Trevor Laffan: You’ve heard about sexism and ageism...what about baldism?

Those of you who know me will be aware of the fact that I am severely challenged in the follicle department. I don’t have a thatched roof or any head insulation so in layman’s language, I’m bald as a coot. I can’t remember when it started to become a thing, but it must be close on 30 years now since I started losing it.

I haven’t been to a barber or a hairdresser in a very long time because even in the days when I used to need haircuts, my late sister Jillian did it for me. She was a hairdresser and back then I would call up to her for a trim.

She passed away in 2005, but she was cutting my hair since the mid-eighties until I no longer required her skills so it’s over 40 years at least since I needed a barber. I bought an electric hair trimming machine instead with all the interchangeable heads. I gradually discarded them and now I just use with the actual blade.

The first time I did that was a mistake. I still had some hair then, and I had meant to give myself a number two, but I forgot to put on the attachment. That error left me with a track of baldness up the side of my head. I had no choice then but to continue with the blade but when I was finished, I was quite pleased with myself.

I’ve been doing that ever since and it has its advantages. I don’t have to leave the house when I need a trim. I don’t have to make an appointment or queue up and more importantly it doesn’t cost me a cent. My buddies tell me they can pay anything from €15 to €30 for a cut. Not me. I just whip out my gizmo, and I’m done and dusted in a few minutes. Never need a comb or a hairdryer either.

Fortunately, losing my hair never bothered me but I can appreciate it can be a problem for some. Particularly for women suffering from alopecia or those who lose their hair from medical treatment. Thankfully there are people who can help with that now.

They’re called trichologists, which is a new word for me. They deal with hair issues or more specifically, the lack of hair. They help with hair loss, hair breakage, oily scalp and scalp psoriasis.

If they were around in Roman Times they might have prevented the advent of the comb-over - that attempt to disguise baldness by dragging the thinning hair from one ear across the naked scalp to the other ear. It’s done to conceal baldness but all it does really, is draw attention to it.

Some scholars have suggested Julius Caesar sported a comb-over. According to a Roman historian, “Baldness was a disfigurement that troubled Caesar greatly since he found it was often the subject of the gibes of his detractors. Because of it, he used to comb forward his scanty locks from the crown of his head.”

These days, some men still favour the comb-over or a variation of it. Donald Trump seems to have invented a unique style due to his own aversion to baldness. “Never go bald,” he is reported to have once declared. “The worst thing a man can do is go bald.”

Baldness wasn’t always popular here either. In 1996, an article in the Evening Echo reported that researchers had decided that going bald for most people was no fun. They arrived at that conclusion after speaking to men and women who had little or nothing on top or had receding hairlines.

Statistics, they reported, revealed that over half a million Irish people over the age of 15 experienced some hair loss which could be devastating from a psychological point of view. Those affected could experience anything from mild depression to acute embarrassment and-in some cases the affected person could stop going out altogether. And that’s not all.

We’ve heard of sexism and ageism, but could there be such a thing as baldism? In 2000, a German study sent CVs to prospective employers with photos attached. In some, jobseekers had full heads of hair. Others had been photoshopped to make them look bald. With crushing inevitability, despite their identical professional experiences, the fully haired candidates were picked for interview more often.

The same goes for love. In 2021 Canadian researchers asked women to describe the personalities and traits of several men, some with hair and some without. Again, the bald men were generally judged to be less successful and friendly. Small wonder that, in a 2022 survey of bald and balding men, three quarters claimed to have had less luck than their hairier friends when it came to dating.

As depressing as that may sound, none of that research would encourage me to go to the lengths some men go to in order to have a hairy bonnet. The Sunday Times wrote about one guy who twice a day, in the morning and in the evening before he goes to bed, stands in front of his bathroom mirror and applies six drops of a solution that is supposed to stop him from going bald.

He buys the drops online for £35 a month. He had googled hair transplants but decided it was “too extreme.”

Many others too are still trying different methods to prevent the full male pattern loss. Lots of them say they don’t want to look like their dad which sounds a bit harsh.

I can’t say that though because my dad still had a full head of hair when he died and so did his father before him.

On a positive note, it’s become trendy again to have a shaved head so I’m back in the game as far as fashion stakes are concerned.