actually feel better if you could buy direct from people, although
that's totally impractical.
I'm rambling here. But like Syren said, I think it's a personal choice,
and there really are no "right" or "wrong" answers. All you can do is
try to research (which is hard when it comes to hair collection) and
make the choice you're most comfortable with.
:)
[From PlastikHaar] "I work exclusively with synthetic hair, because of ethical reasons! There are many facts and ideologies to underline this. I wrote my diploma work about hair and therefore I’m quite knowledgeable about our hair, its meaning and the stories it tells us. 60 cm of real hair lives about 10 years around and with a person. Hair is always with us. Even years later it is still possible to tell how we felt, what we consumed (drugs) and a lot of other biological facts are also still visible. Apart from that it plays a significant role in black and white magic and in the voodoo cult. Genuine hair is available in various qualities, which can be divided into different regions,
European and various Asian hair. Unfortunately trade with genuine hair
is often unfair, you never know where it comes from. There are rumours that it is stolen from temples where it was used as a sacrificial offering. Sometimes it comes from prisons and war camps, sometimes even from dead people. Hair is a dead material, dead human horn, like our fingernails. I would like to make people aware of the fact that wearing genuine hair from other people means to adorn oneself with borrowed plumes, as well as wearing somebody else’s memories. I support synthetic hair ! No it is not real and you may see this. Hair is a personal thing and not a second hand product.
I for one wear Human hair at the moment. Why? Because it is all I know. I am willing to try the synth but I will let you know how that goes when I receive it. For me, I have hard hair to match and I have found that the natural Indian Hair fits my hair to a "T". What I hate though is how expensive it is (which is wrong because these temples and such are getting the hair for free). I also hate ordering human hair and not knowing what shape is it going to be in. Is it going to be soft? No Split ends? Will it tangle? It's enough to drive a girl crazy. I am so hoping that the synth works out because at least I know what to expect.
Kalika
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may not be FAIR to call her a nut but you asked what we thought right?
Hair is dead cells. It would be like wearing someone elses clipped off fingernails. If your friend was having nightmares it was cause she was thinking about it too much. I used to waitress and my pens would always get stolen which would irritate me, which would make me dream about...pens. that sucked.
"It may have been in her mind and nothing to do with the hair" - sounds like you hit the nail on the head.
Edited by Kalika
Syren123
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I don't think it's fair to call her a nut. She was really having very bad
nighmares which only stopped when she took out the hair. It may
have been in her mind and nothing to do with the hair ... but the
dreams were really effecting her.
My bad ... next time I'll just stick to hair application topics
Angelfruit, don't feel badly about this! I for one really appreciated this post. Other people were just trying to be funny...I don't think any harm was meant. It's interesting to read people's reactions - tells you alot about them, really, which I think is interesting.
Anywho, thanks for the post. It was really brave of you!!
AfroPuffs
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I think it's a personal thing. It doesn't bother me to wear human hair on my head but I can understand how this would affect someone. It's all psychological and certain things affect certain people. I, for one can't get a decent night's sleep when I leave my closet door open. I have all kinds of nightmares and I'll literally have to close my closet door in the middle of the night if it's open. So to each his own.
Angelfruit
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I think when people get extensions they always have it at the back of their mind that it was someone else's hair and probably coz your friends found out more about the hair's history then thats why its prob playing on her mind. Its an interesting thought though Angelfruit.
I think when people get extensions they always have it at the back of their mind that it was someone else's hair and probably coz your friends found out more about the hair's history then thats why its prob playing on her mind. Its an interesting thought though Angelfruit.
when i wear human hair, i really don't mind where it comes from at all, as long as it is nice hair! Maybe that's just me though, after all the processes it has gone through, anything that was on it before to make it someone elses has gone..
i'll rephrase that i meant "some people" not all. The thought has never occured to me personally but sometime my new customers (that have never had extensions before) often refer to this. Maybe angelfruits friend is like one of they customers chick
mtolady
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the mind/psyche is really quite a strange thing....too bad we don't have an owner's manual!!
i know there are certain topics for which i cannot discuss, like animal
abuse, Nazi war camps, and most horror movies. My mind will just
run like wildfire on those ideas...it's awful.
Dreams are strange things too....i know when i was pregnant with both
my kids, i would have HORRIBLE dreams that i was drowning. I mean
like i would be looking up through the water at the surface, knowing it
was a couple feet to reach air...and i couldn't get there. My
husband at the time didn't much care for these dreams, as he'd have to
wake me up as i gasped for air. My guess is the baby was
positioned where i couldn't get a full breath while
sleeping....personally, i just know i DO NOT WANT TO DROWN if i die by
accident!
I am seriously looking into synth hair b/c of the cost....it would be
nice if PH and those were available in the States...anyone wanna buy up
a bunch and go into biz??? hint hint
has someone been swimming in the shallow end of the gene pool again?
luzminerva4u
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It was very brave of you to bring up your friends experiance. Really interesting too. Everypersons body, mind and physical chemical make up works different. If the dreams did come from the hair... if that exact same hair was put on someone else that person may not have had the nightmares because they are not equpiped to handle such experiances, while others are more sensitive to the unexplainable. I hope she feels better now.
That's the difference between me and the rest of the world! Hapiness isn't good enough for me! I demand euphoria!
Syren123
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It was very brave of you to bring up your friends experiance. Really interesting too. Everypersons body, mind and physical chemical make up works different. If the dreams did come from the hair... if that exact same hair was put on someone else that person may not have had the nightmares because they are not equpiped to handle such experiances, while others are more sensitive to the unexplainable. I hope she feels better now.
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