Keep an eye on the Police Blotter section of your paper. Sooner or later, Susan Psycho Bitch is headed to jail. Temperments that crazy never mellow on their own.
Seconded. If she’d broken Jen’s nose, would you let her back? It’ll take longer to grow back that hair than it would take for a broken nose to heal. Letting her back almost makes it seem like the bar is OK with what happened, which is a statement you don’t seem to be making in the OP.
Shit, I love my hair so much that if anyone other than my stylist cut any of it, I would probably call the police on them. They assaulted my hair! They cut me! My hair is me… and they cut it, so therefore they cut me! Especially if I was a bit drunk, there would have been a huge fight about it. Someone would have had to call the cops…
Not cool. Never cool.
ETA: and ban her. Get rid of her.
If I were Jen, I definitely wouldn’t try and involve the police - it’d be far more hassle than it’s worth. If I were you, however, I agree with the others - barring Susan would be an appropriate response.
Plus even if you yourself think it’s just hair, you’d have to be a sociopath not to realize that someone else might not think so. Or that even if it is just hair, it’s not your place to change it. It just shows extreme arrogance that you think you’re capable of altering their appearance for them.
Lurker coming out of the weeds…
It may be just hair, but it’s MY hair, dammit! Leave it the hell alone.
If I didn’t like the shirt you were wearing, (that you loved and were proud of, that you may or may not be able to replace) and I took scissors to it to “improve” it, would you laugh it off?
If someone did that to my braid I would be beyond livid. I’m not a girly-girl, I don’t do frills or pink or makeup. I don’t wear nail polish. I DO have a helluva head of hair…
I’ve got long thick hair that I can just about sit on when it’s unbraided. It gets trimmed periodically, but I’ve had it this way for so long now that it’s pretty much part of who I am. Shallow? Maybe. But that’s MY business and no-one else’s.
I too get many comments & compliments on it. Sometimes strangers seem to think it’s ok to tweak it, which pisses me off, or tell me I should donate it, which also rubs me the wrong way. Yes, thank you I DO know about Locks of Love. Yes, it’s a wonderful thing. No, I’m not ready to cut my hair yet. When I do, they’ll probably get it, but for right now I like my hair long. Butt. Out.
Susan is no friend to anyone and should be shunned until she comes up with the appropriate abject apology, and makes it plain that she understands just how far over the line she went.
I don’t think you have to be a complete sociopath to do something like this. I could see this as something you might do almost accidentally in an instant, without thinking, trying to be spontaneously funny or whatever. As you’re not physically harming the person, and you’re not damaging something that obviously has monetary value (e.g. clothing, jewelry), it might slip by someone’s filters on appropriate actions, especially if they were drunk. Alcohol does affect judgement, even after just one drink.
That said - any sane person would have realized within a second or two that they made a serious mistake, and apologized profusely, immediately and repeatedly.
I would interpret this as an apology, and since any apology would have been woefully inadequate (really, would “Sorry I cut off your hair” have helped at all?), Susan probably went with the one that she thought was least woefully inadequate. It was her way of saying, “I’d undo it if I could, but since I can’t, here’s the best way I can think of to make things right.”
UNapologetic would have been “Ha ha, I was drunk” or “Sucks to be you” or “Sorry, but maybe now you’ll quit bitching about your split ends all the time.” Something like that would arguably have been worth ending the friendship over.
Yeah, it was a really shitty thing to do. But not inherently unforgivable. And on the scale of shitty things to do to people, I’m guessing the majority of people have done worse, at least once in their lives.
I wouldn’t go so far as the say it was unforgiveable. But it’s definitely something that Susan needs to seek forgiveness for. She was drunk and went too far. It happens but she should acknowledge that what she did was wrong and apologize.
Eh. She wanted to make a joke and thought it would be exciting and funny. It fell horribly flat. I rather suspect that Susan is ready to crawl under a rock and die. Involve the police or ban her from the bar if you want but if this is the first time she’s done this or something like it, I’d say all the declarations of “This girl has ISSUES.” is overwrought to say the least. Cutting other people’s hair without permission is not cool but it’s still just hair and if you’re that tied up in your hair, I’d say you have a little bit of an issue as well. (Making statements about mental health over the internet is fun!)
Or is it also abuse of the worst order when someone passes out at a frat party and someone writes balls on their forehead in permanent marker?
Jenn should never speak to Susan again, and if you’re smart Susan should not be allowed back in the bar.
Assaulting other patrons should pretty well be a ticket to “You’re not welcome here anymore.”
She has every right to be livid. If she hasn’t gotten it fixed yet, make sure she takes pictures of the “haircut” so that if she does decide to pursue some legal action, she has documentation. Not that I think it needs to be pursued to that extent, but just to be safe.
I can’t even imagine how I would react to this. I would probably have slapped the shit out of Susan. When I was 18 I had to grow out my hair for a project I was working on, and when the project was over, I cut it off to my collarbone as a statement of freedom. I was distraught. I felt the way I think I’d feel if someone told me all my baby pictures had been burned. Yes, it is essentially just material things, but they hold so much emotional value.
It’s not ever ok, but the aftermath would depend on the person and the situation. From how you’ve described Susan, it sounds like Jen would be better off without her as a friend.
