Talk:Blond/Archive 2

message: A television show informed me earlier that blond hair is a biological sign of fertility in adults, and suggested the possibility that this might be the cause of blonds being seen, traditionally, as attractive. The television show was hardly a reliable authority on this; has anyone else heard that theory? 82.69.37.32 11:25, 26 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Blonds and Fertility 

message: From what I know, in the middle east, Iran has an even higher percentage then Afganistan and Pakistan, so that should be also mentioned.
:Are there any reliable sources that can be cited on the issue? Angr (talk) 05:29, 12 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Pashtun, Tajiks and Pakistani's the only ones?

message: "Africans were the first ones with blonde hair and blue eyes, because they were the first humans so of course a few would have blonde hair and blue eyes first! Black people were brown, then black, then turned white as they left, due to albinism!" -busboy —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 68.254.171.54 (talk • contribs) 20:19, 23 June 2006   (UTC)
:Are there any reliable sources that can be cited on the issue? No? Then don't bring it up on the talk page anymore. User:Angr 20:25, 23 June 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: "Um, no. See Human genetic variation. While the core human genome almost certainly derives ultimately from Africa, the origin of the so-called "races" doesn't have anything to do with albinism, and "white people" are largely a western-migratory split-off of central Asians mingled with older Pre-Indo-European populations who may have been in Europe since the last Ice Age (depending on which theory you prefer, both Asians and indigenous paleolithic Europeans were descended from different groups migrating out of Africa, or even the "native" Europeans may have been descended from an earlier west-moving group of Asians). "Caucasian" people are, like the Japanese and other north Asians, lighter-skinned than equatorial peoples apparently because they simply don't need the sun protection, and thus over a long period of time evolved away from producing what for them would have been excessive amounts of melanin pigment. Cf. genetically caucasoid populations in southern India, who are much darker than Europeans generally and even than many northern (cooler climate) Indic populations. Compare also the skin tone of Polynesians, ethnic Filipinos and others farther east and south to that of central-east Asians in China; the complexion of Amazonian Natives to that of North American First Nations, etc. Basically, the closer you get to the equator (when speaking of populations who have been indigenous since prehistory), the darker the skin tone is, to protect against the more direct UV radiation of the sun (there are always exceptions of course - Australian Aboriginals are quite a bit more southerly than equatorial Africans but quite dark when not hybridized with European genes; but they also colonized an area that is basically a desert, with little cloud cover for most of the year). Personally I don't think anyone has an adequate theory yet why certain populations become much paler than others, such as Scandinavians and true Russians (by which I mean ethnic Russians in the area historically known as Russia, not Soviets or Russian Federation citizens in general, who are from a wide variety of ethnicities) - despite being commonly thought of as "extra-White" they have even more definitively Asian genes, on average, than most other Euopeans due to historical invasions of Huns, Avars, Tatars, etc. See also the Japanese who on average are paler than Koreans at roughly the same latitude (and especially see the Ainu, a unique and even paler ethinicity that lingers in a few places in modern Japan). Native North Americans have lived at climes just as temperate-to-cold and northerly as the aforementioned groups for seemingly about as long a period of time, but are uniformly darker than the Old World populations. The climate effect is clearly just one factor among many, with gene dominance being the prevailing one. If you sent a million Irish to a desert-and-jungle planet and a million Congolese to an ice planet, I do not believe that if you returned in fifty thousand years you'd find they'd traded skin tones. Rather, they'd probably both be a medium color, on the way to evolving to suit their environment better, and most of their non-hue-related ethic features would remain unchanged (though probably not all of them - some traits are probably genetically linked to others.) And to come full circle, the albinism gene woud not have helped those on the ice planet in evolving toward producting less melanin - the albinism gene almost certainly causes too many problems for it to be naturally selected for - the vision deficits easily cancel out, in surivability terms, the benefits of not wasting bodily resources generating unneeded pigment. Would an "anti-albino" hyperpigmentation gene do well on the hot planet? Dunno. I have not read up on hypermelanism at all, so I don't know if comes with any negative side effects the way albinism does, and it is (as a genetic disorder; I'm not speaking of an ethic tendency toward a darker shade that some other ethnicity) very rare in humans anyway, much more so than albinism." — SMcCandlish [talk] [contrib] ツ 10:50, 23 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Interesting post. Your basically saying natural selection is at work which takes a long time, but see this article for a discussion of sexual selection as a way to explain why blond's appeared so recently in the human record in Europe. If a culture values blond hair (or light skin - not sure if they always go together), this gives those who are naturally blond a reproductive advantage, which can spread a trait very rapidly, in particular among small isolated populations. I would say this could only occur in northern latitudes because no culture near the equator would value blond hair and light skin simply because it is a disadvantage (skin cancer). -- Stbalbach 14:01, 18 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Blondes are albinos

