Is long hair less popular now? Looking to immerse myself in all things long hair

[Emila]

Hi there. I'm pretty new around here. I hope my topic here doesn't offend. I'm sorry if it's inappropriate.

I am really loving this community and am learning heaps. However, I'm noticing that the majority of the content is quite old. I think this forum may have been a bit more lively 10-15 years ago or so. I often click links only to find that they no longer work. Pictures are often missing. I can't help but feel a little disappointed that there's a lot I can't access. I found the hairstyle directory for example, very few of the links work in there now.

I have googled to find more long hair resources but I always seem to get very generic women's beauty magazine type websites that aren't actually geared towards long hair in the way it's seen here.

Is long hair getting less fashionable now? Do you think that's why?

I feel like I may have found a niche that I'm quite interested in but I'm finding it harder to immerse myself in it than I would like.

Apart from this community, I have found some YouTube vids that I've been enjoying, but again many of them are quite old videos and I worry they might not be up forever.

What's a newbie to do? Is this "problem" something I'm imagining or inventing? I wish there was a bit more modern content for long hair. Am I just not looking in the right places? Are there any key words I should keep in mind, for searching? Are there more resources in languages other than English that I'm not finding?

Please feel free to give me your opinion on this, offer any advice if you have any to give, or share any resources or websites if appropriate 😊

Thanks heaps 😊

[ArtOfNoot]

You are not imagining anything, there are so many awesome haircuts flying in and out of style that long hair is less popular. There is definitely a larger quantity of short to medium hair content on the internet. The LHC is still going strong (albeit less now that we have exited the heyday of niche message boards) and there is so much content from past threads that I have found myself falling very deep into various rabbit holes during my free time.
Many Indigenous nations pride themselves on their long hair and there are some hair-care content from Indigenous creators. There is also quite a bit of historical hair care content on youtube that usually features long hair.

[tuanyiji]

It depends on how you define "long hair", to most non-LHC'ers, APL is long, and MBL might be "very" long hair, and those lengths take the majority of female hair length in modern society.

I used to think like that as well, and my idea and goal of long hair changed drastically ever since I joined the forum, I first just wanted tailbone length, then classic, then knee, then well, terminal, I just want a crazy length that's got a WOW effect.

Growing long hair is one of the slowest hobbies in the world and it takes time and effort to grow those precious locks, and in the fast-paced modern society, most people just don't have the patience nor the genes to reach those "impossible lengths" like knee length and floor length, even in LHC, those are very rare, check out our annual survey and you will see the data more clearly.
https://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=155735
https://forums.longhaircommunity.com/showthread.php?t=155736

And while growing long hair, people get other things to do, life, work, study, and hobbies... even you yourself joined the forum in 2015, yet you only had 5 posts so far, so you're not an active member who frequently takes part in conversations and posts pics, maybe one of the many lurkers who just don't like to share private things, which I fully understand, as we all know, there are many creepy dudes online and longhairs often attract unwanted attention.

As far as I know, most of the long hair YouTubers are a member of LHC, but they might no longer be active here or even on youtube.

And I think many members go through these phases as well, active, lurker, active again, lurker, no longer visit... go on with their life. Grow hair, cut hair, grow again, life happens, trauma, hair loss, grief... especially in this pandemic.

To me, for a forum with about 20 years of history, it's amazing that there are still people here posting new things everyday, not just hair-related, but other aspects of life as well (we do have a non-hair friendship board, I wonder if you've ever noticed?), so this is already very active. And the admins have gone to great lengths to keep the creeps and ads at bay and provide us with a "green" environment.

If you want to surround yourself with longhairs on a more visual (or visceral) level, you can go to Instagram and follow a ton of big long hair model accounts, but be prepared to get a lot of commercial hair product plugs/placements, not-so-modest poses and dresses, and salacious comments sections. I did that in my hair-crazed phase and just don't see the point of getting hair envy there anymore.

So, if I don't like certain things, I either accept it, do nothing, or do something about it, and that's why I create what I would like to see for myself in the long hair community.

I try to focus on producing my own hair content (https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRnJz1hMj708vd1vnCbdcW_zqruiIUCjO), making hair tutorials, and working on bun variations to make my long hair journey more durable and enjoyable. I'm also an active member of the traditional Chinese hairstyle scene and there, tbl hair is very common. I don't have to update every day, I just do them when I have free time, the less stress, the better for my own hair. Also, this helps build my video/photo archive and contribute to the LHC hairstyle thesaurus, that way, our future members will get tutorial links that are actually accessible. And I make sure there are right-handed and leftie-friendly versions for each style, I even make Chinese and English captions for all my videos, so people from around the world can use my tutorials as reference.

To me, growing my virgin hair to terminal means, to some degree, sacrificing a certain aspect of common things that I could no longer partake, like using hot tools, combs/brushes, elastic ties, or chemically dying my hair, heck, I don't even use shampoo that much, just once every 4-6 weeks, and I rarely let my hair down and loose, I bun 99% in my waking hours.

