Female Idol Shocks By Debuting A Completely Shaved Head

The story:

Now, a female idol has made a big change involving her hair!

Recently, XG announced that they would make a comeback, dropping the first teaser featuring member Cocona on May 16.

Viewers were shocked when the video appeared to show the idol shaving her hair. Though they were were surprised, many found the imagery very cool and a way of highlighting female empowerment.

However, many were not sure if the head shaving was real or not…that is, until their opening concert.

XG kicked off their first world tour, The first HOWL, in Osaka, giving fans a look at them in person. From the concert’s opening Cocona’s new hair style was apparent, showing off her completely shave head.

The star looked gorgeous throughout the show, the lack of hair seeming to emphasize her visuals even more.

Pink’s Daughter Willow Debuts SHAVED HEAD in Dramatic Transformation! | E! News

A friendly reminder that there is no one ideal age to rock a buzz cut or shaved head. It's just a matter of personal preference.

In China, Women Are Defying ‘Beauty Duty’ — With a Bold Haircut

 

Buzz cuts of varying lengths are trending in China as well:

When Song Jiaqian passed the Teacher’s Certification Exam last year, she treated herself to an unconventional yet daring reward: She got a buzz cut.

So bold was the 23-year-old’s choice that she had to delay getting it until after securing her government job in Shandong, the eastern province known for its Confucian values and traditional way of life. She even asked colleagues if anyone had been fired for drastic changes in hairstyle, but fortunately found no precedent.

“People are always saying that you should look like a woman, but what does that even mean?” Song told Sixth Tone. “I am a woman. And I look like a woman, because I am one.”

Her decision reflects a growing trend among young women in China, where long hair is often associated with femininity and beauty. While some are now choosing to buzz their hair off to challenge traditional standards and promote gender equality, others simply find it practical and low-maintenance.

Their reasons notwithstanding, the style is quickly catching on, with more and more women ditching long locks for a shorn style. Says Song: “Why do girls have to listen to others and be gentle and quiet, and obedient in particular? I just don’t want to obey the rules.”

Over the last three years, a group on the social platform Douban, called “Women’s Buzz Cuts are Super Cool,” has gained a considerable following.

Established in March 2021, the group now boasts more than 4,500 members. It also includes three sections: “questions before buzz cut,” “posts after buzz cut,” and “anti-beauty duty and male gaze.” It offers women who have a buzz cut or are planning to get one a safe space to discuss their choices and support each other.

Buzz cuts emerged even earlier on the lifestyle platform Xiaohongshu. Starting in 2019, several posts show women flaunting buzz cuts in a bid to inspire others to “boldly make a change.” Song was one of them. She is still active on the platform and now shares her experiences to encourage others.

As Chinese society continues to grapple with beauty standards, buzz cuts are just one of the many trends helping women push back.

I shaved my head to avoid ‘beauty pageant’ with Paige VanZant before becoming UFC champion – now I’ll try to win flyweight title

 

For athletes like Rose Namajunas, shaving her head is simply practical. She has kept a very short buzz cut since her 2015 fight with Paige VanZant. She it easier to train and to compete without hair getting in the way, and she's had a successful career.

From the article:

"Why not do it to keep the focus on the fight so I don’t have to worry about training, then rinsing off and washing my hair, then drying it off, making it all pretty, doing my makeup, then getting ready for interviews and pictures and then having to go back to training and putting it back up.

“I just want to focus on the fight and figuratively and literally cut out as much as I can.

Indeed.

Shaving Their Heads as a Form of Protest

This footage is from a few weeks ago in front of the UK Parliament building. A group of women shaved their heads in solidarity with Palestinian women. As the protesters observe, many women in Gaza have resorted to shaving their heads due to severe shortages of water for washing or even drinking. This is not the first time a group of women have organized to shave their heads as a form of symbolic protest. A number of women in West Virginia shaved their heads in protest of a surface mining project in West Virginia that was going to do serious damage to the environment. Similarly a wave of Iranian women shaved their heads in protest of the brutal beating that led to the death of Mahsa Amini for violating antiquated rules requiring women to cover their heads in public. Readers of this blog can probably find plenty of examples of similar actions. Although these acts of protest in and of themselves won't affect any policy changes, they do serve as a public reminder that a significant segment of a population is frustrated by government actions or inaction. The plight of the Gazan civilians is mindbogglingly awful, and many Western governments continue to enable an unfolding human rights catastrophe, including famine as civilians remain targets after six months of war. The women who shaved their heads may not end to violence, but it does show that they are willing to stand and be counted, and that matters.

Buy Me a Coffee

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I am still on hiatus. One way to motivate me to post new content, or to simply show appreciation for what I have put into this blog so far, is to support me a bit. You can, for example buy me a coffee. Doing so means that I can freely spend time looking through YouTube and TikTok to find content appropriate for this blog. Thanks.

These 4 women have had alopecia since childhood. Their hair loss doesn't define them.

As society normalizes discussions about this autoimmune disorder, it's clear that the challenges extend beyond physical hair loss. Many carry a psychological burden, feeling as though they don't conform to society's beauty ideals. Insider spoke to four women who, as adults, are redefining their relationship with their hair, showing us that beauty encompasses so much more.

Read more here.

Note that this blog is still on hiatus, but it would be remiss not to highlight Alopecia Awareness Month.

Fifteen Years

Happy Anniversary!

This blog's first post was published on August 5th, 2008. There were no blogs focused on videos of women who shaved their heads or were bald due to conditions like alopecia. So, this blog filled a very unique niche. YouTube was new back then, and there were no influencers at the time. 

One of the first posts was a video of a woman with alopecia who talked about normalizing bald heads on women. It's still one of my favorite videos. Over time, this blog would share videos of women shaving their heads, discussing life with alopecia, pros and cons of having a shaved head, shaving and scalp care advice, makeup advice, music videos, ads, GRWM videos, and some of bald women just going through part of their daily life. Sometimes news articles and columns were posted. Even the occasional artistic website got featured here. I tried to make sure there was adequate representation, including videos from different continents, different languages, ethnicities, ages, etc. This blog was intended to be as body neutral as possible. 

I took plenty of breaks. Early on, that had to do with lack of content. These days, there is an abundance of content. Since mid-decade last decade, time to do proper maintenance has been a problem. I took an extended break between 2017 and 2019. I have been posting quite a bit since. The 15th anniversary seems like a good time to take another extended break. Traffic has dwindled since 2021, when this blog was averaging about 5,000 unique visitors per month. Even that was a fraction of what traffic was like at its peak around 2015 or 2016. I have wondered if this blog has more or less served its purpose (which would be a good thing). I'll periodically log on and check for dead links. Otherwise, I think it is time to step back and make some decisions in a few months about this blog's future.

Hopefully you find value in what is already in the blog's archives, and hopefully this blog helped to normalize shaved and bald heads on women.

I shaved my head bald and it's been the most liberating decision of my life

I meant to post a link to this article earlier. 

Although my decision initially plagued me with undercurrents of fear and anxiety, I felt as though a huge weight had been lifted off my shoulders. I could finally be unapologetically me. I was optimistic about the future, eager to explore my femininity through aspects beyond my appearance and re-define my own personal perception of beauty.

Fast forward six months, I have discovered new realms of self-love and now understand that the need to establish ourselves beyond societal expectations is crucial. Beauty is honestly skin-deep and sometimes it takes being vulnerable to obtain the truest version of ourselves. I loved my hair but I knew that I couldn’t depend on it. I now know that when it comes to my appearance, the only opinion that matters is my own.