message: In response to the article's assertation to the contrary, Natural Platinum Blonde or Towhead, does not occur in children only.  I am a living example.  Although my beard and sideburns are red, the royale/soulpatch is Platinum as well.  
--72.196.12.175 04:41, 27 June 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Natural Platinum Blond Adults 

message: Would make sense that an Artic predator would adopt white (e.g. Artic Fox, polar bears etc)
Since we are so close geneticly to chimps it would strike me as obvious we could breed with Neanderthals, who originated from Homo Erectus; 
This would all help to explain the rapid evolution, not sexual selection just cross-breeding with a near relative AND one that was adapted to the conditions (ice, snow etc)
87.74.129.54 21:40, 3 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Could the Neanderthals have been blonde?

message: Just wondering if its true, i once heard the rumour that he dyed his hair black for some reasson.
:My rumour has it that it was to make filming of his movies that much better for the lustre in his locks. Or that of a dark blue sheen under the studio lights.RandomEcho 08:49, 9 September 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Was Elvis Blond?

message: "Researchers predict the last truly natural blonde will be born in Finland - the country with the highest proportion of blondes."  strictly speaking Finland is NOT part of Scandinavia, but one of the five Nordic Countries or, if you wish, it's part of Fennoscandia. So shouldn't the sentence regarding the high number of people with fair hair in Northern Europe read: "particularly Finland and the other Nordic countries..."? Last time this was changed for a while but now seems to have been returned. Clarifer 14:52, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok,ok, the BBC report about disappearing blonds seems to be a hoax but is the estimate on the distribution of blond hair a hoax too? Clarifer 15:08, 28 July 2006 (UTC)
thread_title: Again: Particularly Scandinavia?

message: :The recent study proved that the mental performance of a man worsened after looking at and talking to blonde women. At University of Paris X-Nanterre revealed that men's general knowledge results on tests decreased after viewing pictures that included blonde women. Such an effect is explained by the fact that men unconsciously think that they are dealing with someone with a decreased level of intellect. Thierry Meyer, joint author of the research and professor of social psychology at the University of Paris X-Nanterre said that the study shows how stereotypes can influence our behavior. [8]
I removed the preceding paragraph from the Relation to age and distribution on body section because it doesn't belong there and is highly biased anyways. Oddity- (talk) 14:52, 12 December 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Removed paragraph 

message: "Young Northern European man with naturally blond hair." -- His hair is certainly (naturally) blond, but it looks like he dyed it, too (which 90% of us "blond" Europeans do. The overall percentage of "real" blond is strongly decreasing). That makes the picture pretty useless :-/  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 85.181.24.47 (talk) 03:08, August 27, 2007 (UTC) 
:Why is the main picture showing a supposed "rock star" who bleached their hair as an example?  If it is There should be an image of a child if it's difficult to find an example of an adult.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dmkrantz (talk • contribs) 05:08, 26 June 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I added a picture of London Mayor Boris Johnson a while ago, who has naturally platinum blond hair. London mayor is probably second to New York mayor in world significance in terms of mayoralty, and I thought it would be an improvement over this rock star with ostensibly bleached hair. However, it was removed first without explanation, and then readded by someone else, then removed by an unregistered user complaining that it wasn't a good example due to Johnson being too "controversial". I don't think that personality should come into it, I just added him because he is a rare example of an adult with platinum blond hair. Here is the image which I think should replace the Danish rock star:
http://server2.uploadit.org/files/Juggertrout-borisjohnson.JPG
(it's on my uploadit account, so feel free to use it; though it should still be available from when I uploaded it to wikimedia)Juggertrout (talk) 16:58, 2 July 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Ok, I've added both the original picture of the Finnish skier and Johnson. If someone finds them disagreeable, post here why. I realise that Johnson may be a 'controversial' figure to some, but it's silly to have a girl with bleached hair in the section. If anyone can find an anonymous or little known, uncontroversial figure, who is a verifiable adult platinum blond, then post them here so we can add them. Juggertrout (talk) 15:19, 6 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Picture 

message: Does "blond" only apply to hair? I've heard people use "blond" to refer to other things such as wood and some anthopologists use it for skin (eg, 'blond skin'). ?
:Indeed, the word is used in other contexts as well (more or less poetical). "The blond dunes", "the blond reed" (when it has died off and in winter has a light colour, while the empty ares, even a bit  lighter of colour look a bit like lightblond hair. So the titel of this article might be changed in "Blond hair". James Blond 03:36, 12 April 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Only hair? 

