Human Hair Extensions... vegan/ethical?

[Lean and Green]

Was just thinking about it and I was wondering what others thought about it. Never came to mind that it could be considered non-vegan; does it matter? Should they concern me?

 

I had like 60 of them in my hair on 4 separate occasions about 2 years ago and i'm thinking about redoing it. It's a cool way to put color in your hair without making it permanent. I never used them to lengthen my hair, just to throw in a ton of zany colors... yellow, green, blue, gray, red, purple and more.

 

I was told from the stylist that synthetic hair sucks and does not look natural. Sorry if this is an outlandish question but I was just wondering if because it comes from humans, if it is not necessarily vegan.

 

Thanks all!

[Odidnetne]

I think it's the human hair that's really expensive to get. I thought about getting hair extensions because I'm far too impatient to wait for my hair to grow on it's own, but once I heard about the price, I decided to just stick with this.

 

What kinds of colors are you pondering though?

[Guest]

I don't see it as being a problem...human hair isn't stolen and the people who give it up get paid well for their hair. Animals aren't so lucky.

[Richard]

I am not an expert on the subject, but I don't think there are human hair farms, I think hair is sold voluntarily isn't it?

[Michelle]

I don't think it's an outlandish question. It's definitely a weird grey area.

 

There could conceivably be some kind of lack of consent/payment (slavery, of sorts) involved in acquiring the human hair, but it has more than likely been sold willingly by people who were glad to have the money. Which means it's more than likely cruelty-free; I'd personally feel very reasonably sure that it is.

 

I guess it all depends on how you personally feel about it... whether you need to be "very reasonably sure" or "absolutely sure" to call something vegan. If you're not comfortable assuming that the hair has been willingly sold, you could try to determine the source and make a judgement based on that. If you can't determine the source, maybe you could find someone ready to chop off their hair who will sell to you directly? Or, if it just creeps you out and gives you the non-vegan vibe to have someone else's hair on your head, maybe just look for some better-quality acrylic?

 

If I still had my wild-colored hair, I'd mail you a lock or two. That'd be vegan for sure.

[Lean and Green]

What kinds of colors are you pondering though?

Not certain but I always loved the greens, blues and the yellows together (although the yellows always had the other colors leaking onto them). Otherwise red and purple.

 

 

If I still had my wild-colored hair, I'd mail you a lock or two. That'd be vegan for sure.

AWWWW that's a very nice offer; I would've felt like the coolest person ever walking around with a friend's hair sowed into mine!

 

I always wanted to donate my hair to locks of love when it gets really long and I was looking for a change. One day after I have it long for years, I want to shave it and do just that. But then again, I may have dreads in it by then and that wouldn't work Unless I was donating it to someone a sick person who used to have dreads???

 

It seems like the sentiment is that it is cruelty free most likely and that is good b/c I have it saved as you ca re use them. I have European Human Hair, whole bunch of it. As far as the price went, yea it was expensive but back when I got them I was making loot so it wasn't an issue.

 

I suppose there most likely is not some pasture that exists where humans are cooped up and given biotin injections in their scalp to force it to grow long and shaved every time it gets long. Glad to know it shouldn't be an issue to me

[Im Your Man]

unless there's a human hair traffic, which I never heard of, like poor children in under-develop countries, having their head shaved for 5 cents or some people cutting hair from women in dark streets to sell it on black market... Otherwise I don't see a problem. Most of those hair must come from dead people I guess and certainly not killed for their hair !

[GRardB]

Ehh I dunno...I'd be a little skeptical about getting extensions of hair grown with nutrients obtained from meat. Make sure it's the hair of a vegan!

 

Just kidding

 

I was never a fan of this sort of stuff though. It goes against my survival of the fittest/natural selection beliefs along with wigs, hair dye, make-up, plastic surgery, etc.

[Richard]

I was never a fan of this sort of stuff though. It goes against my survival of the fittest/natural selection beliefs along with wigs, hair dye, make-up, plastic surgery, etc.

