The ethics of hair extensions

Princess Peach · 12-04-2013 3:29pm #1

I want to raise awareness about something that really bothers me, human hair extensions. There has been a giant surge in the industry in the past decade and I wonder how many wearers of extensions think about where this hair has come from.

The fact is a lot of it comes from exploited women around the world. I was considering them a few years ago to thicken out my hair, but after some research I was firmly against it. I'll post a few articles here with some information.

The Hair Trade's Dirty Secret-The Guardian
Let Your Hair Down-The Guardian
Pop Star Jamelia's Expose of the hair trade industry-Daily Mail

While hair extensions are sold here for a high price, impoverished women are selling their long mane for pittance, being told that's what it is worth. There are known cases of husbands forcing wives to shave their heads, and even a case of gang stealing a woman's hair. Hair is being sold from prisons and labour camps, where the women are forced to shave their heads and receive none of the profits. One of the wealthiest temples in India sells hair that women have shaved as sacrifice for prayer, most not knowing where it goes. And there are reports of hair being cut from the dead.

Girls who wish to have long hair so badly that they pay for the hassle of hair extensions know how much ling hair means. How would you feel if you had to cut it off? It irks me to know women are being exploited for the sake of another woman's beauty.

There are hair extension dealers who source their hair ethically, or be patient and grow your hair out yourself!

xLexie · 12-04-2013 6:14pm

Not a fan of hair extentions but never realised how human hair was actually sourced for the extentions, am disgusted.

12-04-2013 7:14pm

I knew of this before. I often wonder how people (who get human hair extensions) think the hair is sourced. It seems obvious to me that exploitation is part of the chain.

It's a horrible thing, as bad as wearing real fur, if not worse.

CathyMoran · 12-04-2013 7:31pm

Got a wig a few years ago when I was having chemo - much as I felt that I needed my hair at the time if I thought that someone else had been exploited then I would have not got the wig. Having said that I was told that they were sourced ethically.

12-04-2013 7:45pm

CathyMoran wrote: »

Got a wig a few years ago when I was having chemo - much as I felt that I needed my hair at the time if I thought that someone else had been exploited then I would have not got the wig. Having said that I was told that they were sourced ethically.

Cathy, some charities in the US have sponsored haircuts. I've grown my hair extra long on two occasions and had sponsorship for every inch, and at the end they charity gives you a haircut and your hair is used for affordable wigs for cancer patients.

I've no idea if that sort of thing is done in Ireland, but I'm sure it would be popular enough to make it worthwhile.

Princess Peach · 12-04-2013 7:57pm

CathyMoran wrote: »

Got a wig a few years ago when I was having chemo - much as I felt that I needed my hair at the time if I thought that someone else had been exploited then I would have not got the wig. Having said that I was told that they were sourced ethically.

The first article linked there is about a man who sources hair for wigs only from the UK. He firstly uses it for cancer patients, and any he has surplus for extensions.

The reason the hair trade had gotten so immoral is because of the high demand for expensive aesthetic hair extensions. With such a huge profit to be made these days, as opposed to 10 years ago, traders use lots of means to fill the demand.

panda100 · 12-04-2013 9:18pm

Aren't a lot of hair extensions synthetic?

xLexie · 12-04-2013 9:20pm

panda100 wrote: »

Aren't a lot of hair extensions synthetic?

Yes, the likes of the clip in ones from hairspray would be. Microbead hair extentions (the proper, expensive ones) would be human hair, as far as I know.

Princess Peach · 12-04-2013 9:34pm

panda100 wrote: »

Aren't a lot of hair extensions synthetic?

You can do much styling with synthetic, so lots of people go for human hair.

username123 · 12-04-2013 9:49pm

Never knew this. In saying that Id never ever consider hair extensions, they make me feel squeamish.

