Would male pattern baldness be considered a more serious disease if less men were to go bald?

paleocapa89

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This may sound like a paradox. This is a thought experiment. I think people generally understand how devastating can it be when someone's appearance (and hair) is destroyed by a burn injury or an acid attack or even alopecia areata. I think it is because those conditions are rare and so out of the "norm" that people can easily understand that they are devastating to the victim.

But when it comes to male pattern baldness people (who are not suffering from hair loss) can't take it seriously and maybe just think of it as a part of aging. I can't help but wonder, would people take male pattern baldness more seriously if it wasn't so common?

Or is it because we see it as a phenotype of people's genetics. If I see a short person (even though I'm not tall myself) I just think of it as the cards dealt to him by his genetics and can't really empathize with him over his shortness even though it may bother him to a great extent. I am just grateful, that I am not that short. Is it hardwired to think about less genetically fortunate people as less "threat" to yourself?
 

hellouser

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This may sound like a paradox. This is a thought experiment. I think people generally understand how devastating can it be when someone's appearance (and hair) is destroyed by a burn injury or an acid attack or even alopecia areata. I think it is because those conditions are rare and so out of the "norm" that people can easily understand that they are devastating to the victim.

But when it comes to male pattern baldness people (who are not suffering from hair loss) can't take it seriously and maybe just think of it as a part of aging. I can't help but wonder, would people take male pattern baldness more seriously if it wasn't so common?

Or is it because we see it as a phenotype of people's genetics. If I see a short person (even though I'm not tall myself) I just think of it as the cards dealt to him by his genetics and can't really empathize with him over his shortness even though it may bother him to a great extent. I am just grateful, that I am not that short. Is it hardwired to think about less genetically fortunate people as less "threat" to yourself?

It'd only be considered more of a serious disease if more women were to go bald. Men's health isn't respected.
 

I.D WALKER

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Some members here touched on this idea (somewhat) a while ago and I think the overwhelming consensus that was made still prevails today:
Were more women, girls/children to experience Androgenetic Alopecia then sooner and more aggressive action would be taken to reach a solution.
 

paleocapa89

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I have to respectfully disagree with you. I think there is no men's and women's cancer or men's and women's heart disease. I can't think of a medical condition that is discriminated against men but not against women. I think men's health is just as much respected as women's health (maybe mental health is another story) I think the main problem is that it is not even considered a medical condition but just a men's trait, a phenotype of men's genetics that is "normal".

I think if women were to go bald just as commonly as men (not like an epidemic starting from now) that would be considered "normal" as well.

On the other hand, if women and children started to go bald now suddenly, it would be considered out of the "norm" and I am sure that actions would be taken immediately.
 

Rudiger

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I agree with paleo, but it depends on the context. If women always had male pattern baldness (or FPB if it was) then it's hard to imagine, but in a world where female pattern baldness existed, and was normal, perhaps it wouldn't matter, just as much as male pattern baldness. It would be just as insignificant and just as important (not at all).

If females were to start developing this gene suddenly, in the last 30 years or so, then it might be a different story.
 

I.D WALKER

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I must have misread Paleocap's premise incorrectly by assuming he was speaking in the present-future tense.
Anyway I believe (from a bald male's perspective) that modern medical history speaks for itself as we know the outstanding lack of funding in male pattern baldness research funding is still strongly lacking.

So yes we can all agree that a spike in FPM would lend a hike in shorter term goal interests.
 

hellouser

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I have to respectfully disagree with you. I think there is no men's and women's cancer or men's and women's heart disease. I can't think of a medical condition that is discriminated against men but not against women. I think men's health is just as much respected as women's health (maybe mental health is another story) I think the main problem is that it is not even considered a medical condition but just a men's trait, a phenotype of men's genetics that is "normal".

I think if women were to go bald just as commonly as men (not like an epidemic starting from now) that would be considered "normal" as well.

On the other hand, if women and children started to go bald now suddenly, it would be considered out of the "norm" and I am sure that actions would be taken immediately.

How much awareness and funding does breast cancer get compared to prostate cancer? Of the two, which are joked about?

The answers are obvious.
 

Afro_Vacancy

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Sorry, the comparison between breast and prostate cancer is not as trivial as Hellouser's post might imply. They're not equivalent diseases.

Here's a chart:
survival-over-age1.jpg

Overall more men eventually die of prostate cancer than women die of breast cancer. But breast cancer, when it does kill women, it kills women in their 30s, 40s, and 50s, which makes it a far worse disease from a government policy point of view than prostate cancer, which disproportionately kills men in their 70s, 80s, and 90s.