message: as having a high percentage of blondes in the middle east. I think it occurs there more so than in iran.
some images of syrians.
http://www.babelmed.net/immagini/lib_syria.jpg
http://www.christianpost.com/upload_static/intl/intl_185_0.jpg
:It looks dyed in the first of those. The second looks more plausible, but a single picture alone isn't enough information. Angr 10:45, 1 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: It isn't a matter of enough pictures. Wikipedia is not the place for original research. If you can find published statistics on the numbers of natural blonds in Syria and Lebanon, feel free to add the information. But just providing links to various photos isn't enough to build a contribution to the article on. Angr 08:26, 9 October 2006 (UTC)

text: If there are no sources for the information about Pakistan and Iran, then that should be removed too. Angr 09:58, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

text: All I feel strongly about is the Wikipedia policy of verifiability. The pages you have given so far are not reliable sources regarding the prevalence of blond hair in Syria and Lebanon. The word Aryan has nothing to do with anything, except that the Nazis commandeered it and pretended it referred to people who look Nordic--and the Nazis certainly wouldn't have considered Syrian and Lebanese Arabs to be Aryan, no matter how blond and blue-eyed they might be. The etymology of "Aryan" is unclear but almost certainly doesn't have anything to do with hair color. Angr 10:44, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Please sign your posts. Instructions are at the top of this page. It's very difficult to read who is talking when you don't sign. Thank you. -- Stbalbach 15:36, 10 October 2006 (UTC)

text: Whahahah! Evolution made man able to fly!? You may be a dumbass nazi but god damn it you how to crack me up ^^. --DerMeister 12:47, 13 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Syrians and Lebanese should be included 

message: Is it certain that all blonds have higher levels of phoemelanin than eumelanin? on this site they say  "Plain blonde hair is predominantly eumelanin while richer honey blonde hair has relatively more of the yellow red pheomelanin present" 218.166.74.1 11:59, 16 October 2006 (UTC)
replies: text: According to that site in principle all kinds of blond have more pheomelanin, but only in case of colourfull blond (goldblond and orangeblond) this kind oif pigment is not coverted into eumelanin by the gene MC1R. VKing 00:27, 30 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Are the levels of pheomelanin really higher? 

message: I think such a section should be added.. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 85.81.84.207 (talk • contribs) .
:I hope your joking. -- Stbalbach 13:37, 29 October 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Add references in popular media section? 

message: I believe the biggest percentage of population with blond hair is in Finland. There is an error in this article. Maybe someone can verify me and fix it. Im too lazy to do it myself.
: I'm pretty sure about this too but I can't be arsed with finding that source again so I won't edit it :P. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by DerMeister (talk • contribs) 20:53, 12 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: That Was A Good Joke! 10 points! But the truth is still that Finland has the highest percentage of blondes. (BBC agrees that, too: http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/health/2284783.stm)
Blonde = Blond person
Blonds -> Blondes
nagara373 4:07, 8 Aug 2007 (JST)
I'm almoust shure, in finland or scandinavia. Many lithuanians have black hair.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.118.205.130 (talk) 08:35, 17 January 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Blondes in Finland 

message: http://img444.imageshack.us/my.php?image=explorar0013hx4.jpg
That´s me when I was 1 year old, but my hair turned dark very quickly know is dark brown almost black. Why it happens?189.170.4.21 04:34, 5 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: This could very well be hormonal. My father was butter-blond as a child, and black-haired as an adult. I was dark-golden/brown as a child and am dark-brown-haired as an adult. The blond streak in the front of my hair has darkened to red - the darkening happened most sharply after I had children, leading me even more strongly to believe it is hormonal in nature.141.156.20.173 16:26, 10 October 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Also, I would not have called you blond as a child; that hair looked like regular brown to me. Adorable, certainly, but not blond.141.156.20.173 16:30, 10 October 2007 (UTC)

text: Tsk tsk thats such bullshit, REAL vikings had red hair :). —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 85.224.45.247 (talk) 19:38, 26 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Meh, most of them probably had brown or blonde hair, it's debatable whether even Eirik Raude had red hair. The blonde side of my family are descended from Lincolnshire Vikings, only the line has become distorted somewhat to the point where we now slaughter women and rape livestock. --JamesTheNumberless 11:29, 30 January 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Is this child blond? 