Benign negligence is the best hair care and by now my haircare routine is so minimal that it actually gives me more time to do other stuff. Many of you know I am a hair shed collector who makes hand-tied wefts/extensions, woodwork for hairstick/forks/hairtoys, and I just dipped into the world of hairwork with mourning rings/hair locket/bracelet/flower/wreaths, but on the non-hair-related side, I'm really into dragon fruit gardening, Zentangle, and Hula Hooping.

Hair might grow long but life is short, enjoy it while you can.

[maborosi]

You aren't imagining it, no. But it's not just a problem with long hair info, it's a huge problem with gathering information on the internet, too.

1) Forums by and large have gone by the wayside in favor of things like Reddit and Discord- they've successfully hollowed out a lot of longstanding internet communities. Plus, you have info being shared on things like Instagram and TikTok, etc., which are not searchable via Google- they're in their own walled garden platforms, making it hard to find info.
This forum has actually done quite well in its 20 years and is still quite active. However, this wasn't the only forum for long hair, though I think it's still the most active. Others have just...vanished. Plus I think that there have been server crashes here and such, so a lot of the info doesn't actually go all the way back to its founding in 2002- there's a lot of lost information.

2) Searching with stuff like Google is awful these days. When I first began growing long hair, you could get a lot more info just from google search. Not so much any more. There are flat-out just fake sites that get promoted to near the top (listicle-type sites, content scraped and patched together, weird-sounding articles that don't really answer your question). It feels like it's harder and harder to find things like personal blogs. Same story with Youtube. It is extremely difficult nowadays to search Youtube and find things outside of the promoted/sponsored videos, or videos made by influencers. The platform nudges you toward those, and away from organic content.

Last point, long hair goes in and out of style, and it does so rather quickly. (Fast enough that it'd be impossible for most people to grow and keep up!) I have never really paid attention to the trends- you have to keep them kind of out of sight if you really want to grow long.

This community is an invaluable resource and there are a ton of knowledgeable members here. It's probably one of the better places on the internet for gathering long hair info.

[lapushka]

Welcome! :)

[shelomit]

Howdy! I'm afraid I don't really have enough historical perspective on hair sites/info in particular to answer your question, but I'd echo maborosi in saying that contemporary indexing practices are making it harder and harder to find any type of specialist content online.

[BVU]

A lot of it has to do with instant messaging apps. I'm in a few long-hair discord servers, and they're very lively. Forums are not nearly as popular as they once were, and that can show for any topic, not just hair. Hair also goes 'in' and 'out' of style very often. Right now its 'out' and short mullets are in, but within the next 2-3 years long hair will probably be back in, and people will likely join the forum for more direct and real information than YT or Tiktik.

[Shorty89]

You aren't imagining it, no. But it's not just a problem with long hair info, it's a huge problem with gathering information on the internet, too.

1) Forums by and large have gone by the wayside in favor of things like Reddit and Discord- they've successfully hollowed out a lot of longstanding internet communities. Plus, you have info being shared on things like Instagram and TikTok, etc., which are not searchable via Google- they're in their own walled garden platforms, making it hard to find info.
This forum has actually done quite well in its 20 years and is still quite active. However, this wasn't the only forum for long hair, though I think it's still the most active. Others have just...vanished. Plus I think that there have been server crashes here and such, so a lot of the info doesn't actually go all the way back to its founding in 2002- there's a lot of lost information.

2) Searching with stuff like Google is awful these days. When I first began growing long hair, you could get a lot more info just from google search. Not so much any more. There are flat-out just fake sites that get promoted to near the top (listicle-type sites, content scraped and patched together, weird-sounding articles that don't really answer your question). It feels like it's harder and harder to find things like personal blogs. Same story with Youtube. It is extremely difficult nowadays to search Youtube and find things outside of the promoted/sponsored videos, or videos made by influencers. The platform nudges you toward those, and away from organic content.

Last point, long hair goes in and out of style, and it does so rather quickly. (Fast enough that it'd be impossible for most people to grow and keep up!) I have never really paid attention to the trends- you have to keep them kind of out of sight if you really want to grow long.

This community is an invaluable resource and there are a ton of knowledgeable members here. It's probably one of the better places on the internet for gathering long hair info.

100% agree. The information is more dispersed and hard to find. Plus, I think there's a lot more people who purport "ways to get longer, thicker hair" that are just selling products. That makes it harder to find the good info. As for pictures, there are a couple issues. We had "the great crash" a number of years ago that deleted the really old posts from around 2007-2008. Plus, most of us used to use Photobucket. But now Photobucket pics are behind paywalls. There is a go-around with an add on, at least on Firefox. It's called LHC HTTP Image Fixer but I'm not sure how to link it.


And I think many members go through these phases as well, active, lurker, active again, lurker, no longer visit... go on with their life. Grow hair, cut hair, grow again, life happens, trauma, hair loss, grief... especially in this pandemic.


Definitely. I have phases where I'm busy or what not and I mostly lurk. Then, I do something like host the swap and I'm on all the time. :lol: It definitely ebbs and flows.

