Because subversion isnt always flat-out rejection it comes with staking claim to your agency.
Cyrus Veyssi(they/he)
Throughout my life, I wore my hair pretty short.
I didn’t really express my gender identity until college.
Courtesy of subjects / Allure
So in some ways, hair is a form of protection too.
Our curls are so historic and so cultural.
I have degendered the hair on my body.
Courtesy of subject / Allure
I can still be very feminine and still be very hairy.
I walked into the public restroom of my dorm and just chopped my hair mid-neck length.
So I think that haircut [made me feel gay] and I havent looked back since.
Courtesy of subjects / Allure
The first time I cut my hair with the intention [of queercoding] was my junior year.
But personally, I feel like both [cuts] are very queer.
Like when I had it longer with bangs and a little color.
Courtesy of subject / Allure
There’s always this really delicate middle ground I’m always trying to achieve.
So you sometimes dont get it as short as you want it.
I just want to tell them, “It’s fine if you make me look like a dyke.
Courtesy of subject / Allure
Don’t worry.”
I mean, my longer hair with green in it was pretty fucking gay.
And the white kids I grew up with would always make fun of my hair.
Courtesy of subject / Allure
Having kinky, coily hair was a struggle, and something I still struggle with finding pride in.
I’m much better than I was when I was a kid.
It had a really big impact on me coming into my transness.
Courtesy of subject / Allure
Im going to do hormones, the whole nine."
It really did start with my hair.
Im going to do hormones, the whole nine."
I’m just lazy.
It’s easy to just get braids, and not have to worry about it.
This past year [during the pandemic], I’ve done my hair more than ever before.
And I really don’t mind it, but I just dont have the energy.
Prior to that, I was wearing twists, and they grew out very quickly.
The people who were struggling to see me in my transition kept seeing “me before.”
It was the middle of Missouri, there are Neo Nazis.
Its a very racist, Christian, right-wing place.
But when I was baby trans, my braids were my saving grace.
They made me feel safe.
They made me feel affirmed.
So it felt like this incredibly liberating “fuck you” because I could control this thing.
It’s all about this control and agency over my own body.
Then going into the salon world and learning how to do hair became the opposite balance.
How do we not exert control, but let this live?
Look at me in this way."
I have gotten to a place where there is one haircut that feels like home.
It has to be this perfectly layered thing.
Where it feels like home is when you get to advocate for yourself.
and closer to “How can I celebrate what its already doing?”
I’ve moved away from, ‘How can I make my hair do what I want it to?’
and closer to, ‘How can I celebrate what its already doing?’
In beauty school, I had a UIC freshman who had come in after her first breakup.
She came in and said she wanted to fully bleach her hair and put any fantasy color in it.
It reminded me of me.
And when I came out, I especially wanted long hair because I didnt want to be stereotyped.
So for the next month, I debated and asked everyone I knew.
Originally, I cut it short.
But if, say, a straight person had that haircut, people wouldnt question it.
I knew when I still had long hair.
I just think that a queer haircut is an affirming haircut.
I don’t think it has one look.
If you’ve ever had that experience of being like, “Ohshit.
Grainne McCormick(she/her)
I always wanted to cut my hair super short in high school.
I loved short hair, and I loved the concept of girls who just cut all their hair off.
But in high school, there was a thing.
Now she’s less pretty.”
And it’s like, why are you reacting like that?
But high school was the first time I cut my hair short.
But I just wanted the short hair and wanted to chop it off.
And since then Ive been testing different hair ever since.
I always felt like I wanted to come off as more masculine than I am.
I really like feeling more masculine than I am.
So I always used my hair to take a stab at dip into that feeling.
But then I’d look at long hair and think, “Maybe I want that, too.”
That was something I’ve always thought about over the years whenever I get a haircut.
I can mesh every feeling into my look.
I don’t have to pick a side I don’t have to choose.
I can just get a haircut, and that feels like home."
I recently ordered these dumb cheap extensions online, and I was like, let me play with this.
My hair has not been that long in so long that I just wanted to see.
I think it stemmed from boredom, but I was like, “Oh wait a minute.
Long hair is still so pretty.”
It’s fun to treat hair as an accessory.
I’m always absorbing everything around me, whether it’s my environment or what I like.
It’s definitely a very playful thing.
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