Western hairstyle?

[manchild]

What is western hairstyle for men, can someone define it?

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18381614/

TEHRAN, Iran - Iranian police have warned barbers against offering Western-style hair cuts or plucking the eyebrows of their male customers, Iranian media said on Sunday.

The report by a reformist daily, later confirmed by an Iranian news agency, appeared to be another sign of the authorities cracking down on clothing and other fashion deemed to be against Islamic values.

"Western hair styles ... have been banned," the newspaper Etemad said in a frontpage headline.

It came a week after police launched a crackdown against the growing numbers of young women testing the limits of the law with shorter, brighter and skimpier clothing ahead of the summer months.

Under Iran's Islamic Sharia law, imposed after the 1979 revolution, women are obliged to cover their hair and wear long, loose-fitting clothes to disguise their figures.

Violators can receive lashes, fines and imprisonment.

The student news agency ISNA quoted a police statement as saying: "In an official order to barber shops, they have been warned to avoid using Western hair styles and doing men's eyebrows.

Iranian young men have in recent years started paying more attention to the way they look and dress, especially in affluent parts of the capital Tehran. Spiked up hair, by using gel, is known as the Khorusi (Rooster) style and some also use make-up.

Several hairdressers for men in Tehran offer cuts in the style of Hollywood movie stars and other Western celebrities. Clients can also have their eyebrows plucked.

Barbers could face losing their permits
The head of the barbers' union, Mohammad Eftekharifard, said police had instructed it to "exercise specific regulations in barber shops that work under its supervision."

Barbers who do not follow these rules might be closed down for a month and even lose their permits to operate, Etemad quoted him as saying.

"Currently some barber shops apply make-up and use (hair) styles that are in line with those in European countries and America," Eftekharifard said.

He added: "An official order has been sent to the union ... not to apply make-up on men's faces (or) do eyebrows ... and hence the barbers are not allowed to do these things."

Since hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad won the presidency in 2005 promising a return to the values of the revolution, hardliners have pressed for tighter controls on what they consider immoral behavior."

According to Iranian authorities all of us in the Western world have same hairstyle. So we are all short-haired-curly-punytailed-long-medium-short-bold-cherokee-punk-dreadlocks-army-bowlcut styled and they are what? What is non-Western hairstyle?

Red Khmers are getting real rivals in Iran authorities when it matters fanatical counter-West politics.

This might sound as a joke but I really do feel sorry for all those people in Iran who are slaving away under such regime. Imagine where the rest of the human rights are when even hair style is something that can get you in jail or beaten to death.

[allan]

f.... retards
what kind of a god would care about my hair cut???? although hearing about those stupid acts drives me crazy, all we can do is sit, and laugh at those poor people...

[checkered]

I certainly hope

my "do" qualifies as Western. Perhaps, just to be on the safe side, I'll go and purchase some of that secular, decadent and thoroughly corrupting cationic polymer compound - better know as hair gel. Do you think Paul Mitchell, Pantene or L'Oreal are "heathen" or "infidel" enough? I'm not sure, I haven't had to consider these sort of things before.

But there's no chance of me wearing makeup, ever, let's just call that an unfortunate and involuntary nod towards the governments of theocratic republics. Metrosexual, as far as I'm concerned, still only means doin' the nasty (or things leading to it) within the confines of a city that has one million inhabitants or more. Nothing to do with manicures or accentuating one's rugged masculine jawline with shading.

Staying on that subject of embellishments of the jaw, I'm pretty sure I've seen many clerics with dye (mostly henna, I presume) on their beards. Surely that has solid practical grounds and has nothing to do with appearance, fashion or vanity? And on a slight aside, I find myself wondering whether under the logic of rules governing facial hair it is forbidden or compulsory for a bearded lady to shave?

