Hair we go again - this time the Army - WTF???

[malaise]

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2014/04/01/army-hairstyle_n_5070180.html
<snip>
The U.S. Army is facing criticism for its new appearance and grooming regulations, which some soldiers say unfairly target black women's hair.

Army Regulation 670-1 was released Monday, with rules on tattoos, hairstyles, grooming and uniforms for soldiers.

One of the new regulations, which applies only to women, is a ban on twists, dreadlocks and multiple braids/cornrows that are bigger than a quarter of an inch. Army spokesman Paul Prince told the Army Times that twists and dreadlocks have been barred since 2005, but these regulations go into more detail about specific hairstyles.

Women with these banned hairstyles will need to get rid of them or cover them with wigs or extensions, which can damage hair.

[Hip_Flask]

1. In my experience, AA women had the hardest time conforming

To the old standards, let alone the new one.

Mostly it's due to the fact that the reg didn't reflect what their hair could do. I also saw some extreme cases where they just gave up and went way outside the bounds and used it as an excuse.

[Warpy]

2. Wow, a twofer, racist and sexist

The stupid males who came up with this need to be kidnapped and tied into chairs and harangued by beauticians who specialize in African hair styles until they finally get it.

Black hair is different and doesn't easily lend itself to a Breck Girl (remember those) whitefolks 1950s page boy.

I always loved the "natural" styles in the early 70s. Even they came with problems, a coworker told me that bed head was super hard to overcome some mornings.

[malaise]

3. Breck girl - BWaaaaaaaaaaaaah hahahahha

Who could forget her.

What is bed head? Never experienced it?

[Warpy]

5. In this case, it was a symmetrical hair style

that was squashed in on one side, like a partially deflated volley ball. It took a lot of pick combing and hair spray to get rid of.

ETA: Those Breck Girls weren't even the worst of the lot. That prize went to "She's beautiful. she's engaged, she uses Pond's." The marriage was going to be a short one if she went to bed in that gunk every night.

[malaise]

7. Ha

Got yah

[bananas]

17. "Bed head" is what hair looks like when you first get out of bed in the morning

Like faded and torn jeans, it became fashion, and there are hair style products for people who want the look but whose hair doesn't naturally mess up at night.

http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=bedhead

1. Bed Head

Hair messed up and untidy after sleep

"Bed head was a popular hair style in the late 90's."
"It's not a cowlick, it's the result of bed head."

by Breseis April 08, 2006

Some photos:

[malaise]

18. ROFL

[MADem]

4. This is called force shaping. They want to make it difficult, so people will leave.

They want a smaller force. That said, this is absolute bullshit. Whoever came up with these "new rules" is doing some serious ethnic "chain jerking." I hope the senior leadership fixes this mess, and soon.

It's not right.

Watch them get to be sticklers about physical fitness standards in a big way as well--it was obvious, during the war years, that those things just didn't really matter. They'l start mattering soon. They want to encourage people to head out the door.

[dipsydoodle]

6. Dreads rule.

Said he who 's out for a night of Ska and Reggae.

[malaise]

8. Enjoy

[dipsydoodle]

15. They even played this last night

The original !

Back in the day we called it "Blue Beat" not understanding that was just the record label..

[malaise]

16. Love it

[Warpy]

9. one of these days I'll make myself a multicolored dreads wig

out of felted wool top that I don't want to spin.

An old broad in clown barf dreads, it should be interesting.

[Aristus]

10. May I offer a respectful dissent?

Especially bearing in mind that I love the dreadlock look, and cheerfully correct anyone who insists that dreadlocks look 'dirty'. (A friend of mine who wore dreads told me that hair dreads more easily when it is clean.)

Everyone, male, female, every ethnicity, is required to conform to military grooming regulations. If one cannot abide by those regulations, he or she shouldn't enlist.

These new regulations aren't (as far as I can see) an attack on these specific hairstyles so much as it is clarification as to which hairstyles a service member may not wear. Unless they are enumerated in the regulations, the assumption will be that those specific hairstyles are permissible.

One of the very first guys I met in the Army at the processing station was a surf bum from California with hair halfway down his back. He looked like someone else after receiving his first buzzcut. He had no more right to protest losing all that hair than anyone else. He enlisted, he signed the enlistment contract, he took the oath.

[SheilaT]

11. I likewise love dreads.

And I'm a middle aged, make that a senior citizen, Caucasian lady.

And while I don't know a lot about the details of these regulations, I do think that anyone enlisting should be aware that they do lose a lot of control over how they are going to look, especially with hair.

Jobs that enforced grooming standards used to be much more common. Especially jobs that involved public contact, but even places like the phone company had pretty strict dress codes for the operators back when I worked for them, sometime in the early Paleolithic.