I’ve also got thick hair and I’ve always wondered how people can stand it so long - did you ever ask her/do you know? When my hair gets much past mid-back the weight starts making my neck hurt and the hair itself starts to get caught in everything (I’ve gotten caught my hair caught in the slats of a chair or, with the help of static, stuck to my wool sweater). I can’t even imagine ankle length. :eek:
Cutting off anyone’s hair is acceptable if:
1: The person is a pro wrestler, and has agreed to lose a hair vs hair match, and said match is booked, and the cuttee loses.
2: The person otherwise consents.
3: There is some imminent peril to the person that can be avoided or mitigated only by cutting the hair, and the person is somehow unable to give consent.
Otherwise, it is both a crime and a tort.
I never asked, but I expect her husband had to do with her wearing it so long for so long. He liked to walk a few steps behind her and watch how people reacted to it. Yeah, he was a bit weird…
When she finally did cut it, I believe it was partly related to her migraines - I think the weight of her hair exacerbated the pain, although I might be remembering that wrong. If I recall, she also liked to swim, and the mass of wet hair became more annoying than it was worth.
By the o.p.'s description, both assault and battery occurred in this instance. Whether either crime can be considered “simple” (i.e. without intent to harm or bring injury to the victim) or aggravated (with intent to injure, use of a weapon or other implement to effect the crime, or use against a child or with disparity in size and strength) is subject to interpretation, but I believe the scenario as described would meet the criteria for aggravation per statute or common law in most if not all jurisdictions in the United States due to the use of a bladed implement (scissors) and evident damage (forcible removal of a measurable portion of hair). Such charges are known as “wobblers” or “hybrid crimes” in that they are subject to the discretion of the prosecutor and interpretation of the jurists as to whether they are justified by intent and context, and can flip a simple assault or battery misdemeanor to a felony offense. This is especially useful in combination with more serious felonies in that the prosecution may be able to persuade a jury as to the intent of the offender to do harm but not the specifics of the more serious crimes, but can meet the standard for aggravation, and which may allow punishment for other crimes under collateral conviction rules.
I find the circumstance in the o.p. disquieting, in that while I don’t think it is advisable to pursue this with the police, as it will almost certainly result in prosecution of the perpetrator and disruption of the lives of both women, at the same time from a psychological point of view it shows a disturbing lack of restraint and judgement regarding alcohol tolerance, a gross exceedance of personal space, and a potentially pathological controlling personality with jealousy or histrionic aspects. It is easy to just blame this on a few drinks, but in fact, alcohol doesn’t change the core personality of the drinker; it simply suppresses the normal restraint that people exercise in polite society. In Freudian terms, if you believe in that sort of thing, it is the id overtaking the superego.
From the events as recounted, one might speculate that Susan has long been jealous of the attention Jen received due to her hair, and in an archetypical controlling manner unmediated by normal restraint, severed her hair to “punish” Jen and elevate herself. Even though she has offered to make a token effort of restitution, the lack of sincere apology speaks volumes toward either her lack of conscience (borderline sociopathy) or an unwillingness to outwardly accept and atone for her guilt (narcissism), neither of which can be waived away with an excuse of intoxication.
The above, of course, is an armchair (and amateur) analysis based upon one side of the account with no knowledge of exterior context or prior relationship, and shouldn’t be taken as any kind of authoritative diagnosis, but it is important to note that our personalities, at least, insofar as they are involved with the exterior world, are in fact the sum of our impulses, not our intentions. There are plenty of narcissistic and antisocial people who do apparently generous and beneficent acts strictly to satisfy their own self-image. This doesn’t lessen the fact that their impulses can be harmful when unmetered by conscience or acknowledged by sincere repentance. I think in this circumstance a genuinely empathic and socially well-balanced person would be mortified by having committed this act and would proffer a lengthy and self-abasing apology even before offering any kind of fiscal restitution.
I’m sure that many will disagree that this is any kind of serious assault, especially based upon the responses to [thread=316302]this old thread[/thread], on the logic that “it’s just hair,” but nether statue law nor psychology theory support this position.
Stranger
I think that Susan should be banned from the bar for at least a month or so. Not just to punish her, but to reassure the other regulars that the bar WILL throw people out if they have boundary issues.
I don’t have long hair anymore (it used to be down to my butt), but it’s still thick and pretty enough to get comments and people touching it if it’s down. Frankly, that’s why I got in the habit of wearing it up in a bun constantly. People that normally respect physical boundaries just forget them completely when it comes to pretty hair.
Now I keep my hair around shoulder length, but my SO has very long hair. I have (jokingly) threatened to chop it all off because it gets in the way so frequently, but:
I don’t know that hair-chopping would be unforgivable by itself, but to me it would indicate that I couldn’t trust whoever did it. If I can’t trust you, the friendship is over.
This. The OP said that Susan ‘fled’ knowing what an idiotic thing it was. She’s also offering to pay. Of course, it’s pretty bizarre, and over the line, but, it really doesn’t deserve more than a butt chewing. Jen was talking of getting a haircut, after all, and, in light of being drunk, and, no objection when Susan grabbed her hair, puts this into the dumb dork, brainless friend category. Although, Jen may want to reevaluate this friendship.
Best wishes,
hh
I’m going to assume that you all recognise that having a broken leg or nose is significantly worse than having short hair, and thus is irrelevant to any attempt to justify bringing out the big guns.
I think this is an almost perfect response from Jen to Susan - Susan’s response to this will tell Jen whether Susan is a nutjob to be shunned from now on or a drunken idiot who is feeling terrible for doing something so stupid. My gut tells me that Susan was indeed jealous of Jen’s hair, but she might be aware of how over the line she was.