In general, I think long hair hasn't been the norm, at least in Western society as a whole since around the 1920's or 1930's where shorter, styled bobs became popular. Back in Victorian type times, we think of very long hair. I think it was a mix of Christianity (a woman's hair is her crowning glory) and culture. I think shorn hair in Greek culture was associated with slaves so you didn't want short hair. I'm not sure if that association was that strong in England or in what era. I know that long hair was associated with youthfulness and having long hair put up was seen as good and proper. Young girls wore their hair down or in braids. Women wore their hair up. You can see that even in Little House on the Prairie where Laura wishes to be old enough to wear her hair up. Sometime in the 1920's, I think it was, styles began to change and the bob became fashionable. Wearing your hair down became the default and that made it necessary to wash it more often to get rid of styling products. More frequent washing and the advent of easier to use styling products (electric curling irons, etc.) meant that it was harder to grow long hair without damage. Plus, wearing super long hair down means more damage. Basically, society changed the default from "hair up" to "hair down", added more accessible hair dye, styling products, and even extension and all these changes made it possible to change your hair frequently and that became the fashion. I'm sure there's a more detailed (and correct) explanation somewhere on the internet.

[lapis_lazuli]

I don't think long hair is any more unpopular now than it was 10 years ago. The problem is forums are dying out and it's so sad. No social media provides the same experience and I truly value what we have here at LHC and appreciate the people keeping it running.

As far as accessing old content...
>A lot of pictures are missing due to Photobucket discontinuing free hosting. There are browser extensions you can download that will fix the links and make them visible again.
>Try the Wayback machine for archives of other broken links.
>Use Google to search for LHC content by putting site:forums.longhaircommunity.com before your keywords.

And if there's anything else you can't find, don't be shy about asking! New posts, threads, and discussions keep the boards active and help create new resources.

[Stagecoach]

I'm a long time member here, and I think like others mentioned, a few things have happened.

I think the biggest difference is when LHC was rocking busy things like TikToc, Instagram, even Facebook and such were not nearly as popular, and way more of us spent a good deal of our time here. Nowadays, there are far more platforms that dilute our time.

As to the picture issue, thats frustrating but really just how it works with the dramatic shifting in digital services that the last 20 years has seen.

[LongLocke]

I’d also say that there was a slight surge in growers from the early pandemic when salons were closed. But as soon as people could start shearing their heads, too many did. I’m surprised that more people didn’t stick it out and just let it grow

[embee]

If you really only have 5 posts, then you can't see much of the material that is here. Keep posting here on MANE and soon you'll see the other (larger) part of the forum. It's a bit confusing since your join date seems to be 2015...

The photo thing is horrid, and not the fault of this forum at all. Many photos suddenly went behind paywalls or simply went away altogether.

[MusicalSpoons]

If you really only have 5 posts, then you can't see much of the material that is here. Keep posting here on MANE and soon you'll see the other (larger) part of the forum. It's a bit confusing since your join date seems to be 2015...

That's an excellent point, you should be able to see a lot more once you've posted more to unlock permissions. Some of our still active threads are very old but very long (appropriately enough) so I don't know if you're just starting all the threads from the beginning and not seeing things because of broken links - the newer pages on threads should have less of that now people use image hosting sites that aren't Photobucket.

I would say if anything long hair is more popular at the moment than it has been for some years, in the mainstream at least. Some of the old members with the longest hair are a lot less active than when they were intentionally growing, now they are settled into a routine and their hair is just an everyday part of their life. But a lot of the variance in activity is due to the change in the social landscape on the internet as well.

I'm not sure why links in the hairstyle thesaurus aren't working for you, it's a relatively new resource so the links and material haven't had that long to die/be lost!

[Bat]

Hi there. I'm pretty new around here. I hope my topic here doesn't offend. I'm sorry if it's inappropriate.

I am really loving this community and am learning heaps. However, I'm noticing that the majority of the content is quite old. I think this forum may have been a bit more lively 10-15 years ago or so. I often click links only to find that they no longer work. Pictures are often missing. I can't help but feel a little disappointed that there's a lot I can't access. I found the hairstyle directory for example, very few of the links work in there now.

I have googled to find more long hair resources but I always seem to get very generic women's beauty magazine type websites that aren't actually geared towards long hair in the way it's seen here.

Is long hair getting less fashionable now? Do you think that's why?

I feel like I may have found a niche that I'm quite interested in but I'm finding it harder to immerse myself in it than I would like.

Apart from this community, I have found some YouTube vids that I've been enjoying, but again many of them are quite old videos and I worry they might not be up forever.

What's a newbie to do? Is this "problem" something I'm imagining or inventing? I wish there was a bit more modern content for long hair. Am I just not looking in the right places? Are there any key words I should keep in mind, for searching? Are there more resources in languages other than English that I'm not finding?