Curiously, clerical clothes are apparently design items in contemporary (I hesitated about the term “modern”) Iran, tailored with intricate folds, thought out detailing, functionality and sewn of the finest quality fabrics. But of course, there's just no point in comparing what figures of moral and governmental authority are doing with their appearance with the actions of impressionable youth who are simply ignorant and need to learn some respect.

http://dir.salon.com/story/mwt/feature/ ... .html?pn=1

Misfortunes are many and varied, some more surprising than others. Naturally impeccable male eyebrows must veer towards the more unusual hereditary conditions with adverse social ramifications. Since Iran has a booming homegrown cosmetic surgery business, at least the wealthy can go and have implants done to get an adequately "bushy" (No, not that Bush! Although Ahmadinejad, at least to me, bears a passing resemblance to W ...) appearance. I'm sure the most business savvy doctors already offer the operation, propably heartily embraced by the morality police in some appropriately upbeat and cheerful TV commercials.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/5391910.stm

But still, I have to say, given a choice between an occasional lashing and getting eyebrows styled a la Leonid Brezhnev circa 1970, I might just grin and bear through an occasional religiously themed S&M session. Should I be personally in charge of organizing facial hirsuteness scrutinies and the penalties that go with the lack thereof, I'd just opt for a simple "pluck'n'pay" tax and be done with it.

I mean, it must take serious research to get the enforcement part right. People doing it must carry eyebrow templates and if one wants to be meticulous and equitable, quite many of those templates are required for the many sizes and shapes a human face is expressed in. We wouldn’t want to groundlessly discriminate against anyone like, say, the small faced. Right? Also, hair product and makeup test kits must be developed, which, in the age of such borderline products as self tanning moisturisers can also easily get overly complicated and costly.

The requirements for a male-specific brow hirsuteness/beauty product inspector (M-S BH/BPI in short for future reference) must therefore be something in the order of a degree in genetics, physiology and chemistry – or perhaps there’s a separate postgraduate faculty for that in some Iranian university. Man, I wonder what the salary range for an M-S BH/BPI is? It could be very lucrative indeed. And imagine the bragging rights, having the badge to show around your friends, being part of a select few, an elite so to say.

The good news about all this investment is that resources clearly are diverted from weapons programs and such that are such a worry for, well, everyone within a certain ballistic reach. A capable nuclear scientist must make for a terribly frustrated eyebrow inspector. Iran must also be losing out on tax revenue as hordes of desperate barbers hide their rollers, curlers and driers as far underground as the government has dug their finely tuned and wildly spinning, although completely benign, centrifuges.

The median age of Iranians is below 26. If the youth of a country represent its future, Iran will soon enough have a big and diverse one indeed. In the end, this endlessly indecipherable World keeps surprising us all, by its logic and its folly. Despite my brand of (boredom inspired) irony here, I wish everyone, and I stress everyone, well and am confident that those subjected to different rules, arbitrary or not, can exist and find personal happiness in ways that don’t conflict with those of others.

For wherever we live, under whichever rule, paraphrasing a famous H. C. Andersen fairytale, the emperors themselves tend not to have those proverbial clothes. That is one of the most profound and eloquent parables every future leader should have heard at least once before ascending to power. It is also very beneficial and uplifting reading to any subject of any administration.

You couldn’t spend ten minutes of your time much better:

http://www.andersen.sdu.dk/vaerk/hersho ... hes_e.html

[DaveKillens]

When you strip away the superficial differences, the thread is common. Be it fundamentalist religious right, or dictatorship, fascism, or any other groups that are intolerant of others, their way is the only way, and everyone who strays from their dogma is just plain wrong. This is a very common malady of the human condition, and practiced almost everywhere. Yea, I would have problems if I went the metrosexual route in downtown Tehran, but then again I'd have a rough time if I dressed up like a muslim cleric and became a card-carrying member of the communist party in any community in the USA.
The oppression of freedom of action and thought is everywhere, it's a constant battle.
Those in power want to stay in power, and a key is to keep the system the same as when they took control. And those in power usually have no reservations destroying or persecuting those who do not toe the party line. (or admire the Emperor's new clothes).

