NationStates Jolt Archive

And the news keep getting weirder!

http://news.aol.com/weird-news/article/mans-mohawk-may-be-worlds-tallest/249619

(Nov. 15) - A Nebraska musician had a real hair-raising experience on Friday -- and he may have set a Guinness World Record in the process.
Eric Hahn of Omaha had his long locks cut to form an impressive 27-inch-high mohawk in hopes of claiming a record for the hairstyle. The 'do beat the old Guinness World Record for the tallest mohawk by 3 inches, according to local station KETV .
Hahn told KETV he donated the hair that was hacked off to create the hairdo to the cancer charity Locks of Love.
"I wanted to take advantage of the many years I've invested in growing my hair, so I decided to use it to raise money and awareness for charity," he said.

Something along these (http://api.ning.com/files/dfqHQLA2i6qqAM4QO-djFsQCjnD-IyAAr*z4C1C7Dgg_/239377875_l.jpg) lines.

At least the ridiculous feat was done for a good cause.

Holy CRAP! :eek:

Thats a lot of hair. :D

27 Inches wow... doorways must have been a problem.

Wow.

27 Inches wow... doorways must have been a problem.

Yeah. And it must've been heavy too.

He can come handy when we want to clean cobwebs from our ceiling.

I would have paid money for him to have a giant afro perm instead.

At least the ridiculous feat was done for a good cause.
Or... was it? Do me a favor, and read a little about Locks of Love. Then get back to me, and tell me you're sure that the hair he donated actually did anything for anybody.

http://charityreports.bbb.org/Public/Report.aspx?CharityID=1839
http://community.livejournal.com/longhair/815649.html
http://verybigblog.com/2006/04/24/locks-of-love-is-a-scam/
http://msgboard.snopes.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=21;t=001082;p=1
http://hannah.tedpearson.com/?p=322

Or... was it? Do me a favor, and read a little about Locks of Love. Then get back to me, and tell me you're sure that the hair he donated actually did anything for anybody.

http://charityreports.bbb.org/Public/Report.aspx?CharityID=1839
http://community.livejournal.com/longhair/815649.html
http://verybigblog.com/2006/04/24/locks-of-love-is-a-scam/
http://msgboard.snopes.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=21;t=001082;p=1
http://hannah.tedpearson.com/?p=322

I know what Locks of Love does. The organization makes wigs and hair pieces from donated human hair for patients who've lost their hair do to several conditions including cancer. My supervisor has donated hers and her daughter's hair for Locks of Love. Your I'm more knowledgable than you is not needed. And if what he did with the mohawk helped anybody in Locks of Love, it was a good cause.

I won't be surprised if I see a cancer patient with a mohawk. *nods*

Or... was it? Do me a favor, and read a little about Locks of Love. Then get back to me, and tell me you're sure that the hair he donated actually did anything for anybody.

http://charityreports.bbb.org/Public/Report.aspx?CharityID=1839
http://community.livejournal.com/longhair/815649.html
http://verybigblog.com/2006/04/24/locks-of-love-is-a-scam/
http://msgboard.snopes.com/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=21;t=001082;p=1
http://hannah.tedpearson.com/?p=322

I was going to say that most of those posts are blogs and therefore suspect, but the links within them to legitimate charity watchdog sites convinced me.

I know what Locks of Love does. The organization makes wigs and hair pieces from donated human hair for patients who've lost their hair do to several conditions including cancer. My supervisor has donated hers and her daughter's hair for Locks of Love. Your I'm more knowledgable than you is not needed. And if what he did with the mohawk helped anybody in Locks of Love, it was a good cause.

You missed the point. If LoL is only making 1000 wigs a year when they should be making 10,000+, that means they're selling the rest of the hair. They use the chemo-kid angle to sucker you into giving something away that has monetary value. That's unethical.

I know what Locks of Love does. The organization makes wigs and hair pieces from donated human hair for patients who've lost their hair do to several conditions including cancer. My supervisor has donated hers and her daughter's hair for Locks of Love. Your I'm more knowledgable than you is not needed. And if what he did with the mohawk helped anybody in Locks of Love, it was a good cause.
I am wholly unconvinced. And I think I am more knowledgeable than you.

LoL fails to meet accounting transparency standards (see current BBB report), and - from the reports I have heard - throws away or fails to pick up most hair donations and sells most of the remainder. Do the math.

I'm not convinced that LoL manages to do much good at all. For every wig made, there are roughly a thousand hair donations gone to waste. Figure 10% of those are young girls pressured into it by their parents or peers (a low figure IMO), and you're causing mild trauma to a hundred people for every one young cancer patient who would probably be better (or nearly as well) served with a good synthetic wig.

I was going to say that most of those posts are blogs and therefore suspect, but the links within them to legitimate charity watchdog sites convinced me.
What bothered me is that when I was trying to dig up relevant links (it's something I haven't even thought about for several years, let alone done a fresh Google search) is that I came upon more "commercial" looking "opinion" pieces saying that LoL has addressed its critics and now meets BBB standards.