Please feel free to give me your opinion on this, offer any advice if you have any to give, or share any resources or websites if appropriate 😊

Thanks heaps 😊

You also only have 5 posts more pictures will start showing etc when you get past 25 posts, you might find more content pictures will present themselves the more you interact here C:

[Emila]

Hi everyone, thanks so much for offering your thoughts on this topic. I have to admit I was a little worried about asking in case I came across as “putting down” this forum – this is not my intention at all. I really like what I have seen on this forum and am a little sad I wasn’t around here much before!

I apologise in advance that this reply will be a giant wall of text!

Firstly, I think I should clarify that I did join this forum at one point in 2015 – I have had an interest in growing long hair in the past! But I don’t remember joining and must have joined and promptly forgot about it, and I only rediscovered the forum recently. So, while I did join a while back, I really do feel like a total newbie here!

I can really see how the internet has changed in the last 20 years. You’ve raised valid points about how these kinds of forums are not really the way things are done online these days, especially with social media platforms changing how we all connect. I think many of you have hit the nail on the head with this observation! I am 37 years old and as someone who started using the internet as a teenager, I can remember frequenting music forums back in the day! Now I am starting to feel quite out of the loop – like social media is changing so quickly and I can’t keep up! I do use Facebook and Instagram but nothing else really. Getting acquainted with this forum recently has made me realise how much we miss out on when using modern social media. Yes, we get the short videos and images which are very direct and to the point – but with all the algorithms and commercialisation we seem to have lost a lot of depth and organic content as maborosi put it… and less exposure to everyday people’s content, if that makes sense.

I suppose the definition of long hair in the western world is different to how it is defined here. I live in Australia, and anything below armpit length would be considered quite long. I don’t see many people with longer hair here, though they do exist! I wonder whether very long hair (ie waist and beyond) is less popular here than it is in other countries. I know that it is quite tricky to find hair toys here, there are some on Etsy but the majority of nicer ones seem to be outside Australia.

I get that long hair is a slow hobby and therefore people probably don’t focus on it constantly. I suppose I have been one of those people for a while now! (I kind of gave up on getting longer hair up until recently because I found that I couldn’t get it to grow beyond hip length and I didn’t realise there were things I could do about this, but now I’ve found out I can do something my interest has ramped up again!)

I have found some LHC people on youtube! I have been enjoying Torrinpaige, Haartraum, 4ypn0tica, and Long Hair Carolyn. I think they are LHC people, sorry if I’ve got it wrong! I have been very sick lately so I’ve been kind of watching and reading a lot online because I’m too sick to do anything else!

tuanyiji – you mentioned the non-hair friendship board. I have looked around the forums a lot but I never found this board. It might be that I’m still learning where to find things around here. Or maybe because I don’t have many posts yet, my access might be limited, I’m not sure. I would love to join in because it would be nice to connect with other long-haired people in Australia 😊

I agree with you tuanyiji – it really is amazing that this forum is still here and still active despite the internet changing so much! Not many other online communities would have survived the test of time and the changing internet and social media trends! I am very thankful that it is still here because it’s so amazing and I think it would be hard to find out about growing my hair longer without it.

Tuanyiji, thanks so much for sharing the link to your videos, I will subscribe and enjoy watching them! I love that you have decided to create content that is in line with your interests and values and not dictated by the commercialisation of social media.

It’s interesting how longer hair lengths are common in some cultures – like indigenous cultures mentioned by ArtofN00t and the traditional Chinese hairstyle scene mentioned by tuanyiji. I am personally not connected with any traditional or indigenous culture, other than the culture of being white and raised under a western worldview. I am interested in learning from cultures other than my own. I wonder what is the reason why white western culture does not seem to be recently associated with longer hair? I wonder if anyone has studied it or speculated on this? Maybe Shorty89’s explanation on how hair and social norms have changed in the last century from hair up to hair down is related to this. I really enjoyed this explanation and how hair down flowed on to hair washing and styling norms. It’s very interesting!

Maborosi, I’m glad I’m not alone in the challenge of googling! It seems that google is also commercialised somehow. I suppose these changes reflect how capitalism seeps into everything and drives it. Its kind of an interesting occurrence, but also frustrating and not great for us long hair enthusiasts – I wonder what other niche interests are getting swallowed up by this phenomenon.

Shorty89, Thanks for explaining the issue with photos – the crash and photobucket challenges! Thanks makes a lot of sense.

Lapis_lazuli , I agree it is sad that the forums are dying out! I really like them too. Especially this one. This is kind of why I posted this topic – not because I want to criticise this forum, but because I really like it! I really appreciate you tips for accessing old content. I am going to give those recommendations a try!

I wonder if the LHC has communities on other platforms like facebook? I would join. But at the same time, I wouldn’t like to see more diluting of this platform and less reasons for people to stay here!

I will try to post more to unlock permissions! Thanks embee, MusicalSpoons and Bat! I will try to post more, but because I’m a newbie I don’t often know how to weigh in on topics because I don’t know much just yet! I’m also trying to get used to how the forum works. I have been doing a lot of reading but not much posting 😊 I’m so excited to reach 25 posts and see more pictures lol.