message: Man in this picture found in the article is not a blonde, but a brunette, light brown haired is still brown haired. At least most finns would say he is brunette. Text is incorrect when it says he is blonde. His beard is blonde but not hair. 193.167.45.242 15:31, 15 January 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Could it be, that this has been an item on this page before?James Blond 05:42, 3 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Picture of a brunette in blonde article 

message: Is there a fetish to people who have blond hair? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 69.228.4.22 (talk) 01:47, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Don't know the exact meaning of the saying "there is a fetish to.....", but suppose it's something like being  more or less adored. If that's so, the posed question would be synonym to: "How comes, that there's so much ado about this haircolour"? And the answer would be:"Well, according to scientists, from the sustainability-point of view there should be no more than 2,5 billion people on Earth. This includes, that the number of subtropicals and tropicals should be no more, than about 2 billion. In reality however there are more than 6 billion. So in a way they have to share a natural place for one person with three of them. This must be rather frustrating for the developement of their personality. (Light-)blonds don't have that problem. Maybe that's one of the reasons, why darkhaired are so obsessed by blondies. And what's more, the cool and most rational Nordics have an elementary function in the human whole. Things would be proportional in this aspect, if there would be 1 Nordic on every 4 or 5 (sub-)tropicals. Right now there is less than 1 on 50!!!!!! and their percentage keeps decreasing (not by their fault). James Blond 04:36, 7 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Just out of curiosity for the absurd, what's that "elementary function"? If it is "to breed blondes", man, I do agree. --euyyn 10:28, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Fetish 

message: Shouldn't there be some discussion of pubic hair and other body hair in terms of natural blondes? 68.103.207.65 17:45, 2 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You mean, about the question, in how far bleached celebrities also use to bleach their eyebrows?James Blond 03:39, 4 February 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pubic Hair 

message: appears to show 2 of the 4 people having dyed hair - on the left, peroxide-blond; on the right ginger dye.
:No way to know. Eyebrows can be different from hair naturally. Some very light blond can naturally bleach blonder with sun and shampoo. Also the light in the picture might make it appear whiter than it is. -- Stbalbach 15:07, 6 February 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: The one on the right is hot. --euyyn 10:44, 22 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  I agree! ;) Where they come from? -- 89.61.182.89 (talk) 20:48, 19 July 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  Gallery images 

message: Look me up, baby.
<BR>
by Wild Mountain Thyme 06:25, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Can I please date the guy in the first picture? 

message: I've removed pictures of living anonymous people as it is problematic. 1) without explicit permission from the person in the picture it can run afoul of Personality rights () 2) Even if someone were to give explicit permission, there is a problem with vanity. We have lots of excellent examples of blonde on Wikicommons that are uncontroversial, do not promote anyone, are not vanity shots. -- Stbalbach 16:31, 3 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: But you've brought us back to the same non-NPOV position we were in on this page a year ago: except for the toddler, all the images are of women. I have no objection to using historical images, but we have to maintain a balance between pictures of males and females for the sake of NPOV. —Angr 11:53, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  What about using this picture - 1. male, 2. not dyed, 3. dead (apropos vanity). Politically incorrect? 217.236.230.168 18:26, 5 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text:  Not freely licensed. We could never make a fair-use claim for that image in this page. —Angr 19:21, 5 March 2007 (UTC)

text: Thanks for your opinion. Please see discussion above about Vanity pictures and pictures of living people. -- Stbalbach 00:39, 12 March 2007 (UTC)

text: Conflict of interest often presents itself in the form of self-promotion, including advertising links, personal website links in articles, personal or semi-personal photos, or any other material that appears to promote the private or commercial interests of the editor adding the material, or of his associates.
There is no way to know if you have any connection with the people in the photos. It seems unusual that you would be so determined to add these pictures, that you have a single-purpose account with no prior history, yet seem to have some knowledge about these pictures prior history being in the article and how to add them back etc.. plus there is the problem of Personality rights (see Personality rights template of Wikicommons) - given all these issues, and since this article is just supposed to be examples, there is no reason to keep pushing for these particular photos when we have dozens to choose from that are free and clear of all problems. -- Stbalbach 04:39, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Pictures of living anonymous people 

message: see http://www.flickr.com/photos/extranoise/200545533/ . to see that this photo is allowed
platinum blonde 20:06, 12 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:   blonde 

message: See the MoS on how to place images. They should be staggered left-right and not have text in the middle of two images. -- Stbalbach 00:45, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Image MoS

