I am lucky in the hair department somewhat. Thankfully I will never be bald. I do not want to be bald. If I was bald, I would look like Curley Howard from The Three Stooges. I would have to shave it off because I wouldn’t want one of those hair rings with a dome on top.
Some men when they lose their hair have hairpieces (otherwise known as toupee’s) made for them. I think if they are professionally done and cared for, I don’t think looks too bad.
I was thinking about William Shatner, with me watching the Comedy Central celebrity roast, when some of the guests were making fun of his hairpiece among other things (one comedian said that it growls to him). Frankly, I think the Shat looks great and I would have never known about his lack of hair if it wasn’t pointed out by someone making fun of the man, as in “He’s was an insufferable asshole, and he wore a rug!”
Remember Morty the Hair for Men guy from the film Goodfellas? He was portrayed as a schmuck. Another schmuck was Jim Carlson the hockey announcer/TV guy from the film “Slapshot”. Ralph Ciffaretto from the Sopranos secretly wore a rug which scared the bejesus out of Chrissy when it unexpectly fell off Ralphie’s head. Stan, the schmuck ex-husband of Dorothy on “The Golden Girls”. There are many instances in entertainment where having a toupee’, rug, hairpiece, whatever is something to be made fun of or scorned.
Seems unfair to me. Toupees are seen as fake, and people hate fake and equal it to being a liar or untruthful. It is strange and I don’t understand why.
a) Toupees are almost always very clearly a toupee, and as such look peculiar. See the uncanny valley effect.
b) Television can be quite forgiving. From what I’ve heard, KITT from the old Night Rider show had nearly all of his panels held on with black duct tape. On TV, you couldn’t tell. That Shatner is wearing a toupee may not have been obvious to you, seeing him on TV, but meeting him in real life it may be glaringly obvious.
It’s not because people with toupees are equated to being liars. It’s because they wear toupees out of vanity and conceit instead of accepting their age, yet most toupees don’t fool anyone. Which makes them prime targets for The Funny, since they accomplish the exact opposite of their purpose, i.e. make someone who wishes to be more beautiful look ridiculous, and draw attention to the man’s baldness combined with the fact that he can’t deal with it and/or cares about his appearance. FWIW, people who get (bad) cosmetic surgery catch the same amount of flakk, for about the same reasons.
IOW : Real Men ™ don’t care about going bald !
Do Vin Diesel and Bruce Willis feel the need to wear dead muppets on their heads ? Real Men ™ have bald spots, pot bellies, wear wife beaters covered in grease and pizza sauce and have more back hair than a hippie gorilla. And they don’t give a damn.
Signed : Kobal2, who shaves his head to hide the MPB
Toupees fall into the same category as combovers. Either the person is so deluded that he thinks it really looks natural, or else he thinks everyone else is too clueless to notice that it’s fake.
In short, he’s either lying to you or himself. Neither conveys trustworthiness.
One thing tangential to the OP that fascinates me is the change in attitude over the last 50 years or so. Back then, a toupee was not considered nearly as pathetic or shameful. Frank Sinatra made no secret about his wearing a toup. He owned dozens of them, and had a full-time employee dedicated to their upkeep. I can’t imagine a male celebrity of Sinatra’s stature today even feeling the need to wear one. Today, he’d probably shave it off and do a ‘Willis’, and that would be Old Blue Eyes’ ‘new look’.
Certainly, back in the day, if a rug blew off, or if it was obvious, people would snicker. But today, there is more acceptance of the bald/balding male ‘look’, so a toup is more likely to be an object of ridicule.
That’s a very judgmental way of looking at things.
Why stop at toupees and combovers?
You could apply the same logic to just about anything anyone does that affects their appearance.
I really doubt that anyone who uses a comb over actually thinks it’s fooling anyone, they just think they look better that way than showing a bald pate.
By your logic, anyone who uses any technique to make a receding hairline less obvious - or any woman who uses subtle makeup - is a liar.
I’m less bothered about someone doing something with their hair that actually improves their appearance, because there are aesthetic grounds for it. But the bad toupee, the blatant combover - it fools no one and makes you look like an idiot.
I think that this is the main thing. As a man ages, his hair naturally thins, but wearing a (cheaper) toupee leaves one with the impression that he has the hair of a 16 year old.
My Dad was almost completely bald by his early 20s. He wore a toupee until he died at age 58. Nobody that I talked to ever suspected that it was a toupee because, I think, when you see a man in his 20s, 30s, and even 40s with a full head of hair, your mind doesn’t associate any difference from the norm.
Now, when he got into his 50s, he started getting rugs with flecks of gray blended in and ones that had the hairline receding in the two front corners. It always looked natural.
But, then again, since he was my Dad, maybe I just didn’t notice it, but I never talked to anyone that did.
How about women who apply their eyebrows with pencil? Or wax their upper lip? People who whiten their teeth? They’re all liars and should not be trusted?
Well what’s the difference between a bald man wearing a hairpiece and a woman wearing a wig? Many women have wigs in different lengths and styles to wear, and they are wearing them for the same vain reasons as the man (not happy with the hair that’s on their head). I just don’t understand what the big deal is. People will pick on you for looking bad, but then try to fix it and people laugh at you still. I say live and let live. I don’t care if your bald, or want to wear a toupee. Just get a good one, so no one laughs!
Women losing their wigs is a comedy staple too. Seeing someone’s hair unexpectedly come off is always a reliable sight gag because it always makes our monkey brains laugh, just like farts or fat guys falling down.
In general, though, it’s also expected that women will do artificial things to alter their appearance, but not men. It’s expected that women will wear makeup, but not men. Vanity is seen as a de facto feminine trait. Therefore vanity in men is seen as effete and unmasculine – as weak.
A rug, in particular. is seen as effete because it shows vanity over a particularly “feminine” issue – hair. There’s another kind of male vanity based around caricaturing or exaggerating masculine traits like muscles (see Jersey Shore or Google “Guidos”), but that just makes guys look like assholes. Baldness signifies vulnerability. That’s what was striking about it with Ralphie on the Sopranos. Here’s this ultra scary, cold-blooded mobster sudddenly looking ridiculous and vulnerable when his hair comes off. It showed an unexpected insecurity beneath the tough facade.
It’s the same problem fake boobs have. People only notice the really obvious ones, and they tend to look bad. Nobody ridicules a good toupee/boob job because you are not suppose to ever notice it isn’t the real deal.
I saw David Letterman saying someplace once that the network made Willard Scott Scott start wearing the piece against his will. So he wears it, but basically does it in such a way as to make no secret that it’s a piece. He intentionally slaps it on there crooked and the like. According to Letterman, he’ll amuse the crowd during breaks by taking off his rug and tossing it up in the air like a pizza, then slapping it back on right before he goes live again.
Digital - you read my mind - which is pretty impressive considering how scary it can get in there.
My dad had thinning hair and a receding hair line on the right and left sides but not the middle. By the age of 40, it looked like he had a mohawk. I’ve been fortunate. My hair has thinned but I won’t be going bald for at least another couple decades - if ever.
Most men in my family however ARE bald so it was something I worried about in prior years. I always felt that hair transplants would be the way to go. If that meant selling my body to rich old widows to get the cash, then so be it.
