Child Abuse and When Unwanted Haircuts Become Torture

by Anonymous
(USA)

An visitor's opinion: 
I'm going to do the commentary that describes the haircut torture my awful parents inflicted just because they could and also because it was yet another way they could make me squirm all they liked. Why are so many parents so antagonistic to their children? Do you get haircuts you don't like? Well, why should your child? With so much other choices available, why turn something nice, pleasant and simple, such as getting haircuts when necessary, into yet another nasty punishment? How damaging it is for kids who can't even count on getting their grooming needs met! Imagine when you wake up with your bad hair day; what would you think of your parents if they insisted on only choosing the haircut that you hate and, if you didn't get one to their satisfaction, then decided to reschedule and then dragged you into the hair salon to get your hair cut the next day. That's just plain meanness -- if you really hated something when it's new, you're not going to like it when you get the same haircut again. But that's not the point, right? The point is to make children understand that they have no rights, that no one cares about them, that their hair is NOT their own, that their parents don't have any qualms in hurting them and that there's nothing they can do about it. Sick, sick, SICK!!!

When I was 16 or 17 years old, my parents tried forcing me to cut all my hair off; I did not want to cut any of my hair off; I wanted to keep it long and maintain it that way and I did not understand why I had to cut it off, just because I "wasn't behaving myself"; every time I refused, they would often hurt me. A few months later, they dragged me into a hair salon, where they made my mom's hairdresser cut most of my hair off. Later, when were were already going home after that (Nightmare! My beautiful hair was short now and I was horribly crestfallen), my parents said, "We hope your schoolmates laugh their a**es off when you come back to school because, next time, you should think before asking us for something!" I had hair extensions and while my dad hated me wearing them, I wore them to school anyway because I was ashamed of my short haircut. I never forgave them for taking advantage of me being young and helpless to get away with the abuse that would've most likely landed them into prison for a long time if they would've tried it with an adult, so what is your motivation of being cruel to the powerless, other than simply enjoying having the power of being as cruel as you like and get away with it like my parents always did? Just think about it next time you were about to have another hair-related battle with a child who doesn't happen to like haircuts or when you decided to force the child to obediently comply without question just by hurting that child.

That's a shame that most people think that children are somehow obligated to "forgive" their parents (no matter how abusive they are to the kids), "forget" and "understand" -- and then inflict the same abuse on their own children. I know for sure that not all children grow up willing to sugarcoat or simply excuse such clear, hateful abuse. Are you willing to risk lifelong estrangement from your children, just for the thrills of being cruel? Is being cruel that important to you? Food for thought.