Are you calling me ginger?

Upcoming DJ Tim Cheddar expresses distaste at being called ginger.

You’re a gentleman of reddish tint; do you have Irish blood?
Are you calling me ginger? I prefer strawberry blonde. My real surname is Derry so I could be Irish Cheddar, I suppose. And I like The Pogues. But I don’t go around saying, ‘Top of the morning’ to people, so I can’t be Irish, can I? Eejit!

Source: Timeout Dubai

Ginger and Fat

Stuart Heritage describes the latest American Idol contestants with equal fervour. Including this snippet about contestant number 11:

American Idol Contestant 11 - Michael Sarvner. FACT: Michael Sarvner is both ginger and fat. This means he’ll get the American Idol disabled pity vote even more than the blind bloke.

Source: Heckler Spray

Burn victim's freckles disappear after explosion

This isn't gingerism, but it is very interesting. A red haired teenager has lost all of his freckles after suffering serious burns to his face and arms.

If someone told you their face was burned off during a camping trip, you would not expect it to be a tale with a happy ending.

But Aiden Kelly has found a positive in his nightmare experience: his skin has grown back – without the freckles he despised having.

The 15-year-old was turned into a 'human fireball' when an aerosol can exploded in a fire during the trip.

His hair and face were set alight leaving him covered in scabs which doctors feared would never heal.

But after months of treatment his skin has recovered – minus the orange marks. 'I think it's turned out quite well, actually,' Aiden said.

Source: Metro

It’s revenge time for agents orange

Columnist Nathan Bevan takes a comical look at the latest red hair related happenings.

DURACELL! Copper top! Agent Orange! Or my personal favourite: “Did your mum drink from the hot tap while she was pregnant?” – a red-head’s life has traditionally not been a happy one.

They’ve been ridiculed, vilified and, in some parts of the Valleys, suspected of sorcery and burned.

How do I know? Because I live with one of their number and have lost count of the times she’s come home in tears after being barred from the local Dunelm for clashing wildly with the home furnishings.

Source: Wales Online

Gingerism.com interviewed by Kiss Magazine

Kiss, the largest teen magazine in Ireland has taken a look at what gingerism is, how it manifests itself and what to do if you're a victim of it. The article includes some quotes from our very own Keiron Waites (that's me!).

It's really hard to pin down exactly why someone is slagged because of the colour of their hair, just like it's tough to understand why a bully will decide to pick on a particular person.

"Belittling someone because of their appearance or because they're a minority is a cheap but very effective trick and probably gives those people that do it instant gratification and a sense of superiority", says Keiron.

Take a look at Kiss online

Red head stereotypes enhance advertising

Australian advertising agencies are apparently taking advantage of the stereotypes associated with red heads and using ginger children in marketing campaigns.

Mostly Kids Model Agency and Academy owner Liz Philippou said consumers were led to believe redheads depict "certain individuality, fiery temper traits, sharp tongues, determination and mischievousness".

"When an advertising campaign features a redheaded child, it sends a message of that same determination," she said.

"(It) catches the eye and holds you, pondering the possibility of the redhead being an absolute little devil, and then considering the product they're associated with."

Advertisers cash in on redhead appeal

Root Ginger exhibition review

The Evening Standard has the first review of Root Ginger, the exhibition by Jenny Wicks running now and up to 1st March 2009.

Making a mockery of the term “redhead”, the palette forms a glorious autumnal swatch, while the distribution of pigment is fascinating: sometimes, a single tone appears to have leached from hair into skin and gathered in small puddles as freckles.

Walking among these portraits has the air of a scientific sampling, like a Victorian survey. And in some ways it is; Wicks’s fascination is as much with the journey of the ginger gene as with photography as art — and that element is just as striking as the show’s value as an exquisite portrait collection.

Read the review

Will gingers become extinct?

Retired professor John Brock takes a lighthearted look at the widely held belief that red heads will soon be extinct.

As genetic science progressed with the deciphering of the human genome (whatever that is), modern scientists now doubt that red hair is on the way out. But Oxford Hair Foundation declared a few years ago that redheads were headed for the way of the dinosaurs. Their conclusion lost some of its steam when it was finally revealed that the group was funded by Procter & Gamble — a major purveyor of hair dye.

Source: The Post and Courier

Being ginger's been the making of us

Ann McFerran discusses the gingerism her children have encountered throughout their lives and how they feel about being red heads today. Particularly interesting is the distinctive difference between Canadian and British reactions to red hair.

When we returned to the UK, there wasn't much let-up, only instead of admiration, those who stared and shouted names at my son because of his hair were mostly other children. Copper knob, ginger nut, carrot top, Duracell, ginger ninja; the names were not particularly inventive and, with the exception of the latter, didn't seem to have changed since I was a child. “I was probably oversensitive to the names,” admits Patrick, 30.

I now think that I wasn't sensitive enough to my son or aware enough of the kind of routine bullying that is regularly meted out to gingers, and particularly to young gingers whose hair colour is at its most extreme. I may even have exacerbated the problem: I thought my son's hair was such a spectacular colour that I let it grow quite long to show it off.

Source: Times Online

A ginger Prime Minister?

Writer Anne McElvoy pontificates on a week of news and spares a thought for gingerism, prompted by the opening of Jenny Wicks' Root Ginger exhibition.

Red hair gets the praise it deserves in a new exhibition devoted to gingerism. I am unsure as to what qualifies, having faded to something you might politely call strawberry blonde, or what my son described as "dirty light brown", down the years. But you never really forget early years' membership of the ginger club with the pleasure of standing out in a crowd. Or the pain of being too strikingly visible to teachers looking for someone to blame. Catherine Tate, Simon Heffer, Mick Hucknall and Tilda Swinton, you know what I mean. But can we yet envisage a ginger Prime Minister?

Source: Evening Standard

He's ginger, he would melt

Jimmy Carr on Prince Harry going to Basra.



Thanks to Gingerism.com reader Phillip Parr for reporting this.

Root Ginger Exhibition receives wide coverage

The Root Ginger Exhibition, due to open Tuesday 17th February has received wide coverage by the British press this week. The BBC hosted a discussion of gingerism with psychologist Anjula Mutanda and Root Ginger model and poet Richard Tyrone Jones. Most poignant in the discussion is Anjula Mutanda's strongly emphasized opinion of the existence of gingerism.

The fact is, if it hurts somebody's feelings and it's discriminating against them, making them feel bad about themselves, then it has to stop and not be seen as innocuous.

Secondly, the Daily Mail have covered the event, with many photographic examples from the exhibition and quotes from the models, including the following:

I had to grow fast as my mother's reaction to being told her first born was a ginger was to weep uncontrollably.

The quote reminds me of my own mother, who once told me "I didn't like ginger hair until you were born."