Which, as the BBB link attests, is patently false.

You missed the point. If LoL is only making 1000 wigs a year when they should be making 10,000+, that means they're selling the rest of the hair. They use the chemo-kid angle to sucker you into giving something away that has monetary value. That's unethical.

I've been to their site. The Spanish First Lady wholly sponsors LoL. What I have seen first hand from them is so contrary to what you and TJHairball allege. Mind you, Intangelon, I'm not putting less stock on your post. I'm merely going with the experience I've had with LoL while working for the Spanish government.

I've been to their site. The Spanish First Lady wholly sponsors LoL. What I have seen first hand from them is so contrary to what you and TJHairball allege. Mind you, Intangelon, I'm not putting less stock on your post. I'm merely going with the experience I've had with LoL while working for the Spanish government.

Wakari-ma sen, Nana-ku. I read through all of TJ's links, and there's some convincing stuff in there. I acknowledge your personal experience, and my mother's donated to them now for 5+ years. Seems to me that taking in what they do and only producing wigs at a 10% rate looks pretty suspicious.

Wakari-ma sen, Nana-ku. I read through all of TJ's links, and there's some convincing stuff in there. I acknowledge your personal experience, and my mother's donated to them now for 5+ years. Seems to me that taking in what they do and only producing wigs at a 10% rate looks pretty suspicious.

No, I know it seems suspicious. LoL recieves hair from all over the world and that's something that occurs year round. That they're producing at a 10% rate is not only suspicious, it's heart-wrenching.

With every 10 inches of hair (which is what they accept) or more, they can make, at least, a short haired wig, or at least that's what my supervisor's telling me.

Ano, no harm done, Intangelon.;)

Wakari-ma sen, Nana-ku. I read through all of TJ's links, and there's some convincing stuff in there. I acknowledge your personal experience, and my mother's donated to them now for 5+ years. Seems to me that taking in what they do and only producing wigs at a 10% rate looks pretty suspicious.
Actually, IIRC, they are producing at a much lower than 10% rate. I've heard about 100 a year. A couple thousand is the cumulative wig production figure for the charity's existence. According to the NYT, only about 500 eligible children apply to LoL every year:

http://www.nytimes.com/2007/09/06/fashion/06locks.html?pagewanted=print

I really don't think the LoL people are actually making serious bank off of hair donations, relatively speaking; it's just that they really aren't doing much, except get a lot of long-haired people harassed to get haircuts.

I'm not sure it should count if he didn't have to go through the trials and tribulations of actually living with the damn thing...

CharityNavigator (http://www.charitynavigator.org/index.cfm?bay=search.summary&orgid=9285) gives Locks of Love the coveted 4-star rating, and LoL only fails to meet the BBB standard because LoL didn't provide them with one piece of financial info that they wanted. That happens with a lot of charities, not to mention companies. Smith Barney had a black mark from the BBB for a while -- not for anything they actually did, but because they didn't give them 100% info during the CitiGroup acquisition as it was impossible for SB to know what the numbers were.

Locks of Love doesn't intimidate or harass anyone into donating their hair. Like any charity dealing in in-kind donations, they get a lot of stuff that they can't use or that it makes more sense for them to sell than use in-kind. It's too bad that some people feel taken in because they didn't read the FAQ on the charity's website, but my feeling is generally caveat donor.

....The above sounds bitchier than I intended it to be. I really don't mean to jump down anyone's throat. I sometimes get defensive about non-profits in general because I so often deal with people who are looking for any reason not to give.

Locks of Love doesn't intimidate or harass anyone into donating their hair.
LoL may not personally, but there are plenty of people out there with two bits of data who do it for them. Leaving aside the parents who push their daughters around.
Like any charity dealing in in-kind donations, they get a lot of stuff that they can't use or that it makes more sense for them to sell than use in-kind. It's too bad that some people feel taken in because they didn't read the FAQ on the charity's website, but my feeling is generally caveat donor.

....The above sounds bitchier than I intended it to be. I really don't mean to jump down anyone's throat. I sometimes get defensive about non-profits in general because I so often deal with people who are looking for any reason not to give.
Other similar non-profits have a much better donation/wig ratio. One serving adult women - "Beautiful Lengths" - has a 9:1 donation to wig ratio. I've heard good things about Wigs for Kids, too. The BBB says they only spend 60% of revenue on program activities, but they actually report all their information. Unlike LoL.

With the figures we're talking about for LoL, which discards most of the hair and then sells most of the rest, you'd do them better sending them a $5 donation than sending them your hair.

No, seriously, look at the figures. ~100,000 hair donations annually that they record (that's not counting the ones that LoL doesn't even pick up/have delivered, something I've heard they're really bad about), 99% of which is sold or discarded for a couple hundred thousand bucks of revenue. Now compare that to the price of a haircut. So if you're having it chopped professionally to donate it to LoL... you're failing at being a smart charitable donor. Even if you think LoL is the best charity to give to.

Which I don't.