[Bat]

Seeing the pictures is the best part! We also have off topic threads as well if you struggle with just hair topics

[Todd]

We're all just fortunate this forum is still here and as active as it is. I've been on so many great forums which withered and died over the last decade plus-or-minus (on all sorts of subjects, not just hair). Actually, most of them weren't about hair at all. This new era of social media (Facebook, Instagram, Tiktoc etc) just don't measure up, with their endless scrolling, terrible searching and archiving capabilities, etc. And often when a forum does die, it is because it was replaced by a bunch of overlapping and often-competing Facebook groups and then everyone wonders where everyone went and the sense of community that used to be there is gone.

[Ylva]

I believe there is a good chance that forums will make a comeback. Maybe in the exact same form, maybe in a slightly different form, but as with most things, trends come and go in waves, but after a while with the new thing, we realise that some older things simply work better for a specific purpose, or remember the good features that are unique to that particular format. Look at vinyl sales, for example! Companies are even producing new vinyl players at this point. So we should just keep our community going as strong as we can, and a second wind will happen sooner or later. As mentioned by many, today’s social media lacks a lot that traditional forums have.

[GoatLady]

I’d also say that there was a slight surge in growers from the early pandemic when salons were closed. But as soon as people could start shearing their heads, too many did. I’m surprised that more people didn’t stick it out and just let it grow

I am a "pandemic grower" who has stuck it out. Can't say it has saved me money. I just take the money that I'd be paying for haircuts and spend it on hair toys. :rolleyes: But, for me, long hair is much easier to care for.

Speaking of hair toys, there were so many more makers and options back when I first joined the forum, back in 2011. I miss having all of that variety. Selection seems to be quite limited now. One thing that was surprising is that flexi-8's have morphed into the whole Lilla Rose thing, with "stylists" (independent salespeople, similar to Avon or Mary Kay, etc...). Back when I bought my first flexi's (pre-2014) it was off a little website with a limited variety of choices.

[solocricket]

Tbh, for me the thing I like about very long hair is that it's counter cultural right now, both in looks and in thwarting current beauty standards and pressures! So, if it's not mainstream popular, that doesn't really bother me at the moment.

Additionally, I am also in my 30s and I miss old internet, it absolutely was better in terms of community, archiving, etc. and not made to be as explicitly addictive as social media is now.

[Brandt]

I would love to see statistics showing the average length of hair by year (can be separated into "categories"--male, female, or even by nation). That way one could see trends (though perhaps the standard deviation would be more telling--a higher standard deviation would generally indicate more people with long hair and short hair, versus medium length).

While I might be biased having long hair now, I think hair length, at least for men, has gotten longer in the past few years. Perhaps the pandemic played a role (my last haircut was January 2020--though I was considering growing my hair long regardless), but it just seems like there are more men now with long hair. Heck--even Trevor Lawrence, the Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback, has long hair, and I've noticed other NFL players with long hair lately (in a sport where hair isn't usually a highlight since it's usually covered up with a helmet)--as well as in other sports. Compare that with, say, the 2000s when (for men) hair was rather conservative overall, and fewer men had long hair.

Not as sure about women though, except that looking back at the 1960s and 1970s, long hair seemed to be more common then among women (then the 1980s had more big hair, even though I think that got more attention--a lot of women I remember then actually didn't have big hair). Of course, long hair on men has typically been more counter-cultural (which I am myself in at least some, but not all ways) than with women. Thinking of men, long hair was probably most common in the late 1960s and 1970s with a resurgence among some in the 1990s before going shorter in the 2000s.

[angel-baby]

Like others have said, I think forums have just gotten less popular now that there's Tiktok, IG, Pinterest, etc.

I for one will always love LHC just because I actually have people to talk to about my hair goals and slight obsession. No one I know in real life is as invested in my hair journey as I am (and why would they be?) so it's great to have a place where we're all growing together and are all interested in having the healthiest long hair possible, even if all of our goal lengths and haircare routines are different.

For inspiration, tho, I spend a lot of time on long hair tiktok/hair care tiktok, IG, and Pinterest. Super long hair is definitely still a thing that people are chasing, and a lot of the newer platforms have their own version of long hair "communities" also.

[sarana]

Like others here, I much prefer LHC as a platform. I have tried following Reddit's r/longhair, but it's just not doing it for me. It's full of random sexy selfies and guys with barely shoulder-length hair, and while there's nothing wrong with those, it's just not very relevant when you want to find informative discussion about growing to waist and beyond

[Ada-banana]

I am a "pandemic grower" who has stuck it out. Can't say it has saved me money. I just take the money that I'd be paying for haircuts and spend it on hair toys. :rolleyes: But, for me, long hair is much easier to care for.