 

As far as I know, natural selection / survival of the fittest does not exist in modern society. There is very little which is natural about how we live anymore. The houses we live in, the cars we drive, the buses we ride on, the computers we use, the guns we get killed by, the planes we use... I think it's impossible to call those things natural. If you call those things natural, then everything is natural including hair extensions so there's no problem, I don't think it's something to worry about.

 

Also, natural selection is a pretty cruel practice. Every time somebody gets a bad injury, you'd have to leave them alone and not use modern medicine on them, since that's what would naturally happen. And in childbirth you'd just have to leave the mother to it, no doctors, no medicine, no apparatus, otherwise you're interfering with "nature". If the child is dying, you'd have to just leave it to die. If someone is starving in another country, leave them to starve, since in nature there is no way to help someone in another country. I don't think that's a good way to live.

[Dr. Pink]

I want to look like Milli Vanilli. That way I can blame everything on the rain. Oh what's that? Were not really singing on the album? Were fakes? Let's blame it on the rain.

 

Works every time

[Im Your Man]

Look what I found... Human hair is certainly one of the last things I would like to find when I eat bread:

 

"Also known as l-cystine, our research indicates that the source of cysteine is human hair. Cystine is an amino acid needed by humans, which can be produced by the human body. A very small quantity is used in less than 5% of all bread products. Often the hair of third world women is used."

 

Source : http://www.vegetarianvitamin.com/vegetarian.php

 

So not only they put animal products in everything, but also from human sources... "Soylent Green" is definitely not so fictious.

[Guest]

It can come from humans but you never really know where it comes from in bread...so if its in bread I just won't buy it(this knocks out most breads in stores)

[Im Your Man]

It can come from humans but you never really know where it comes from in bread...so if its in bread I just won't buy it(this knocks out most breads in stores)

 

I just wanna make sure... 95 % of different breads we can find don't have this, right? I just hope the 5% write L-cystine in their ingredients list because that's really nasty, that's cannibalism. I wonder if there's a single person on Earth that would buy this bread knowing it and having the choice of many other breads. Imagine if you would see "human hair" listed in the ingredients of your bread.

 

That's like honey, I thought it was bee's spit, but someone told me it's bee's shit, which one is true? Both are nasty, it's like eating your own shit or someone else's shit or spit, samething, just coming from different animals.

[Guest]

I don't think people care that much...after all...you can buy skin moisturizer with foreskin in it. And no...95% of bread DO HAVE CYSTINE in it(at least in crappy American breads)...you just can't be sure where it comes from. As for honey...its not really shit or spit...either way...we shouldn't consume it.

[Im Your Man]

95%... damn, I'm almost puking right now thinking about all the human hair bread I may have eaten all my life... why the #$%?& do they put that in bread ?! we don't need to be Einstein to know that only flour and water are necessary to make bread.

At least I don't buy bread very often, and even less often commercial bread with added glucose-fructose, molasse and human hair, lol, but that certainly did happen a few times... On tv news, one day they talked about a woman that forgot the bread on the counter of her kitchen with the bag opened. When she came back from a trip in Florida, 3 weeks later, this chimic bread was still the same than before, not even dry.

 

There's a girl at work that panick every time I tell her stories about meat and the scum they put in many foods. I told her it was 5% of bread, wait that I tell her that it's 95% ! She only buy white cheap bread with a long list of ingredients, it there's bread with human hair, that's definitely the bread she's buying.

She said they can't put this in bread because everybody would become sick. I said that's the point, everybody's sick.

She was really mad when I told her that industry puts cochineal beetles into some products as a red colorant, instead of simply using beets.

[Guest]

All the bread additives do things to modify chewyness, flake, fluffyness, lower costs and increase shelf life. Thats the only way bread can stay on a shelf for much more than a week. As for the hair thing(outside of it not being vegan a lot of times) I'd be much more concerned about the refined flours and other stupid preservatives they add.

[Vixen]

I see no problem with it. Its better than getting hair extensions from an animal.