parental pressure

Since I signed up in December, I have found quite a few posts relating to those whose
parents make them wear their hair a certain way, or at least put a certain ammount of
pressure on them. Here are some examples:

A long thread on the "bloopers" board was started by a girl who had long hair when her
mother (who is divorced from her father and has sole guardianship of her) announced
in the middle of a shopping trip that they were going to have her hair cut. She made
her daughter sit in the chair and have her hair cut short. A number of different takes
on this were given in further examples, some showing a greater cruelty or strictness on
the part of the parent than others (for example there was a mom who had no objections
to her daughter having long hair yet suddenly announced that she was cutting it short
and that it must not get long again until she was eighteen. This demented woman did not
listen to anything the daughter had to say, made her cut her hair and get rid of the
ponytail, causing her daughter great grief). This post generated another on the subject,
with several more examples of this kind of bullying.

On the long hair board, there is currently a very lively thread that started as a question
as to whether "moms" should allow their sons to grow long hair, but the subject was more
or less changed to the issue of whether parents should be able to MAKE their sons have
long hair. Two moms who have "grown" their sons` hair and really enjoying it are under
question - would they force their sons to keep it against their will - yet they don`t want to
give us a straight answer!

Examples were cited of the cropping of hair as punishment!

Finally, there are the usual complaints of parents who won`t let their children perm or
dye their hair. And those who enforce segregative rules, making daughters have long
hair or sons have short hair.

Why do parents do this to their children? Any act of authority can be resented, let alone
something so personal as the choice of how to wear one`s hair. Society seemed to be
leaving the authoritarian dark ages in the 1960s yet there are still these primitive-minded
people who have no problem dictating such a trivial yet personal issue to their children.
I understand (but by no means excuse!) that they may not like certain styles or have
certain old prejudices (such as the sexual one or that one just "has" to be "clean-cut")
but can`t they have some wideness and recognize that their children are not an
extention of themselves and that they have no right to live through them? The mothers
who have no problem chopping off their daughters` hair seem particularly demented. One
must question whether they really love their children (yes, there are parents who don`t.) or if
they are sadists (with the current state of the law, sadists have a perfect opportunity to
indulge in their mania - just become a parent and order the innocent child around for 16 to
25 years under the pretext that you "know best" or that they are living under "your" roof).

Many modern pedagogists have a stricter take on parenting than myself and my organization,
yet most would aggree that parents should not take advantage of their authority for their
own pleasure and by extension, one would think, that so unimportant an issue as hair style
can be more or less left up to the child. My question to readers is this: what is your experience
with this issue (i.e. with your parents, in your community?) Do you see much of this type of
bullying in your community?

Colonel John Doe
Commanding Officer, the Cameron Highlanders Militia for Freedom and Democracy

You`re completely right, I had quite long hair until I was around 9 and begged my parents for short hair, in bob, but I wasn`t allowed to. They finally changed their minds when I was 9 and I got a long bob. Since the age of nine, its been going from bobs to shoulder length.
I think its OK for parents to be like this with a small child (to a certain extent), but not teenagers, at the end of the day, its not their hair to cut.
Big unwanted hair cuts can cause a lot of trauma for children.

Ha! This thread`s been round for a long time
but not many posts. Sheesh. As I said on 2
other posts having to do with this, people
should read the story Make Him Look Smart
on www.crewbuzz.com and they`ll
understand VERY GRAPHICALLY what kind
of psychological torture this authoritarian
treatment can produce.

Thank you for sharing, Ingrid. Your friend`s mother seems to suffer from
obsessive-compulsive syndrome. If my kind of people were in the
government, she might be forced into parental counseling or even more
serious psychiatric treatment for her daughter`s sake.

Colonel John Doe