THE ILLUSION ABOUT RED HAIR.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 255, 27 October 1928, Page 8

THE ILLUSION ABOUT RED HAIR.

Instead of being fighters, red-haired people, according to recent statements of some scientists, are the victims of 3. congenital inferiority coinpie*. Although such 9, statepient ||iay start lots of the red-headed population into fighting, we are told, they ought to "stop, look and listen" to discover whether or not these new scientific pronpuncenjents can be proved or disproved. For long enough, observes the "Manchester Quardiaii," there has been a popular belief that red hair is the sign of ai) ardent character and that the head that bpftra it displays at once the native hue of Put, this newspaper adds, we are now asked to group thi.B bpjjpf under the heading of P9|Wl#F fallacies because a leptijrer to the British Social Hygiene Council at Cambridge assured his audience that the real truth in the matter is that red hair leads to "an attitude of permanent selfdefeijpe," $nd the "Quardian" continues: "So far from being the daring adventurers, born with ginger so Hot i' the mouth that it mHPt needs emerge at tho top of *he head, the redheaded league are all vjptims of our old and even •too-familiar friend, the inferiority complex. They were so teased about their colouring at school that they have been standing fiercely on the offen-sive-defensive ever since. It is an interesting theory; presumably if they had only been left alone at school William Rufus and Queen Elizabeth wpnld have been two of the mildest monarehs that ever ascended the English throne, and the name Barbarossa, or 'Red Beard,' would never Ijave been given to a whole family of Mediterranean porsairs.

''It they had never been bothered as little boys the whole pf the I|ftrbaroßßa family might have lived in pe*cp and amity with their neighbours instead of harrying such Christians as they wild reach for most" of the sixteenth century. There seems to be a very serious and important moral j Mtspbffd to possibilities of this much Mstory has been misinade during school davs by iil-mdged jpst? that have permanently lighted the twpn of rebellion in lives that were otherwise peaceful and sedentary! Still, one would have thought by this tone there was Jess inflammatory WflJ about om? sptjoojfpq|nq— j{ only bee&psp ret* h*ir, at least in the adult world, is eagerly admired in women and regarded as no 4r»wpaelf to » num. But it may b«lh»t esthetie thporieg make slower progress with the young, and thftt in the matter qf sjjnpje faith ß and ancient prejooipps schoolroijpi |p yow true home of Jo§t pgnges." *