Speaking of hair toys, there were so many more makers and options back when I first joined the forum, back in 2011. I miss having all of that variety. Selection seems to be quite limited now. One thing that was surprising is that flexi-8's have morphed into the whole Lilla Rose thing, with "stylists" (independent salespeople, similar to Avon or Mary Kay, etc...). Back when I bought my first flexi's (pre-2014) it was off a little website with a limited variety of choices.
This is so relatable, I don't pay for haircuts anymore. But I spend a lot of money on hairtoys, shampoo and scissors.


Like others here, I much prefer LHC as a platform. I have tried following Reddit's r/longhair, but it's just not doing it for me. It's full of random sexy selfies and guys with barely shoulder-length hair, and while there's nothing wrong with those, it's just not very relevant when you want to find informative discussion about growing to waist and beyond

Same, I feel there is so much knowledge here. At Reddit they are less extreme and less knowledgeable.

[WednesdayAddams]

I feel like hair is getting "longer" again, at least if exensions are any indication.

[Bri-Chan]

I feel like hair is getting "longer" again, at least if exensions are any indication.

I feel this way, in real life at least! In the last years (also pre covid) and where I live, I'm sure hip/bcl hair wasn't so common in 2016/1017 as now. It's not something so unusual.
I think that forums are "off". I've always enjoyed forums and the way they connect people, but it's since 2011 at least that they are basically dead, with few exceptions (like this one).

[LongLocke]

While I might be biased having long hair now, I think hair length, at least for men, has gotten longer in the past few years. Perhaps the pandemic played a role (my last haircut was January 2020--though I was considering growing my hair long regardless), but it just seems like there are more men now with long hair. Heck--even Trevor Lawrence, the Jacksonville Jaguars quarterback, has long hair, and I've noticed other NFL players with long hair lately (in a sport where hair isn't usually a highlight since it's usually covered up with a helmet)--as well as in other sports. Compare that with, say, the 2000s when (for men) hair was rather conservative overall, and fewer men had long hair.

When the league made it legal to tackle someone by use of their hair (the Ricky Rule essentially states that hair is treated the same as a jersey for purposes of tackling), that likely cooled a lot of people from growing out. Teams even tried to ban long hair at their level but players opposed it enough that I don't believe any team owner was able to force a ban.


Like others here, I much prefer LHC as a platform. I have tried following Reddit's r/longhair, but it's just not doing it for me. It's full of random sexy selfies and guys with barely shoulder-length hair, and while there's nothing wrong with those, it's just not very relevant when you want to find informative discussion about growing to waist and beyond

r/longhair is a mess IMO. You hit the nail on the head that it's essentially a bunch of karma baiting selfies or dudes who's hair barely touches their ears asking "what do I do with all this hair?" I have found a few informative posts. My night time protective style came from a reddit post. But they are few and far between. I try to go out of my way to be informative to the one or two posts a week asking for help and information.

[lapushka]

The internet has changed so much that my phone co. is "upgrading" to fiber cable. Only, those with regular phone lines would have to have their house broken up (their drive for sure), and inside the house: same, because it all needs replacing. Who is gonna do that. On top of that they say they will only "support" the old lines for 4/5 more years. Now here's the kicker, and those who can't have their entire house in shambles? I mean who's gonna do it? Only the new builds and those are rare since there's a "beton stop" (concrete stop), so no more land can be built on. So there we are. Means I'm gonna change providers! I have to, I have no choice. That's the state of things now. In other words, things do not necessarily improve is all I'm saying.

This forum also went through quite some changes. First there were a lot of members with really extreme (knee) lengths and then sulfates and silicones both were frowned upon; it was like a different lifestyle. These days it's a YMMV thing and change is welcomed and accepted. So that means this forum is also more populated with people with short(er) lengths when before they were very rare until they had some length to speak of, literally and figuratively.

Back then I don't think I'd have lasted 2 seconds. :lol:

[BVU]

I think theres starting to be a resurgence of forums. Ones that I am a part of have been a lot more active lately with new users, mostly gen z. Very interesting. :hmm:

[lapushka]

I think theres starting to be a resurgence of forums. Ones that I am a part of have been a lot more active lately with new users, mostly gen z. Very interesting. :hmm:

Wait. Gen Z, is who, again? I forget. LOL!

[LongLocke]

Wait. Gen Z, is who, again? I forget. LOL!

The new youngins

[mochichichi]

The new youngins

Not so new! GenZ starts in 2000-ish give or take 5 years depending on who you talk to. The older GenZ folks have already graduated from college. There's already a new generation growing up.

[BuddhaBelle]

I think theres starting to be a resurgence of forums. Ones that I am a part of have been a lot more active lately with new users, mostly gen z. Very interesting. :hmm:

As a fellow, albeit older, gen Zer I’m all for the resurgence of forums. I miss browsing random forums sooooo much.

I also think, not a criticism of the forum, as the design isn’t very mobile friendly I could see this putting “younger” people off too.

[MusicalSpoons]

Not so new! GenZ starts in 2000-ish give or take 5 years depending on who you talk to. The older GenZ folks have already graduated from college. There's already a new generation growing up.

Yeah, Gen Z are digital natives (Zoomers) who came after the Millennials. I think the current children are Generation Alpha.

