HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Citizen, 2015-10-15, Page 5THE CITIZEN, THURSDAY, OCTOBER 15, 2015. PAGE 5.
As a certified old guy, I‘ve had the
mixed blessing of living through a
cascading cornucopia of male
coiffures. In my teenage years, there was the
D.A. – short for Duck’s, um, Behind. This
style was achieved by growing one’s hair long
on the sides, lacquering it down with copious
splodges of Brylcreem, then sweeping the
soggy strands to the back of the skull, where
they amalgamated like the feathers on a duck’s
posterior. The D.A. was crowned with a
tsunami of hair stacked into an ocean breaker
above the brow.
Think Elvis Presley. For an example of a
D.A. gone hideously awry, think Donald
Trump.
The D.A. spawned at least one exotic
offshoot: the Boogy Cut. The plastered, swept-
back side panels remained the same, but the
rococo pompadour was dropped in favour of a
brush cut.
So. Matching waves of greasy hair to port
and starboard, topped by a field of stubble. The
Boogy Cut enjoyed limited appeal, being
adopted primarily by juvenile delinquents,
recidivist felons and tattooed adherents of
White Power gangs.
Other hairstyles waxed and waned through
their 15 minutes of fashion fame –the mop top
shag popularized by The Beatles,
the Iroquois Wedge popularized by First
Nations wannabes, the Afro, for those who
cherished the look of a gangly dandelion gone
to seed....
And Canada’s chief contribution to male
hirsuteness – the Mullet, AKA Hockey Hair.
You can see classic mullets on WWE
wrestlers, Yonge Street bouncers and on Mel
Gibson in his early movies – cascading
curtains of hair waterfalling down the back of
the neck. For reasons unknown, journeymen
hockey players adopted the style (hence the
name). So did sundry B list country singers
like Billy Ray Cyrus (which accounts for one
of Hockey Hair’s synonyms – Kentucky
Landslide). There are other aliases – Beaver
Paddle, Ape Drape, Missouri Compromise and
Tennessee Top Hat to name a few.
Which brings us to yet another, more recent
male hair style: the Man Bun. That’s where a
guy gathers his longish hair into a clump or
cluster on the top of the head, kneads it into a
giant hairball and ties it off like a sheaf of
wheat.
Does it look good? No. It looks like a
ponytail with an erection. Some Man Bun fans
claim the style is utilitarian in that it keeps the
long hair out of the wearer’s eyes and mouth.
Here’s a suggestion: get a buzzcut. Or wear a
shower cap. Anything – just lose the ugly Man
Bun.
Fortunately, the Man Bun seems to be dying
out of its own accord. Yesterday I saw an
intense TSE broker type dude, striding
purposefully through downtown Toronto in
regulation pinstripes, shiny black shoes, blue
tie, attache case – and a Man Bun on his head.
When a male fashion fad hits Bay Street you
know it’s officially on life support.
And not a moment too soon. Trust me – the
only man who can possibly look good in a
Man Bun is a samurai warrior. And that’s
because any guy who wears a kimono, carries
a three-foot sword and knows how to use it can
look any damn way he pleases.
For the rest of us its a non-starter, the Man
Bun.
Or, as it should be known – the Dork Knob.
Arthur
Black
Shawn
Loughlin
Shawn’s Sense
This is probably going to be one of the
least popular columns I write (which I
honestly hope is at the top of a short
list) but, Toronto Maple Leaf fans, you have
really got to get that chip removed from your
shoulder.
Just because I don’t have room to say “some
but not all fans” every other sentence
throughout this piece, I’ll just say this now.
I’m not talking about all Toronto Maple Leaf
fans. I’m talking about (and you probably all
know a few of them) the Maple Leaf fans who
make themselves look like those hardest-done
by in the sports world.
Last week I took to Facebook to poke a little
fun at the Maple Leafs since my team, the
Montreal Canadiens (Les Habitants, or the
Habs), were able to best them 3-1. All I said,
and this is literally verbatim, was, “Did anyone
catch the Montreal game last night? I had to
work.”
Of course, it was a tongue-in-cheek
comment. I knew exactly how the game went
(though I did actually have plans and missed
the entire game). It was just the kind of thing
that my non-Maple Leaf fan friends and family
members say to each other to joke around with
each other.
A friend of mine, also a Canadiens fan,
suggested that I “tag” the post to include all
my friends who happen to cheer for the Maple
Leafs.
I explained to him that I would like to, but
Maple Leaf fans can’t really take the kind of
ribbing I was dishing out. They’re so danged
sensitive to anyone saying a cross word about
their favourite team.
No sooner had I said that, then a certain
someone in the community told me to ‘tread
safely’ because he knows where I live. I know
he was joking, so I, also jokingly, pointed to
him as a perfect example.
Not long after that, however, a family
member of a really good friend of mine
went on an unabashed diatribe regarding
how Montreal should not have won the game
in question and talked about how poor
the Habs were with the exception of their
goalie and how the analysts say Toronto
played better and... you know what, I think you
get the gist.
That kind of reaction was exactly what I was
talking about when I said, then half-jokingly,
that Maple Leaf fans really can’t stand jokes.
The people who react like this are like school
in the summer. (No class, if that was a
stumper).
Obviously, I pointed out the comment as a
second example and referred to how “damned
sensitive” some Maple Leaf fans are.
Maybe some of you over-zealous Leaf fans
just don’t know how these exchanges are
supposed to go, so I’ll give you a quick
demonstration.
My father (and don’t worry Dad, this isn’t
going to be anything embarrassing... well,
except for the fact that you cheer for the
Bruins) and I are often ribbing each other
given that our teams, the Habs and the Boston
Bruins, are perennial rivals.