message: re: this sentence (and the dog picture someone removed):
:Blond hair can be found in humans and certain breeds of dogs and cats, among other mammalian species.
I tend to agree this is somewhat of a problem. Do we call dogs "brunette"? It is potentially a slight. If we are going to discuss blond in terms of non-human hair we need some sources - for example, from national/international dog breeding and show organizations. Obviously some people may do so informally but it's not clearly mainstream and accepted. -- Stbalbach 18:18, 15 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  non-humans 

message: there's a link to here about Peter Frost theory on the origin of blond hair yet i can see no mention? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 82.26.107.111 (talk) 06:31, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: Footnote #4. -- Stbalbach 23:54, 18 March 2007 (UTC)
thread_title: Peter Frost

message: Please add this link to the article.
http://cogweb.ucla.edu/ep/Frost_06.html —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 129.13.186.2 (talk) 00:25, 2 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  distrubution 

message: This article is meant to provide examples of blond. We've had problems with people inserting their favorite movie star, porn star or other "hot blond" - in order to deal with this, a solution is to approach picture selection using some logical guidelines:
1) Pictures should, if possible, tie in with people mentioned in the text. 
2) Failing that, the pictures should be as neutral as possible ie. they should not promote the interests of any person. There is actually a guideline about this.
3) The images should provide a balance between male/female, child/adult, westerner/non-westerner and painting/picture.
Currently the article is somewhat balanced according to these criteria. Picture "quality" is not really an issue, if users want high-rez pictures for some other reason there is a Wikicommons gallery with dozens of pictures to choose from. -- Stbalbach 22:37, 3 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: You seem to think that using a photograph of a fifty-year old blonde model is "promoting [their] interests."  Since I have photographed over 200 well-known people, I can assure you that my choice of Christie Brinkley is not a choice of my "favorite movie star, porn star or other 'hot blond'."  This is your own criteria, and I don't know why you think you are setting the tone for the article.  A high-quality image of a former model known for her blonde hair seems far more appropriate than a faded, poor-quality image just because you think it adds "balance," "neutrality" or whatever other POV criteria you are proposing here.  The image is from the commons, and frankly I think it gives the article more cachet than the poor image you keep proposing for the lead.  I have plenty of other blondes I have photographed that I could use, but since Brinkley's career is essentially over, I think your argument is myopic, at best.  Right now this is your own personal crusade to keep the crap photo as the lead.  Let's hear from some other people.  Absent more consensus, I'll revert back and we can then invite the larger Wikipedia community to comment on which photo looks bests and illustrates the concept of blonde better.  --David Shankbone 03:29, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think that the problem with Christie Brinkley is that it's "promot[ing] the interests of any person"--it was misguided to suggest this.  However, I do prefer a non-famous person as the lead image.  Though the image now is faded, I still prefer it over the Christie Brinkley image.  An image of a famous person, unlike an image of an unknown, immediately brings to mind all sorts of associations that overshadow the fact of their blond hair.  I think the best of all worlds would be to find a higher-quality image of a non-celebrity for the lead, but as it is, I prefer the faded picture of the random guy. Calliopejen1 04:57, 4 May 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Picture balance 

message: sexual selection 1:
Women are much more than men and extinct both Neanderthals and original Cro-Magnons in Europe, because a lot of men died due to long hunting trip. A lot of men died, women are more than twice concidered to men, only big blond-haired blue-eyed young men are alive.
sexual selection 2:
Men select blond-haired blue-eyed women. Men with color-blindness get married with women with red hair.
Nagara373 09:46, 10 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  sexual selection 

message: blond area:
latitude between the 50th degree and the arctic circle (above the 50th degree and below the arctic circle of latitude)
Nagara373 03:41, 13 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  latitude 

message: Not sure if this is a relevant and an acceptable source for statistics, but this 2006 paper tells that the highest number of people with depigmented hair can be found in a) Finland, b) Norway and c) Sweden.  These countries along with Iceland and Denmark can be grouped under the term Nordic Countries which also cleverly avoids the endless discussion of whether Iceland and Finland are part of Scandinavia or not. Clarifer 14:28, 28 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  statistics 

message: The Natalie Clifford Barney states that picture of her was made when she was 20 rather than 10. Someone, please, check this. --Taraborn 16:35, 3 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Contradiction with another article 

message: I don't know many people who would consider Marilyn Monroe's natural hair color any thing but reddish-brown as it's described in most biographies.  —Preceding unsigned comment added by 76.176.181.196 (talk) 22:41, 6 September 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Marilyn Monroe's Natural Hair Color