My sister in law gets them a lot but Ive no idea if its real hair or not, must ask her. I think they look disgusting, all these little knotted or glued on bits near the scalp, makes me feel crawly.

pwurple · 12-04-2013 11:35pm

There is a charity here that takes donated hair for wigs (not extensions).

http://www.irishhairdressers.ie/rapunzel/197-rapunzel.html

Legs.Eleven · 13-04-2013 10:44am

Candie wrote: »

Cathy, some charities in the US have sponsored haircuts. I've grown my hair extra long on two occasions and had sponsorship for every inch, and at the end they charity gives you a haircut and your hair is used for affordable wigs for cancer patients.

I've no idea if that sort of thing is done in Ireland, but I'm sure it would be popular enough to make it worthwhile.

My niece in the States grew her hair long and got it cut to donate. Little cutie. I think it's such a great thing to do. Fair play to you.

I'd never consider getting extensions (the idea of wearing someone else's hair turns my stomach anyway) but he more I read, the more I'm shocked to what extent humans will go to for vanity. It's a kind of madness. Thanks for letting me know about this, PP.

Lia_lia · 13-04-2013 1:11pm

I remember I made a Facebook status on this a few months back, cue a b*tch-fight of about 30 comments between different girls!

But yeah, ridiculous. I don't know how anyone gets human hair extensions, it's mank. And the business is just horrible.

Teyla Emmagan · 13-04-2013 1:17pm

I just don't know why anyone would want to wear someone else's hair on their head?! Not just for vanity reasons anyway, I think it's gross.

A wig is a different matter, but human hair extensions - eeewwwwwwwww.

meeeeh · 13-04-2013 1:50pm

I don't like them but considering I shop in Ikea, Apple, in high street clothing shops or don't particularly look for ethically sourced food (just few examples) I can't really judge people who use them.

ennis81 · 14-04-2013 11:45am

To be honest I would say there is huge ignorance in where the hair comes from, I imagine most girls dont really think about it, I've always found it a bit weird and think I would feel strange wearing someone elses hair

dfx- · 15-04-2013 5:41am

I saw the BBC programme with Jamelia going to India looking at how it was sourced (presumably same trip for the basis of the Mail article) a while ago. It was eye opening..

5tratoca5ter · 15-04-2013 11:30am

First of all, getting your hair cut is not a disaster. It doesn't harm you, it doesn't kill you, it doesn't do anything to you. Not everyone likes having long hair (I myself hate having long hair) and it doesn't look good on everyone either.
Saying that hair extensions are as bad as, or even worse, than real fur is totally insane. Do people die an agonizing death when getting a haircut? Are they skinned alive when getting a haircut? Yeah, I didn't think so either.
Nobody is getting 'exploited' in this whole thing as it is not something that harms people. Getting a haircut is not akin to being forced to do hard labor or being forced into prostitution. The reason why Indian women donate their hair is because their 'gods' tell them to do so. They don't care where the hair goes or what happens to it. It's called religion, and religions are weird anyway, all of them. I find it unfair that in some countries, people can't do their shopping on a Sunday because some god decided that shops must stay closed on Sundays. But is it exploitative? No. If the Indian temples choose to make some money with the hair, why shouldn't they? India doesn't have a social security system or anything of the like, therefore the temples can help the people with the funds raised from selling the hair.
Some women take their looks and everything that comes with them way too seriously. They really think that having short hair is a disaster. They really think that every woman must feel the way they do, everyone wants to be Barbie. Well you know what, get over yourselves and your long hair. If you want to do something ethical, stop eating meat, stop buying all the latest gadgets that will end up on the scrap heap in a year's time and stop buying cheap crappy clothes that just go into landfill. And remember, getting a haircut is not damaging, unhealthy or deadly.

La_Gordy · 15-04-2013 11:41am

Chris Rock made a documentary called Good Hair that focuses on hair extensions and the pressures of European beauty aesthetics on black communities. It's really interesting and like the Jamelia documentary described above shows agents sourcing the hair for free in India and the massive mark-up by the time it reaches the US.

