No, I don't believe my subject line for a minute but when I've had short hair people have certainly thought I was a lesbian. I also remember an ex-boyfriend liking long hair on women much better. My hair doesn't really grow long and I certainly didn't want to do it just to please someone. I like the easy maintainability short hair offers which is why mine is fairly short, but not as short as when people thought I was a lesbian.

Jen at Semantically driven and Safari suit

There must be a term for this.  When you ask some ones opinion about something in the abstract - you get a different answer than if you asked about a particular case.

I'm sure if you ask some one "is long hair sexier on a woman" their answer says more about how they hope  other people will perceive them, than how they actually feel about specific women's attractiveness. 

Which is still revealing, but the data should certainly not be used in your own personal decisions about how to cut your hair :D.  

At various times I've shaved my hair very short.  At the moment, its very short indeed.  I look a LOT better with very short hair as I have a very long skinny face with a very tall forehead.  Long hair (which I've had) makes me look even more elongated and certainly not sexier.

Its always an incredibly liberating feeling having my hair cut so very short.  It feels as though my brain is getting more oxygen.  I would love to know if its all in my mind or if there is any physical change in your body when you have a hair cut.  Don't you also feel sort of energised, as though the old hair contained lots of bad old stale stuff that you can now get rid of?

 I sometime wonder if people assume I'm gay, as I have such short hair, am fairly bony-skinny and dress in jeans mostly and am also covered in tattoos.  I also wonder how I feel about such assumptions as I would certainly not be ashamed of being mistaken for a lesbian.  

Whenever I've had a haircut, people do ask me "but - what will your husband say?" and I can happily say - "Well - he cut it himself!"

I don't think that a woman cutting her hair indicates anything about whom she enjoys or fantasizes about having sex with.  The "problem" in the situation is that not all women 'have the right face' to carry short hairstyles.

If you don't have the right face for it, when you cut your hair short, you emanate androgeny or attempting to look like a boy... which many people interpret as "indicating that you're a lesbian".

Once again, the industry does women a diservice (as it does with makeup, weight-loss programs, fashions designed for drug-addict-sized women...) and acts like all of you look good in a short haircut because it's in the magazine this month.  It's just not true.  Each woman has her own style and looks best with a hairstyle that suits her.

Another issue is that women tend to cut their hair in an attempt to gain more respect in the boardroom.  This move is also interpreted as an attempt at feigning masculinity, so you can see where people might perceive women who look androgenous as "indicating lesbianism".

~ Bill
I blog at billcammack.com

Bald was fun! Seriously. People did not mess with me, which came in handy when bums tried to ask me for money. They didn't. Plus, I had more guys come up to me as it they were interested.

I went bald because I didn't have time to futz with my hair. It is also very sensual in the shower. Sunlight on my head, wonderful.

I learned a lot of underlying culture cues about femininity and socialization. For example, there were people who knew me that thought I had instantly had Chemo over the weekend. Some people did not talk to me. Others came up gingerly and asked if there was a problem.

No, I just had all of my hair removed from my head. My hair grows very fast so folks mellowed out after a week or so but my goodness, it is just hair. It does have the power to invoke what society implants in our heads what a woman is and how she is defined.

I've now gone the other extreme by dyeing and relaxing. I needed a change. Not a peep, not getting hit on by guys and I have to roll it up at night. Where is the love?

Gena - Out On The Stoop

BlogHer ads lately have featured a very sexy looking Ellen DeGeneris with medium-length hair. Compare that with the yogurt ads on TV now featuring the presumably straight Jamie Lee Curtis who manages to be very sexy with hair that is not only short but (gasp) gray. If you need my opinion, trying to equate hair length with sexual orientation is just silly. And rock on, Jamie Lee, thank you for the gray!

Virginia DeBolt
BlogHer Technology Contributing Editor
Web Teacher
First 50 Words

Who the hell cares what anyone thinks about your hair? Wear whatever hairdo you choose. Walk into a room - with short hair (or long)- and own it. That's power. Anyone who judges you based on your haircut clearly has issues of their own. 

The Moxie Report. Giggles. Gaffes. Girl Talk. From television producer, writer and mom Tracy Evans. http://themoxiereport.blogspot.com

I think, "Confident."

I admire women with short hair.  I can't do it.  I tried, and I felt exposed.   While I'm generally a confident person myself, I didn't realize how much I rely on having my hair as a little buffer between me and the world. 

