Baldness in Our Social Media World – Part 2

In Part 1 of this topic, we covered some of the activities found when looking through social media sites for videos or discussions about balding. Looking at the big 3 of Facebook, Instagram, and TikTok, hashtags can be used to search for just about anything. #BaldIsBeautiful and #AmIBalding are just a couple to get started.

Messages of support, desperation, hope, and sympathy, to name a few, can be found in the posts and reactions. All human emotions and levels of intelligence show up as well, so viewers beware. We see people in every stage of baldness, from curiosity to early signs to “this is really happening to me.” Here is how some choose to interact with the topic:

1. Humor – This involves balding men and women at a stage of their journey where humor is their default response to being noticed as a bald person.
   1. Boys Club – Men asking for advice from other men going through the same thing. They’re using humor to cope by joking they have more hair on other parts of their body than their head, all while seeking community interaction.
   2. Self-Deprecation – Topics like “Why you should date a bald man” come to mind. Let’s play along. Why should you date a bald man? Because they don’t borrow your brush, curling iron, hair dryer, expensive shampoos, etc. Social media is full of tongue-in-cheek posts poking fun at themselves.
   3. Familiarity – Jokes about baldness have been around for decades. Legendary comics Don Rickles and Bob Hope made good money from poking fun at the hairless. There is still an audience for all types of humor, even the demeaning or self-deprecating, whether we agree with it or not.
2. Cancer Support – Parents sometimes post videos of shaving their own heads in support of their children undergoing cancer treatment. Even volunteers or celebrities buzzing their hair off for awareness for St. Jude children is a form of support involving baldness.
3. Lists – One of the more popular posts involves listing the most beautiful bald people. We love our lists. We love comparing and opening discussions. It gives traction and exposure to the posts and likes. It creates engagement. A recent poll listed the following men as the most attractive bald men in entertainment (in no particular order):
   • Bruce Willis
   • The Rock (Dwayne Johnson)
   • Morris Chestnut
   • Jason Statham
   • Shemar Moore
   • Vin Diesel
   • Denzel Washington
   • Taye Diggs
   • Tyson Beckford
   • Pitbull
   • Stanley Tucci
   • Patrick Stewart
4. Hair Choices and Wardrobe – Another form of engagement comes from a content creator showing their bald head to the camera, embracing the freedom of it. Others show hairstyles like wigs and head coverings. Hats, scarves, and other fashion accessories are shown to either accentuate the lack of hair or sometimes to hide it.
5. Reactions – A large percentage of social videos are of someone filming another person reacting to something for the first time. In this case, seeing your bald head in the mirror, seeing a friend’s shaved head, or even the reaction of your proud new hair transplant are all commonly found posts out there. The emotions behind the reveals usually bring tears of some kind.
6. General Thoughts – Some users are here to narrate their thoughts out loud. A favorite of some comes in the form of stating what a lot of people feel. The process of balding can look very undesirable, whereas the completed stage of bald is usually the opposite. Meaning someone who is performing comb-overs or flaunts their thinning hair is not nearly as attractive as someone who has made a definite decision regarding which way to go – full bald or hair transplant, according to public opinion anyway.

We check social media for information and trends about different hobbies, ideas, questions, concerns and just for our overall curiosity. There is a large community discussing hair transplants, balding, and all related topics. There’s an online group of people there to offer advice on all of it, trust me. Just be warned that it’s mostly opinions discussed, but may be worth seeing how others are coping or what actions they’re taking. Feel free to schedule a consultation if you want medical options from a professional staff. Don’t be anti-social – come visit us!