Princess Peach · 15-04-2013 11:49am

5tratoca5ter wrote: »

First of all, getting your hair cut is not a disaster. It doesn't harm you, it doesn't kill you, it doesn't do anything to you. Not everyone likes having long hair (I myself hate having long hair) and it doesn't look good on everyone either.
Saying that hair extensions are as bad as, or even worse, than real fur is totally insane. Do people die an agonizing death when getting a haircut? Are they skinned alive when getting a haircut? Yeah, I didn't think so either.
Nobody is getting 'exploited' in this whole thing as it is not something that harms people. Getting a haircut is not akin to being forced to do hard labor or being forced into prostitution. The reason why Indian women donate their hair is because their 'gods' tell them to do so. They don't care where the hair goes or what happens to it. It's called religion, and religions are weird anyway, all of them. I find it unfair that in some countries, people can't do their shopping on a Sunday because some god decided that shops must stay closed on Sundays. But is it exploitative? No. If the Indian temples choose to make some money with the hair, why shouldn't they? India doesn't have a social security system or anything of the like, therefore the temples can help the people with the funds raised from selling the hair.
Some women take their looks and everything that comes with them way too seriously. They really think that having short hair is a disaster. They really think that every woman must feel the way they do, everyone wants to be Barbie. Well you know what, get over yourselves and your long hair. If you want to do something ethical, stop eating meat, stop buying all the latest gadgets that will end up on the scrap heap in a year's time and stop buying cheap crappy clothes that just go into landfill. And remember, getting a haircut is not damaging, unhealthy or deadly.

In a lot of eastern cultures long hair is seen as the ultimate sign of beauty, and can have an impact on a woman's life, such as marriage prospects. So having a shaved head can be damaging to their life and social status. Not only to mention what being forced to shave your head against your will could do to your mental health and sense of self.

The temples aren't selling hair with the donators' consent and aren't using it to benefit other people, just themselves. If they wanted to do it right they should inform the donators where the hair goes and give them the choice to share in the profit.

We live in a culture where getting a new hair style is sometimes akin to buying a new outfit. But in other cultures growing your hair long is what is important. And being forced to cut it for a few euro or nothing, when someone in Ireland is paying several hundred euro for it, is exploitation.

I choose lots of ways to be a better person and a moral consumer and I just wanted people to be more informed on one thing they may not have been aware of.

5tratoca5ter · 15-04-2013 12:03pm

Regarding hair collection in China: a friend of mine who is Chinese went home to China to visit her parents. She wanted to piss off her mom, so when she saw a hair collector in the street she decided to sell her hair. It was really long btw. The hair collector took a look and said, no thank you, because he deemed her hair to be unfit for purpose. So it's not even like they'll buy any hair out there.
Concerning the 'hair from dead people' stuff: Do you think dead people care? Is it ok to cremate (literally burn) them? Is it ok to bury them somewhere in the dirty earth? Is it ok to have someone they couldn't stand in their lifetime attend their funeral? And what about organ donation? Is that ok? Really? Hair is dead by the time it leaves our bodies on the surface, only the follicles are actually 'alive'. Organs, on the contrary, are not dead, but eerily alive and kicking when they are inserted into another person's body because modern medicine has completely lost the plot and uses people to execute vile eхperiments on them.
Using hair from another person is not a new thing anyway, it's been going on for centuries. Why is the wearing of a sheitel any different than having extensions? Is it because it's a religious thing so we should 'not judge'. And in what way is the wearing of a sheitel different from getting rid of your hair, both in the name of religion? One as lunatic as the other, but hey, it's the choice religious people make, and it ultimately is their right to do so.
I also find it disrespectful that we somehow pity the women donating their hair, although we don't pity people who can't shop on Sunday/ wear a scarf/don't eat this or drink that/ eat only blue Smarties etc. It's as if the Western woman channelled all that is unknown to her through her prisma-"I could deal with only eating blue Smarties, but not with having short hair".

