The Haircut

One of the initiation rituals at the small rural high school I attended in Texas in the 1970s was for the senior boys to cut the hair of the freshman boys. As for as I was concerned, it was a stupid ritual, but I was far outnumbered by fellow classmates who thought the ritual was just dandy and a fun thing in which to participate, whether they were seniors or freshmen. The hazing rituals toward freshman girls were less violent--freshman girls were expected to do whatever a senior girl asked them to do, which usually was something servile such as carrying a senior girl's lunch tray. I refused to participate, mainly because I hated being coerced into anything, a trait that I never outgrew, and I really didn't admire the girls who took their power for granted.

 My father, who had also attended the same high school (but I don't think the haircut hazing was in effect there in the late 1940s and early 1950s), was wise in that he knew the activity could lead to unintended and perhaps even tragic consequences. So when my younger-by-six-years brother was an incoming freshman, my father laid down the law: if my brother wanted to have his hair cut by a bunch of marauding senior boys, fine, but the seniors would have to come to our house to do the deed. And so they did, chasing my brother across our property before holding him down for the haircut. The usual plan was to cut part of the hair and leave some of the hair, creating a mohawk or other lopsided design.

There is always an element of meanness to such activities even when done in a so-called spirit of camaraderie, and some of those hazed are going to be treated more roughly than others. Conversely, if you were so beneath contempt that you weren't included in the hazing, that marked you as a loser, too.

Hazing sends a message of power and powerlessness. That's what bullying does, too, and the effects can be lasting. I still remember the names of boys in my class and a grade or two above me who were bullies. I suspect that they are still blustery and bullying types though I hope they are nicer adults than they were teenagers. I also remember the names of the boys who were often the recipients of the bullying, and I hope that their experiences in the small-minded atmosphere of our school have not affected them unduly as adults. But I bet they still remember those bullies' names, too.

When I first read the story of Mitt Romney's leading a group of prep school boys in cutting the hair of a 'nonconformist' classmate, all those high-school memories returned. I certainly believe that our high-school selves reveal something about the person we are to become, but I also believe that people can change. If the hair-cutting incident was an isolated event, then I would just mark it up to the kind of stupid act anyone could do and later regret. We've all done things we regret. And, I, for one, have not forgotten those actions I've regretted.

Mitt Romney, however, whose classmates remember his teasing another "closeted gay student," yelling "Atta girl" when the kid spoke up in class, remembers nothing of these events that other classmates remember well.

Does it matter?

What matters to me is what the man has become, and there is enough to trouble me in the adult Romney than to be worried unduly by the prep school Romney.

What I do know is that if a couple of the guys whom I remember as bullies in high school were running for office, I sure as hell wouldn't vote for them--yeah, thirty-eight years later, the memories retain a residue of bitterness that would require quite a bit of persuasion to overcome.