[underpants]

30. Funny story - basic Ft. Knox 1990

The complete strangers that were just getting to know each other went into one end of the barbershop....when we came out the other side we had to re-introduce ourselves to each other. I had no idea how much hair distinguishes people.

We also saw a guy with jet black hair about as long as the surfer guy you mentioned in BDU's but still with the hair. We guessed that the timing just screwed up and he received his issue before going to the barber.

[mwrguy]

12. It's almost as if the army is a racist patriarchy

Go figure.

[jmowreader]

13. People need to read the ACTUAL REGULATION and not rely on briefing slides

Here is the regulation:

http://www.apd.army.mil/pdffiles/r670_1.pdf

This is the opening paragraph of the Female Haircut section:

(3) Female haircuts and hairstyles. The illustrations provided in figure 3-3 are intended only to clarify language regarding authorized hair lengths and bulks. The requirements for hair regulations are to maintain uniformity within a military population for female Soldiers while in uniform, or in civilian clothes on duty, unless otherwise specified. Female hairstyles may not be eccentric or faddish and will present a conservative, professional appearance. For the purposes of these regulations, female hairstyles are organized into three basic categories: short length, medium length and long length hair.

I read through the entire hair regulation and the only really huge change is positive: women with long hair no longer have to put it up for physical training. The rest of the shit that's in there has been in there for many years under the cover of "non faddish" hairstyles; they are now clarifying things because, to be frank, NO ONE could figure out what the female grooming regulations allowed before and women knew that. (In the old days the nail regulation allowed women to wear nail polish that was "conservative and compliments the uniform." Can anyone tell me exactly what that is? Beige? Pink? Clear? Red? Obviously it wasn't blue, green or purple, but a lot of us just figured, if it was a "traditional" color and not something like fluorescent orange, okay. Now they tell you exactly what color - clear - is authorized.) The requirement that cornrows be no more than a quarter-inch in diameter was put into place in the 1980s when Headquarters, Department of the Army (HQDA) first authorized their wear.

[NickB79]

14. I'd go the other way: REQUIRE all AA female soldiers to have dreads

I can only imagine the sheer terror enemy troops would feel seeing a battalion of Michonne's bearing down on them:

[CFLDem]

29. More of a turn on

than scary.

[madokie]

19. Why can't they just let soldiers be

Who really cares how someone wears their hair or what tattoos they put on their skin

I'd have hair down to my ass if it wasn't such a hassle to take care of. When I did I washed it every day just like I do my short hair today

[MineralMan]

20. Because this is such a good look...

[malaise]

21. If you like the McVeigh look

[MineralMan]

23. The rise of the white sidewalls military haircut

has always interested me. When I enlisted in the USAF in 1965, all of my hair was removed in about 30 seconds by a barber at Lackland AFB in San Antonio, TX. It was the first step of the depersonalization process that is Basic Training. Once basic was over, as an enlisted man, I was able to regrow my hair into a short hair style that looked OK, if not my preferred way to wear my hair.

Nobody at the time, at least in the USAF, cut their hair in the drastic white sidewall style seen so often today on men in uniform. For some reason, that drastic and ugly hairstyle has become the norm in the military. I'm not sure of the reason.

Back during my enlistment, a lot of guys like me tended to push the hair limits. Mustaches were OK, so I grew one, keeping it just inside the boundaries of acceptability. Sideburns were strictly controlled, so most of us wore them at the very limits. The result was being told from time to time to "Get a haircut, Sergeant!" Finally, my contracted enlistment time was over. I have not shaved my face since that day, and my hair has varied from a couple of inches in length to halfway down my back.

I feel for the women in this story, who are trying to maintain their sense of being an individual while serving in the military. It's a very difficult goal, since military discipline is based on the idea that those serving are not individuals, but interchangeable parts of a machine.

[malaise]

24. That's why so many of them break down

Too many contradictions.
Sadly the machine also decides which individual is the model.

[delta17]

25. Technically that was out of regs, at least when I was in the AF.

Your hair was supposed to "present a tapered appearance." It was rarely enforced, though. First Sergeants worried more about guys trying to get away with faux hawks or sideburns.

[MineralMan]

26. Well, I know that I didn't see those haircuts during my

service from 1965-9. I heard "Get a haircut!" a few times, though, from one person or another.

[delta17]

27. I think those haircuts make you look like a moron.

I was in avionics, and most pointy heads distrusted people who were gung-ho military. They usually were good at barking orders and terrible at troubleshooting.

[CFLDem]

28. AFAIK

Being in the military is a privilege, not a right. Don't enlist if you can't conform.

[idendoit]

31. While in uniform, the service you are in will tell you....

....how you will appear in uniform. Having worn OBAs and NBC masks in the Navy, I would think that the braids, dreads, pony tails and buns would prevent proper seating of a breathing mask. I learned that lesson when I reported to flight deck firefighting with a beard. After the first hands on, I stayed clean shaven the rest of my career.