5tratoca5ter · 15-04-2013 12:12pm

I once saw an Indian woman who had donated her hair at a temple for religious reasons in a documentary saying she didn't care where the hair went, and that after she was told it had been used for extensions. She made it very clear she would have never accepted money for something that is seen as a sacrifice to the gods. So the temples are not doing wrong, see above re social security etc. Many families go to the temples, ie mom, dad, kids and maybe grandparents etc, therefore the marriage prospect thing doesn't hold true at all. I would like to find a person who has been forced to sell their hair. And I don't think that there is a culture more preoccupied with long hair and 'sexiness' than the Western one.

Princess Peach · 15-04-2013 12:23pm

5tratoca5ter wrote: »

I once saw an Indian woman who had donated her hair at a temple for religious reasons in a documentary saying she didn't care where the hair went, and that after she was told it had been used for extensions. She made it very clear she would have never accepted money for something that is seen as a sacrifice to the gods. So the temples are not doing wrong, see above re social security etc. Many families go to the temples, ie mom, dad, kids and maybe grandparents etc, therefore the marriage prospect thing doesn't hold true at all. I would like to find a person who has been forced to sell their hair. And I don't think that there is a culture more preoccupied with long hair and 'sexiness' than the Western one.

The 8th paragraph of this article has a quote from a girl who was attacked for her hair and she speaks of other women she knows who were forced by husbands or blackmail to sell their hair.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2006/jun/25/india.theobserver

username123 · 15-04-2013 12:24pm

5tratoca5ter - with respect, I dont think you understand what is being objected to here.

Trivialising the issue or making an invalid comparison with other issues that affect women in the world - does not make unethical hair sourcing for hair extensions go away.

Any one of us is as entitled to object to unethical hair sourcing as we are to object to hijab wearing, blue smartie eating or anything else. But this thread is about hair - not other issues.

Perhaps you could comment on the articles that links are posted for and actually post some links yourself to back up your own claims?

5tratoca5ter · 15-04-2013 2:29pm

I am in the hair industry, so I guess I can comment on this topic. When it comes to the ethical sourcing of hair, everything is being thrown into the same cauldron- the hair donated in temples, the combings that come out of brushes and the women who are forced by their husbands to cut their hair. On a side note, I am pretty sure these husbands force their wives to do other things as well, but let's not get into this here. So really, it's not a problem of unscrupulous companies, but of bastard men. The hair that comes from the combs is waste anyway, it makes for the cheapest extensions, and I fail to see how children suffer from it. Trust newspapers to come up with sensationalist headlines! In another of the articles mentioned, the journalist is too stupid to know what a polymer is-she calls it a plastic-coated metal ring. She obviously did not attend school. Apart from that there are too many inaccuracies for the article to be taken seriously.
The main problem with extensions is that Western women want them for next to nothing, like everything else. If they were prepared to pay a decent price, there would not be this problem.
The only reason I even decided to comment on this thread, and what really outraged me beyond belief, was the post that said hair extensions were worse than fur. I repeat, nobody is being skinned alive for extensions. Nobody. Remember that, you animal hater.

meeeeh · 15-04-2013 2:44pm

A bit of overreaction here on all sides imo. But I do agree that in the centre of the problem is the desire to have something for next to nothing. 5 Euro t shirt in Penny's has to cover profit, shop overheads, transport costs, tax, insurance, advertising and cost of production and material. Even if there is no abuse it's clear it can't be produced in any other way than with paying extremely low wages. We would have to live in a lot more sustainable way to minimise exploitation of people in third world, hair extensions is just one part of a story. But there is no point in giving out about those people who use hair extensions and at the same time shop in Penny's or basically anywhere in the high street.