[manchild]

Yea, I would have problems if I went the metrosexual route in downtown Tehran, but then again I'd have a rough time if I dressed up like a muslim cleric and became a card-carrying member of the communist party in any community in the USA.
The oppression of freedom of action and thought is everywhere, it's a constant battle.

Technically yes but you're forgetting that dressing up as metrosexual is a matter of choice while dressing up as Islamic law imposes is not a matter of choice but also part of repression. Man (especially woman) in fundamentalist Islamic countries don't dress up like that because they like it but because they have to dress up like that to avoid lashing, going to jail or even death.

People from the middle east who have moved to west and who are not burdened by threat to their family in their homelands dress completely different which proves that people in countries like Iran just don't have freedom and what they do is not their choice.

This choice thing is important because respecting and being politically correct to some of the practical manifestations/customs/attitude these people demonstrate without analyzing if they do it on their own free will or not actually means respect and political correctness to their oppressors.

Imagine situation from 1943 for example and people from the free world saying "we must respect yellow David's star Jews wear on their clothes because it is just something they do" regardless on fact that they were forced to wear it by their oppressors just as today people in Iran are forced on certain fashion and hairstyles by their own oppressors.

[mx_tifoso]

Another story relating to that. It is a recent update, which I just accidentaly happened to find a moment ago.

http://news.yahoo.com/s/afp/20070722/wl ... 0722152958

- Iran is to launch a new crackdown Monday on slack dressing that targets both men and women whose clothing and haircuts are deemed to be unIslamic, police said.

The police will act against those whose trousers are too short, have skin-tight coats, shirts with Western logos and Western hairstyles," said Ahmad Reza Radan, the head of Tehran's police force.

"We will ask those arrested where they bought their clothes and where they had their hair cut so those outlets can be closed down," state broadcasting's website quoted him as saying.

Radan said anyone arrested would receive a warning and have their name added to a list. "If they reoffend, there will be no pardon."

Since the drive began in April, thousands have been warned and hundreds arrested across Iran for failing to adhere to the country's Islamic dress code, its toughest such crackdown in years.

Women in Iran are obliged to cover all bodily contours and their heads but in recent years many have pushed the boundaries by showing off bare ankles and fashionably styled hair beneath their headscarves.

Some women still don figure-hugging coats and skimpy headscarves despite the April crackdown. By renewing the drive, it appears the police want to send a message that they are serious about enforcing the dress rules.

Many conservatives have applauded the crackdown as important to protect the security of society, but moderates have publicly questioned whether Iran would be better off tackling poverty and crime rather than slack dressing.

^What the last sentence says would solve a lot more problems than that extreme "unIslamic appearance" law if you ask me.

skimpy headscarves

When you actually say that, you know it's taking it too far .
Poor women.

[Scuderia_Russ]

I'm all for embracing other cultures etc. but this country really is nuts. They are about 2/300 years behind us in many respects. Especially when they stone women by burying them up to their neck and have their village throw stones at their head. Not just any stones though, only the ones that will prolong their miserable death for as long as possible. Sick!

[FLC]

That is only the tip of the cruel, black, crazy stick of the people who run that country.
I'm sorry if this will be too much for any of you, but I've seen movies showing 5 year olds being held by adults on the ground as cars(!) run over their hands as a way of punishment (I think that particular one was accused of theft), people with their eyes covered being thrown off of bridges and buildings, some, I suppose, for doing what these articles talk about, heads cut off in the streets with swords and what not... I think that's enough...
This country is determined to get a nuclear bomb and is only a few years from actually getting it. The western world is considered a threat in their leaders' eyes (although I'm pretty sure most of the people aren't sharing the same views), and who knows what they might do.

[West]

I'm all for embracing other cultures etc. but this country really is nuts. They are about 2/300 years behind us in many respects. Especially when they stone women by burying them up to their neck and have their village throw stones at their head. Not just any stones though, only the ones that will prolong their miserable death for as long as possible. Sick!

You thought that was bad...