WTF...When I had dread locs...folks thought I was lesbian. Now that I cut my hair to my scalp...I get the same whispering looks.  I think its because I am comfortable in my skin or atleast I exude that.   If a woman wants to cut her hair...its about HER wanting to cut her hair. If she digs it then all the noise is just...well noise!  Having an opinion about what women do with their hair is insipid. Who cares if you think she looks male, or female or somewhere in between.

There is power in going your own way. Whether its cutting your hair or wearing stilletos or none of the above. You see FREE WOMAN don't concern themselves with small opinions.

Besides cutting one's hair is quite liberating if I say so myself...and for the record I love men for sex...

Be loving & Be in LOVE

I had short hair in my early twenties. I cut it because I felt like experimenting with my looks. I now have very long hair that I almost always keep up in a bun. Men harassed me then. Men harass me now. I see no difference. And I don't like the assumption that everything a woman does, she does for men. It's ridiculous.

----

A Mommy Blogger and a Blogger For Hire

I used to hear that too, when my hair was short. Her and Ashley Judd. ANYWAY, I don't think that short hair means no sex, but it's very true that a majority of men think that long hair = "girly". My husband will tell you that he found me sassy and sexy with the short hair (though I made the mistake of going for a 1 inch pixie when I was pregnant and that was happy for *anyone* involved). But he also teased me about looking more like a girl than I did because his hair was (marginally) longer than mine. And once the hair grew out he confessed that he likes it better long, because that's a girl thing.

 *sigh*

And I have to also admit that when I wore my hair very short, I made sure I wore lots of makeup because I wanted to look very feminine.

http://mamafasha.blogspot.com my fabulous must-read blog ;)

http://MKSkinCare.myarbonne.com now with a contest through Jan. 31! Go!

I've had my hair so short I didn't even have to comb it and I've had it long. I've looke dhot in all of its iterations and I've looked bedraggled, disinerested, and decided non-sexy at every length, texture and color.

It's all in what you bring to the game. 

Some women have hair that does grow long.  Some women have never done the "silky" thing.  You can't tell a thing about a woman's head by what's on her head except whether it's clean or not.  Hair is  not ideology.  India Irie was primarily addressing Black women in her song but I think everyone can relate "I am not my hair." 

Sexy is as sexy does - no matter the orientation.

Stereotypes, sigh. I know plenty of long-haird lesbians! I also know women that look like what people "think" a lesbian looks like that are straight, married, have kids, etc. Basically the stereotype that lesbians (or gay men for that matter) are so different needs to end! Most lesbians and gay men are not like the stereotypes that we've been made to believe represent the gay/lesbian community.

Follow me - Artsy Crafter - on twitter

Like vered above me, up until less than a week ago I had seriously SERIOUSLY long hair. Like down-to-my-knees long.. so long that I managed to donate 17 inches of it to a company that makes wigs for breast cancer patients who could otherwise not afford one.

For most of my adult life, I wore it up in a bun. Do you have any idea how much freakin' work long hair is?? How much it costs?? And I am not talking dye jobs and  trendy streaks/foils, I am talking basic shampoo and conditioner.

When your hair is that long it gets into every freakin' thing. If I wear it out to a restaurant it had a tendancy to find its way into other people food. Hell, if I bent my head to slurp up some noodles, I looked like Cousin It and Nana Mouskouri's love child. 

Hair like that isn't even sexy in bed, despite what men would like to think. That damn stuff gets everywhere. It gets caught around, in, on and under all manner of body parts. Imagine being in the throes of passion, rolling around the bed, only to have 1/2 your scalp ripped numb, as your hair gets wound around the bed post. It's a serious passion killer

Don't laugh, it's happened to hubs and I on more than one occasion. Sex is only possible with your hair in "librarian mode"

I grew my hair long out of sheer laziness. It had nothing to do with my self-percieved sexuality, and everything to do with never having time to get it cut. So, for 20+ years I wore it in a bun for 95% of the time

LAst week I had it cut to shoulder length, and I am loving it! I look 10 years younger, I feel sexier, can now afford to have trendy things done with it. 

I'll NEVER go back to long hair!!

The best thing about short hair is that it doesn't get in the way during sex! No rolling over on it, no pulling (unless you're into that sort of thing), no catching, no having to put it up in a pony tail for...other activities. Yes, short hair totally rocks for that alone!

http://mamafasha.blogspot.com my fabulous must-read blog ;)

http://MKSkinCare.myarbonne.com now with a contest through Jan. 31! Go!