15-04-2013 2:45pm

5tratoca5ter wrote: »

I am in the hair industry, so I guess I can comment on this topic. When it comes to the ethical sourcing of hair, everything is being thrown into the same cauldron- the hair donated in temples, the combings that come out of brushes and the women who are forced by their husbands to cut their hair. On a side note, I am pretty sure these husbands force their wives to do other things as well, but let's not get into this here. So really, it's not a problem of unscrupulous companies, but of bastard men. The hair that comes from the combs is waste anyway, it makes for the cheapest extensions, and I fail to see how children suffer from it. Trust newspapers to come up with sensationalist headlines! In another of the articles mentioned, the journalist is too stupid to know what a polymer is-she calls it a plastic-coated metal ring. She obviously did not attend school. Apart from that there are too many inaccuracies for the article to be taken seriously.
The main problem with extensions is that Western women want them for next to nothing, like everything else. If they were prepared to pay a decent price, there would not be this problem.
The only reason I even decided to comment on this thread, and what really outraged me beyond belief, was the post that said hair extensions were worse than fur. I repeat, nobody is being skinned alive for extensions. Nobody. Remember that, you animal hater.

Wow.

Exploited women, bastard men, illiterate journalists, animal hater, and best of all, blameless extension manufacturers who are just profiting on the backs of that bastard men/women who are exploited anyway.

To be perfect clear, I will always think that the exploitation of a human being is immeasurably worse than the exploitation of an animal. I will always think that knowingly wearing the hair of another person, who's provenance you do not know, is as I originally said as bad as wearing fur, if not not worse.

What I do not support, and which is just one of your incredible assumptions about the intelligence of the authors of the article, the husbands of the women who's hair you glue to other peoples heads, and the companies who turn a blind eye to the origins of their profits, is the use of animal fur for fashion.

And I love animals so you can save yourself the outrage.

Princess Peach · 15-04-2013 2:53pm

meeeeh wrote: »

A bit of overreaction here on all sides imo. But I do agree that in the centre of the problem is the desire to have something for next to nothing. 5 Euro t shirt in Penny's has to cover profit, shop overheads, transport costs, tax, insurance, advertising and cost of production and material. Even if there is no abuse it's clear it can't be produced in any other way than with paying extremely low wages. We would have to live in a lot more sustainable way to minimise exploitation of people in third world, hair extensions is just one part of a story. But there is no point in giving out about those people who use hair extensions and at the same time shop in Penny's or basically anywhere in the high street.

I totally understand. Ask my friends about the guilt I have expressed for shopping in Penneys! I can't afford any better alternative though

But I don't think everything needs to be pooled together Just cause you shop in Penneys then you may as well wear unethically sourced hair, sure why not. If people can just make one better choice in their purchases, it may make a small difference.

15-04-2013 2:58pm

meeeeh wrote: »

A bit of overreaction here on all sides imo. But I do agree that in the centre of the problem is the desire to have something for next to nothing. 5 Euro t shirt in Penny's has to cover profit, shop overheads, transport costs, tax, insurance, advertising and cost of production and material. Even if there is no abuse it's clear it can't be produced in any other way than with paying extremely low wages. We would have to live in a lot more sustainable way to minimise exploitation of people in third world, hair extensions is just one part of a story. But there is no point in giving out about those people who use hair extensions and at the same time shop in Penny's or basically anywhere in the high street.

I don't know if I agree with the part I bolded.

I think any inroad you make in your life that minimises the exploitation of another is a good thing. If you don't get hair extensions and still shop in Penny's its got to be better than shopping in Penny's while wearing hair extensions

Even just choosing fairtrade coffee or tea helps improve the lives of the poorest people in the world. To borrow a line from Tesco, every little helps.

Edit: Princess Peach said it first, and more succinctly.

TobyRyan · 15-04-2013 3:10pm

If people are that desperate for human hair there is a vast room of it in Auswitch.

Western Ideology is the root of the problem. As long as it isn't Women in Western countries then no one actually cares.

15-04-2013 3:24pm

TobyRyan wrote: »

As long as it isn't Women in Western countries then no one actually cares.

If that were true this thread wouldn't exist.

I think a lot of people are walking around with hair extensions who gave no thought at all about how they were sourced, and who wouldn't get them again if they were aware of the issue.

I take your point though, but it's always going to be human nature to not think about the out of sight or out of mind.

The ethics of hair extensions

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