There's only 7 years between my sister and myself but she's culturally Gen Z, I'm a Millennial. We had the same parents, same home, went to the same schools (at different times) but had different childhoods.

[LongLocke]

Not so new! GenZ starts in 2000-ish give or take 5 years depending on who you talk to. The older GenZ folks have already graduated from college. There's already a new generation growing up.

My oldest is a Gen Z (he was born in 2002). My middle child was born in 2011, which puts him in the tail end of the generation i believe. My youngest is in gen alpha

[BVU]

As a fellow, albeit older, gen Zer I’m all for the resurgence of forums. I miss browsing random forums sooooo much.

I also think, not a criticism of the forum, as the design isn’t very mobile friendly I could see this putting “younger” people off too.

I'm younger Gen Z. We didn't really grow up with forums (Other than reddit.... or 4chan shudder:)

[lapushka]

I think I may be... gen X. :lol:

[Todd]

I think theres starting to be a resurgence of forums.

I am all for that. I've been on too many forums that migrated to Facebook, and that's never ended well.

[Emila]

I'm excited for a resurgence win forums too! I miss the old internet

[Lady Stardust]

Wait. Gen Z, is who, again? I forget. LOL!

You and I are Generation X, best is Generation Y/Millenials, then Gen Z. I’ve just realised I pronounce that I’m my head as the American Z (zee) and not the English (zed) :)

I was watching a 90s tv programme yesterday and everyone has shoulder length hair, and it made me think of this thread. I think that long hair is more popular these days.

ETA: Sorry for some reason I didn’t see the last page or so of posts :)

[BuddhaBelle]

I'm younger Gen Z. We didn't really grow up with forums (Other than reddit.... or 4chan shudder:)

Eurrrrgh 4chan. I didn't get to do it often, but I vividly remember stumbling upon weird forums in the late 2000s. I also had a brief foray into browsing pretty dead forums in the late 2010s too, lol.

[jlw9222]

I love this place. I've been around here for a very long time and used all the information I could to grow my hair to a wonderful length that I was able to maintain for years. I drifted in/out for awhile after I reached my goal. January 2022, I chopped my hair off to well above shoulder length (without crying) and loved it for about three months. Now I'm back once again for motivation while growing out my hair yet again. I can only assume others have done the same. I for one am happy this forum is still here. Everyone here is so wonderful & encouraging.

[Vara La Fey]

In browsing Pinterest for hair inspo last year, I saw a LOT Insta influencer reposts and general sexy models and selfies where the hair is waist+. Beach girls, car girls, motorcycle girls, clothing models, etc, from all over the world, and especially the Orient where it seems to have always been in style. Based on all that and on the younger Latinas here in the southwestern US, I'd say that long hair is in the middle of a huge resurgence. Globally. Newer tv shows is another example, where so many actresses have long flowing hair.

Re forums, the internet has been grinding longer/detailed attention spans down to almost nothing. New social media is built on immediate and brief gratification and is built on extremely limited platforms. Sh*tter (err, I mean Twit) likely started that. There's plenty of internet space for all types, and I certainly spend time on Pinterest these days because it's an addictive rabbit hole if ever there was. But if true Learn-Something conversational forums go out of existence as populations age, then I fear for the world because the new stuff is blatantly and deliberately anti-intellectual. It's built for "smart"-phones and for outbursts of immediate and thoughtless whims. You can see this in the comments on Youtube, Sh*tter, Insta, almost everywhere now.

It will be tragically ironic if we abuse our communication systems so badly that we literally don't know how to communicate.

[Joliebaby]

I left all social media a while ago, FB and Insta, and I was never on Twit or TikTok.
I belonged even to the predecessor of LHC, the LongHairLoom, though I have absolutely no recollection of what happened to that and why we moved here. I wasn't active here for a very long time, cut my hair short and kept it above shoulders for years.. then all of a sudden my hair had grown to my waist and I realized I really like it and want to grow it even longer, and I remembered the forum and decided to check in :D

We just have to keep posting ourselves, a community doesn't have to be huge to be active.

[MadHouseWitch]

It is funny that this comes up. Because I left most social media around about the 2020 stuff.... it was just too much! It was very slow and some sites I had like a year or so in active before deleting. I found I didn't much like being told how to feel or think... and being told that my own thoughts or feelings were wrong. LHC from what I've seen has kept the good. Now I purposely have stayed clear of some areas, just to be safer. But I'm kind of peeking my head out into this online world, and peopleing again. I've been hear quite some time too, and really I've not much hair to show for much of my efforts. But I'm giving it a go again (it seems I have to choose LONG OR CURLY) my hair just wants to stay in mid back forever.... so up hair for a while as I FINALLY have some of the longer whispies hitting waist when stretched... IT. IS. FRUSTRATING.