I'm so sick of the stereotypes. Who cares if a woman wears her hair long? If someone doesn't like it, and they are not said woman... then what exactly are they going to do about it? It is just talk, and ridiculous at that.

Hair length has nothing to do with sexual orientation. If a woman or a man, even, wants to wear their hair long or short... so be it! More power to you, IMO. :)

www.babyheaton.blogspot.com

When I saw the title of this post, I thought back to our conversation at Walker's last month... about the hair stylist who scolded TW for wanting her hair cut short because... "what will your husband say?"

What's annoying about that is that it isn't the first time it has happened to her.

Hair stylists should KNOW better, shouldn't they?

~Denise
BlogHer Community Manager

Flamingo House Happenings

Great post, Suzanne! I love my long hair but people assume I'm straight. I need a "dyke" shirt, I reckon.

SJ

Blogher Pop Culture Editor | I, Asshole

My first reactions was "What!?"

I first got my hair cut super short when I was in grade seven. I grew out my hair again for prom, mostly because my mom and other people hated my hair short. I also grew it out because my then boyfriend said he liked long hair.

Then I graduated and went into nursing school. My hair was very long, curly, and I absoutely HATED it. It was frizzy, unmanagable without a crapload of product in it, and took forvever to get ready in the morning. I was forever wearing it in a ponytail or bun to work.

Finally, two years ago I had had enough. After months of disasterous cuts by salon professionals who kept giving me the "triangle" effect, I had given up. But when I walked into this one place just to get a trim, I asked the girl about curly hair and short cuts. She asked what I meant, and I told her all about my bad luck so far. She then went on to explain to me how she specialzed in curly hair because she herself had curly hair, but had cut it short and straightened it now. So after she told me all about how she could cut it, I looked at her and told her to go for it, I was ready. By then my hair was pretty long, about halfway down my shoulders. She asked me twice if I was sure and I told her "It's about time". So half and hour later, I looked up into the mirror.....and it was pure relief. A nice short pixie type cut that was cute and I loved it. I have never gone back to having my hair long, and never will. For me, cutting my long hair was like cutting off that subservient part of me that always wanted to please other people with my looks, and now I was standing up and being true to myself. I love my short hair, and so does my current boyfriend and my mom has admitted that I look better with it short. My short hair in no way has any connections to my sexuality.

Oh, and just for the record, it  is in no way "subconsciously indicating that she does not want sex?" My boyfriend can attest to that!

I used to have very very (past my tush) long hair, and people made assumptions about me, too (hippie, simple).  I think, as a woman, the shorter your hair gets the more intimidating you get to some people who need clear delineations to spare them the pain of having to actually think.

I once heard a man say that a woman is not a woman if she doesn't have long hair. Maybe a good portion of society believes that as well. I just got my hair cut last week and I felt liberated in a way. Now, it's not cut boy short and is still a good length; but this to me (and others that know me) was a huge haircut because I have always had very very long hair. I feel sexy with the cut. Yet, I felt sexy with the long hair. It think it all depends on a woman's confidence when it comes to if she can work a short or long do. I don't know if shorter hair alone makes a woman more itimidating. It seems like society is always finding something that is, in it's view, "out of the norm" for a woman as itimidating. So a woman who is business savvy, is highly educated, has her own house, isn't married, doesn't have any kids, oh, and let's not forget the short hair is intimidating. When oh when will our society evolve?  

Oh, how strange! I grew up with a mother and grandmother who have always had short hair, as well as a father who was constantly trying to get my sister and I to "do the Wynona," so it has always been more of a style option than any form of statement.

The closest I got was chin-length when I was around 19: it looked fabulous and was very easy to maintain, which was a plus considering I was living on a tropical island. But I never thought of it as indicating anything other than style. Some women like it long, some like it short, some go back and forth, some try crazy cuts, sometimes it coincides with what their partners want and sometimes it doesn't and in the end, it all grows back and you get to get creative again.

Ah, assumptions. My hair is now past my shoulder blades, I wear it parted to the side and blown out so it cascades in a mass of generic, un-highlighted brown. I wonder what that says about me?

Wow! I find this artilce really interesting. I had never imagined you could draw this conclusions from how a woman wears his hair. In my experience I find that men in my group of friends and work environment prefer long hair in women. This is unanimous. I think culture has a great deal to do with this. I live in Buenos Aires, Argentina and women are considered much femenine if they wear they hair past their shoulder blades. We do have some really sexy models who wear it really short. But they are really much the exception.

Ciel at http://advice-woman-2-woman.blogspot.com/