Baldness in politics

Steve Rushin is brilliant on the true outrage of the US's political system - it's bias against bald men (via Norm). In this, Britain and America are united; as Christie Davies has pointed out, we haven't elected a bald PM since the 1950s either.
Why is there this discrimination? Three things make it especially puzzling:
1. Bald Prime Ministers have been good. Churchill, Attlee and Gladstone are, arguably, our three greatest ever PMs, even though between them they didn't have enough hair to string a ukulele. What we have here is therefore taste discrimination, not statistical discrimination.
2. Bald men don't suffer discrimination in other areas. I know of no evidence that they have worse earnings or job prospects than hirsute ones.
3. Appearance isn't valued in women politicians. Margaret Thatcher and Angela Merkel (and Golda Meir or Indira Gandhi before them) look like bulldogs sucking a lemon, but this was no obstacle to their success. Conversely, there's no talk of Caroline Flint as a future Labour leader.
So, what's the solution? One possibility is that baldness looks bad on TV; you don't see many bald newsreaders (I don't believe the rumours about Sophie Raworth).
But this runs into the problem that many bald men have succeeded as screen actors: Ben Kingsley, Sean Connery, Vin Diesel, Telly Savalas, Patrick Stewart etc. And what's more, shouldn't the public recognise that TV appearance is not an important part of the job of being PM?
So, here are two other theories.
First, bald men - because of our superior intellect and virility - are seen as threatening; this is why they are often cast as baddies, such as the evil Hood in Thunderbirds. (Perhaps the childhood trauma he caused is itself part of the explanation). But what the public want from politicians is comfort and the illusion of security. Hairy boys, being blander, offer this.
Secondly, the people who report on politics want politics to be a vacuous, glamorous business. They don't want to think their job consists of no more than talk about who can best empty our dustbins. And they certainly don't want to investigate substantive questions of who is genuinely competent to run the country.
And glamour is identified with having hair. In this respect, perhaps its no coincidence that discrimination against bald politicians has emerged at the same time - since the 50s - as rock n' roll. Pop stars are almost never bald, which adds to the identification between glamour and hairyness.

Comments

[Matt Munro]

"Conversely, there's no talk of Caroline Flint as a future Labour leader".

I was slightly disturbed to find myself fantasising about Caroline Flint last night while she was being interviewed about the immigration figures on the news. Harriet Harman was pretty fit when younger and has made deputy PM ?

[Bob B]

And William Hague, who apparently shaves his head, is shadow foreign secretary. But then he comes from Yorkshire.

[Blognor Regis]

Peter Garrett, pop star, politician and baldie. The exception which proves the rule perhaps?

[dearieme]

Bald men symbolise the Reality Principle, for which The Age has little taste. Present company excepted.

[Shuggy]

"First, bald men - because of our superior intellect and virility - are seen as threatening"

Ha ha - keep telling yourself that and maybe it'll come true. Baldness is quite rightly a handicap in politics, as well as in life in general. Those of us who are over forty but still have a full head of hair know you baldies resent us bitterly and would dearly love to impose taxes on our flowing locks, should you come to power.

[a very public sociologist]

If one has to be bald to do well in the "glamorous" business of politics, does this extend to pundits and reporters? While I note Mad Mel has a full head of hair, Andrew Marr and Nick Robinson do not, and they seem to be doing alright for themselves.

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Perhaps there are just fewer bald men than you think?

[Paulie]

Nick Robinson is not only very bald, he is quite stupid as well.

I don't know what bearing this has on your arguments but I thought it needed saying. That's all.

[Paulie]

Nick Robinson is not only very bald, he is quite stupid as well.

I don't know what bearing this has on your arguments but I thought it needed saying. That's all.

[Hugh Markey]

John Wayne, Marlon Brando and Robert Montgomery, Prez Eisenhour's tv adviser, wore toupees, as did Bing Crosby. They survived for decades in the public spotlight.
Now that pols are using the techniques of Hollywood and tvland, surely a wig is not out of the question.
Of course, there is less 'nuns'' hair available.
Incidentally, I am also lacking in this area.
Hu

[Bruce]

Politics is showbiz for ugly people, baldy or otherwise.

[Ed Darrell]

My brother, with hair, argues that the roots of hair grow down deeper and deeper. If they strike gray matter, the hair turns gray; if they strike nothing, they fall out.

Sen. Jake Garn, R-Utah (long retired), whose shiny pate was famous in television studios, said that men have only a finite amount of "the male hormone." "Some men choose to use theirs growing hair," he would sniff.

The reality is that most people say, "Hair follicles? Who's counting?"

Vox Day has a particularly vapid analysis, which I have poked a fork into at my blog, Millard Fillmore's Bathtub. C'mon by.

[redpesto]

Random suggestions:

Bald pop stars? Errol Brown of Hot Chocolate, Isaac Hayes, Seal (does this argument only apply to white males?)

Baldness and phrenology - high cranium...superior intellect...The Mekon?

Re. Villiany: it's beards, not baldness (esp. in Disney, apparently)

Women and hair - it's length, perhaps? See Ruth Kelly (hair/voice), Yvette Cooper, or the way Mad Mel looks like a particularly scary psychiatrist.

[W]

It's odd that bald men are discriminated against in politics but men who aren't good looking can do fine.

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Comments please

[hair loss treatment]

politics makes people bald 8) -- period haha

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And glamour is identified with having hair.

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