Kristen Stewart shaved her head and she looks incredible. But of course she does, because shaving her head doesn't actually take away from the absolute buckets of fit that Kristen Stewart has exuding from her every pore. Kristen debuted her new buzzcut on the red carpet for the Los Angeles premiere of her new film Personal Shopper last night, and the reactions have been...mixed. The Daily Mail called her look 'edgy', which is what they say when they mean 'mannish and ugly', but know they can't quite get away with it. There's something a little off about the fact that it even matters to us at all - tying someone's looks and femininity to their hair is extremely archaic, and too many of us (me included) hide behind our hair.
Kristen's new look comes mere weeks after she came out as gay on SNL, and while I can't speak for her, all of these things along with her apparent newfound happiness signal that she's finally feeling a little more free and comfortable with herself. Too often we associate head-shaving in women with bouts of mental illness; we only have to infer clippers to have someone bringing up Britney in 2007. Britney, though, was arguably just trying to free herself from the way that she was seen. The head-shaving wasn't necessarily a result of her breakdown.
It's increasingly common to see women who have a buzzcut, and for many its for aesthetic purposes or out of necessity, but for others, its symbolic of unshackling themselves. Refinery29 did a feature last year on several stunning women who have shaved their heads for various reasons, some of whom I'm proud to call my friends. Last year, GBBO's Ruby Tandoh shaved her trademark ginger curls, and wrote a beautiful longform essay for Elle on her reasoning. Among her many other reasons, she said, 'I wanted to be able to shrug off the shyness that I'd carried with me my whole life, and to stand up tall and unembarrassed, as the kind of butch, kind of femme, kind of camp, kind of straight-laced person that I am,' and, 'even though I never had some grand agenda for my haircut, I quickly realised I was being naive in thinking that shaving my head was a totally apolitical act.' It wasn't all plain-sailing, though, and Ruby added, 'I'm more nervous now about holding my girlfriend's hand in public for fear that the intimacy coupled with my haircut will coax out peoples' bigotries.'
If you're considering taking the plunge, there's a lot to take into account, and some have more privilege to step out with a bald head safely than others. In a world where how men (and women) see us is so tied into our hair, shaving your head will always carry a political statement. For Ruby and Kristen, among other things, that's a statement about their sexuality and the pride that they feel. It's about taking control, and as more brave women take the plunge, many more will come. If you're considering it, it could be freeing; plus, it'll grow back. If you want it to.
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This article originally appeared on The Debrief.