I had also backed away from LHC when I had a friendship break up, and she was also a member here, I think we'd been members about the same time, BUT she actually had the long hair (knee) and mine just existed. (we were both members before we met, and actually bonded over knowing some of the things from here) Now I know I also have a right to be here so I am here now but my growth process is S.L.O.W. partially because I've also been trying to care and keep my curls properly (and have recently hit what I call an "up hair" stage LOL)

But I'm here for now as a way to stalk hair toys, talk hair stuff, find new updos, until I get frustrated again and back away LOL I figured I'm starting to feel like I can't interact with people, but it seems like things are friendly here, and it was still active. Most groups and communities have moved away from old school forums. Turned to FB groups, Reddit, or Discord. FB gives me the ick, Reddit does most of the time too, and Discord is overwhelming! The bigger the groups the more the problems. IME anyway I'm just trying to not end up as a anti-social shut in I guess ><

[SevereLocks]

oh hey i agree! its funny alot of people have this notion that people with very long hair are very conservative but i kinda see it as a mohawk :D when people think its wierd to want that level of long hair i get some from of enjoy from it

[SevereLocks]

tho i will say i have seen a bit of a sergance from people wanting longer hair i will say about the forum i love the old style of it! the signatures, emoticons, and the sharing of information just to help with no alternative motive its refreshing!

[Rayosunshine]

I love this forum too. It reminds me of what the internet used to be 20 years ago. If you were dialing up the modem and waiting 3+ minutes for a page to load then you had to be pretty jolly purposeful about how you used it.

I'm won't go anywhere near social media (I don't need that rubbish in my life!) but I will happily take the time to engage in a forum like this. I think if it became more 'user friendly' then people would use it less purposely and more thoughtlessly. That's when the rubbish creeps in.

I don't think of long hair as a 'fashion'. I think it kind of transcends fashion. Even when it was common for women to have longer hair 150+ years ago, it was NEVER worn down. It was certain hairstyles that were the fashion, and whatever hair you had to work with you were aiming for the same kind of 'look'. I think that's still true today, even if most people wear their hair down there are still certain 'looks' that come and go. I also think more people would grow their hair longer if they could - but most are too addicted to heat tools and colouring.

[spidermom]

People are accustomed to instant gratification these days, and one cannot get that with growing hair.

I've never had trouble finding long hair content on youtube.

[Iyashikei]

The lob has been popular for some time now but I feel like longer hair is gonna make a comeback somewhere between now and 2030.

[AvalonMoon]

I'm a millenial, and while I think social media has its uses, I grew up using forums and chat rooms! By the time I was 18 in 2010 forums were largely dying out, with only a few niche ones still very active (mostly either fitness-related stuff or geeky ones). LHC is honestly probably the most active forum I've ever seen still being used in the 2020s and I'm here for it. Reddit is probably the closest you'll get to a forum, but it's not the same. Forums just have a different feel to them. They're more intimate, somehow, and the conversation acts very differently.

I'm here for looking after my hair, but tbh I'm equally here for the nostalgia trip.

About long hair being popular/not popular right now: Honestly? It's hard to tell. Because I think one advantage of social media is that there is a diversity of representation that you just didn't see before the internet really took off. When I was a kid there was pretty much only one or two ways to look, and that was whatever celebrities were styling at the time (and if you didn't look like that you reallyyyy stood out). But I was a teen during the Myspace era and that's when you started to see alt kids, goths, scene queens etc presenting an alternative to whatever young celebrities were making popular at the time - and while they always existed, those looks were taking up space and being consumed by bigger audiences. 2020s social media definitely has specific looks and hairstyles widely dominating online culture, but there are also a loooot of other looks that have sprung up alongside it. All the cottagecore, fantasy cosplay/geek, and historical clothing + haircare communities on Insta and YouTube seem to like long hair and often have large followings keen to try and replicate the style.

I see tonnes of Gen Z teens and young adults around my city with long hair, so I don't think it's exactly unpopular if that makes sense!

[sipnsun]

I don't know about popularity because I don't keep up with trends but I have noticed that hair has gotten longer in my community/town since the start of the pandemic. Maybe it's because shops were closed for so long and people realized they liked their hair longer, idk. Even a few of my close friends that have always kept their hair above their shoulders now have hair closer to BSL. Our youth sit together on the second row at church and the average length for girls is between waist and hip and guys around shoulder or a little longer. It makes me happy to see it trending longer locally at least!

[luxurioushair]

The 90s are coming back because Generation Z loves that era, and long hair/skinny bodies were definitely popular back then.

[Vara La Fey]

Ok, I'm really really really biased here, but I'm starting to think that the internet being so ubiquitous allows the cream of any crop - even a bad crop - to rise to the top. And I say that the cream of the hair crop for feminine contouring is length from WL to TBL. And there's just so much of it on Pinterest, which gets a lot of its stuff from Insta. Tiktok shorts are full of long hair. Random influencers on the news for unrelated reasons have long hair. I think it's def a trend.

One day there will be a punk rebellion where a lotta people go short. But hopefully that'll happen about when the sun expands and burns Earth to a cinder.

BTW, I cannot set up an Instagram acct with any email addr or from either comp I've had in the last few years. :confused: