-Mallory
Wednesday, March 2, 2011
GINGERS DO HAVE SOULS
I'm a natural redhead. When I was younger, older women always used to tell me how lucky I was to have red hair and how much they wished they had my hair color. As I got older, I realized people my age didn't exactly feel that way and I got made fun of a lot. I recently had a boyfriend and one of his female friends didn't like us dating. She made the comment, "Have fun with your ginger girlfriend."
-Mallory
-Mallory
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Both of my best friends and my boyfriend have red hair, so in a way it offends me when people make rude remarks about red heads. I personally do not see them as any different than anyone else and I don't think they deserve to be judged from the second that people look at them and say "oh, well your hairs red" like it is an insult. It would be the same if people started to make fun of brunettes and using it against them. People shouldn't have to worry about how people see them just because of the color of hair they are born with.
ReplyDeleteBeing a natural redhead myself, I can relate to this. Being young, I got made fun of because my hair wasn't the "normal" brown or blonde. But, in my eyes, my hair was normal. I received compliments everyday and to this day about my red hair. People are constantly asking if it's my natural color and I'm proud to say it is. My hair is strawberry blonde and you can instantly tell from my red, curly hair, and my fair, pale skin that I'm very Irish. I think people should become more concerned with how they see themselves and not how they see others. Making rude comments and gestures towards one set of people is not something to be proud of. The looking glass self is demonstrated through this because it again all depends on how you see yourself in retrospect to how others view you.
ReplyDeleteI've always been self-conscious about my hair color. Even when I was little and older women used to tell me how much they loved my hair it didn't make me feel special, it just made me feel different. That was how I started noticing it's not like being a blonde or brunette because red hair isn't nearly as common. As I got older I constantly become more self-conscious about it because people didn't hide the way they felt anymore. I think that may be part of the reason I've always dyed my hair, to try and hide my natural color. For the past few months I've stopped dying my hair and just led my red show. After the girl made the, "have fun with your ginger girlfriend" comment, I've kind of learned to embrace the fact that I'm a "ginger." It was funny because she didn't exactly have a reason not to like me and the only insult she had towards me was the color of my hair. My friends and I joke about it all the time and I've realized that just because other people see me as a redhead doesn't mean I'm JUST a redhead. This is a great example of looking-glass self because the way people have viewed me as redhead has really had a major effect on how I feel about myself, and mostly a negative view. But 19 years later I'm finally learning to embrace it and realized that if people are going to judge me off of something so superficial, they're not worth my time anyway.
ReplyDeleteI think that no matter what, people are self conscious about at least one thing about themselves. A lot of the time, that person is self conscious due to what has been said from others about that particular body part or personality trait. People will tell girls such as Mallory to flaunt their red hair, to be proud of it, which by all means she should, but she still will always have in her memory what has been said. No one wants to be made fun of for what they look like, whether it is hair, skin, eyes, etc. I think this is an example of looking glass self because it is how others perceive the red heads, which causes them to look at themselves (the red head) as differently because of what has been said.
ReplyDeletePeople are often self conscious about one thing or another that has to do with their physical appearance. Everyone was born differently and no one can control their hair color. Sure, you can dye it, but it doesn't change whats natural. No one should be looked at differently as a person because of a physical feature. I have blond hair which sounds completely normal, but I've always been the butt of "dumb blond" jokes. There will always be stereotypes for certain physical characteristics and as dumb as it is you just have to look past it. Even though my brain capacity has nothing to do with my hair color, people think it's okay to go off stereotypes and comment about me as a person even if they don't know me. Mallory has the same problem with being a red head even though there are not even any stereotypes that go with them except a rude nickname of "ginger." It's one of those things that as Anna said, she should be able to be confident about her hair and even if she is it doesn't mean she can erase what has been said in the past. Women need to start being more confident and try their best to erase the rude things that are said about them and be the best they can be as people without worrying about the physical aspects.
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