I’m pretty sure that, right now, I owe him
two or three coffees and a decent bottle of
spirits because lately Boston seems to keep
besting Montreal in important games.
Every single time our teams play each other,
whoever is cheering for the winning team will
be sure to call the other person to make sure
they aren’t missing their team lose.
We laugh, we agree that there are a lot of
missed opportunities, we rib back and forth
about bad calls and we keep an unwritten,
unofficial tally of who owes whom which
beverages.
Neither of is going to call the other on the
owed coffees (unless we’re actually going
through a coffee shop drive-thru). It’s more
about being able to talk to someone about a
good game of hockey and having a laugh.
It’s always a fun exchange.
You don’t get into analyzing the game, you
don’t get into who deserved the win, you
laugh, smile and say, “we got you last time,” or
“we’ll get you next time,” or “well the Cup is
still ours.” That’s how those exchanges are
supposed to go.
Some Maple Leaf fans, however, feel like
they are the most ostracized people in the
world.
I could make some pretty dark references
here, but let’s just say that the way some Leaf
fans react to ribbing makes you think they
must be stoned and persecuted when walking
the streets because of their choice in hockey
teams.
The way these few fans act, you would think
that they are in northern Quebec and the
minority group of fans. My experience is the
opposite: Most people around here are Toronto
fans. As a matter of fact, if I had to rank them,
I would say Toronto has the most fans in this
corner of the province, followed by the Detroit
Red Wings, Montreal and then maybe the
Ottawa Senators. That’s been my experience
anyway.
We’re so close to Toronto that, it just makes
sense that many of the people around here are
fans. We’re also close to Detroit, so that makes
sense. But you don’t see people who cheer for
Detroit acting this way and the rest of us (the
Blackhawk fans, the Montreal fans, the Bruins
fans, the Canucks fans, the Jets fans, the
Colorado fans...) are just happy to have some
people to talk about the game with.
It seems to be a disease that affects only
fans of the Maple Leafs.
I know it isn’t easy being a Leafs fan and we
all feel for you. You cheer for a team that
hasn’t held Lord Stanley’s Cup in so long and
that has to sting, but you can’t go around
freaking out every time someone verbally (or
digitally) elbows you in the side and tells a
joke.
You also have some of the most ridiculous
expenses to see a game. A quick search shows
that single tickets left for one of Toronto’s first
games are $100 minimum while Montreal’s
tickets are as low as $51.
So don’t misunderstand me, I know it’s
rough being a Leafs fan. That said, it’s not like
it’s something you can’t change. If cheering
for this team makes you so angry, so bitter that
you have to react like someone insulted your
mother when they rib you about your team
losing, then maybe it’s time to trade in the blue
hat for a Sens hat or a Habs hat.
Either that, or maybe switch sports. I hear
the Raptors always need a few more fans.
Denny
Scott
Denny’s Den
Shut out
The offices of The Citizen can feel like a
bit of a bubble sometimes. I’m sure all
workplaces can give employees that
bubbly feeling at times. Especially when it
comes to a job involving creation, operating in
a bubble is a legitimate concern.
Take the Blyth Festival, for example. Most
people involved with the Blyth Festival have
been around the world of theatre their whole
lives, so when they view a play, they view it
from the perspective of those who have been
around theatre their whole lives.
It’s natural, of course, because you can’t
simply invent a new perspective for yourself.
But, again, using the Blyth Festival as an
example, the kind souls there always need to
remember their audience and how they will
respond to a play the Festival produces, not
just what people who have been around theatre
their whole lives will think.
Back to our office, things are the same. We
“create” content here (not to say we create it
out of thin air, but you know what I mean) and
then send it away to you, the reader, to do with
what you will.
And we must remember that. What’s
important to a room full of writers is, perhaps,
not always important to our readers.
For example, when preparing questions for
local federal candidates for this week’s issue,
we proposed a question about the future of the
CBC, but we wondered if that was maybe
something we cared about, but the general
public didn’t, so we dropped the question.
So, when I read last week about Premier
Kathleen Wynne banning journalists from a
number of events involving the province and a
high-ranking Chinese official, as a journalist, I
was disgusted – and I hoped this wasn’t one of
those things that only mattered to journalists
and no one else.
In reporting done by The Globe and Mail, it
was discovered that Luo Zhijun, party
secretary for China’s Jiangsu province, was in
Ontario for a trio of events with Wynne, all of
which were held behind closed doors.
A decision like this made by the woman
running the province is, of course, going to
infuriate a journalist – someone who has
dedicated his life to the concept of the freedom
of the press in a country as great as Canada.
But why should the general public care?
The same has been done by Prime Minister
Stephen Harper. As reported by Vice, reporters
have been banned from a number of Harper’s
events. This comes after Harper restricted
reporters to five questions per day in 2011.
Perhaps those daily five tuckered him out, so
he decided to nix media inquiries altogether.
When asked why media was banned from
the events, apparently at the request of the
Chinese side of the equation, Wynne said she
hadn’t been part of those conversations.
If not the woman running the province, then
who exactly is involved in those
conversations?
It’s sad that the exclusion of media is
becoming more widespread and more accepted
than ever. Members of the media are the
window into your government, among other
things, so if we’re banned from events, so too
then, by extension, are you.
So if the person running our country and the
person running our province are not allowing
the media to report from events, then I’ll have
to have this whole freedom of the Canadian
press thing explained to me over again.
With Wynne’s (and her party’s) already-
shoddy transparency record, she doesn’t seem
to be keeping that “open government” promise
of hers.
Other Views
Male dilemma: to bun or not to bun
Toronto Maple Leaf fans take note