Why patriarchy fears the scissors: for women, short hair is a political statement

[DetlefK]

1. "short hair = damaged good" dates back to medieval times.

When a woman committed a crime that wasn't severe enough for jail or execution, but still bad enough so they had to get rid of her, she was banished from the town and her head was shaved.

This meant that having short hair automatically branded a woman as a "damaged good", as the varying classes of medieval society adhered to a strict fashion-code to show off their standing: peasant, merchant, scribe, nobility, criminal...



There was a similar punishment for men: If a worker was dishonorably expelled from a guild, his mark of membership, his ear-ring, was ripped out. This left him with a slitted ear-lobe. Accordingly, having a slitted ear-lobe became an indicator for men for being a criminal. (It's a metaphor still used nowadays in German for "likable" criminals.)