The gender issue that may be at play is that I think a lot of society thinks that physical appearance only matters for women. When it comes to women, the media and pop culture blast the importance of appearance on loudspeakers and often ignores the importance of brains, and for men it is the opposite. It's a false mythology, that is why we laugh about Donald Trump having a combover, but nobody ever talks about Hillary Clinton dying her hair and wearing blue-coloured contacts.

In general though the pharmaceutical industry does a poor job with appearance related issues. There continues to be poor solutions not just for male pattern baldness, but also for obesity, wrinkles, acne, and so on.
 

GoldenMane

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The biggest problem with male pattern baldness is that it's just seen as a natural thing that happens to lots of men as they grow old. When it happens to a 19 year old or a 25 year old, he's just supposed to accept it as a natural part of aging.

People forget that 19 or 25 is not old, and you're not supposed to go bald when you're still so young/ supposedly in your prime... Hell, this "natural part of aging" happens to some kids before they're even fully grown/developed!!

People just don't see the difference between age related male pattern baldness and early onset male pattern baldness. It's not the same, not even close!
 

nameless

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GoldenMane, why should they see a difference in it? In a different thread you yourself stated the following:

There's no excuse for making jokes at the expense of those less genetically fortunate than the average man, but humans are ****. Get used to it.

So then just get used to it that people don't see a difference.
 

winnyblues

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meh
If it actually caused some form of physical illness, disability, etc, it'd be more seriously looked at. But its just a loss of self-esteem/confidence/etc, which obviously is a big deal otherwise there wouldn't be forums like this but diseases such as cancer are more serious and therefore more money is placed in research for those diseases
 

nameless

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If it actually caused some form of physical illness, disability, etc, it'd be more seriously looked at. But its just a loss of self-esteem/confidence/etc, which obviously is a big deal otherwise there wouldn't be forums like this but diseases such as cancer are more serious and therefore more money is placed in research for those diseases

Partly correct, partly incorrect. I agree that baldness is not as serious as cancer. But baldness is not just an issue of self-esteem/confidence. If it was then it would be purely psychological. But study after study after study has proved that unattractiveness is detrimental to a person's financial future, health, well-being, and even risky to the person's life. So unattractiveness has real-life consequences even if the person loses no confidence or self-esteem due to his/her loss of attractiveness.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-443754/Ugly-defendants-likely-guilty-attractive-ones.html

http://www.youbeauty.com/love/attractiveness-bias/

http://www.businessinsider.com/beautiful-people-get-more-job-interviews-2013-9

I could go on with study after study after study proving that unattractiveness has real life implications whether the person has confidence or not but why should I bother posting a lot of these studies when posters who do not want to know the truth will continue to spout misinformation no matter how much evidence to the contrary is presented to them? Some people simply do not want to know the truth or they are incapable of absorbing it.
 

Afro_Vacancy

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Partly correct, partly incorrect. I agree that baldness is not as serious as cancer. But baldness is not just an issue of self-esteem/confidence. If it was then it would be purely psychological. But study after study after study has proved that unattractiveness is detrimental to a person's financial future, health, well-being, and even risky to the person's life. So unattractiveness has real-life consequences even if the person loses no confidence or self-esteem due to his/her loss of attractiveness.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-443754/Ugly-defendants-likely-guilty-attractive-ones.html

http://www.youbeauty.com/love/attractiveness-bias/

http://www.businessinsider.com/beautiful-people-get-more-job-interviews-2013-9

I could go on with study after study after study proving that unattractiveness has real life implications whether the person has confidence or not but why should I bother posting a lot of these studies when posters who do not want to know the truth will continue to spout misinformation no matter how much evidence to the contrary is presented to them? Some people simply do not want to know the truth or they are incapable of absorbing it.

That's sort of true, but from a government level that doesn't matter.

Attractiveness is a zero-sum game, if you make one portion of the population more attractive, you're just making another portion less attractive. To cure the baldness of bald men everywhere would be to take away a small advantage of non-bald men. There would then still be attractive and unattractive people, just as many as there are now, but the distinction would come from other factors.

One difference though, is that when private medicine designs extremely expensive cures for unattractiveness, for example $10,000 for hair transplants, breast implants, nose jobs, or $25,000 for liposuction, it transfers the distribution of attractiveness within society to richer people. I would guess that a lot of economists would then perceive this as making the economy "more efficient", since they believe richer people are intrinsically better, and thus they should live happier lives.
 

blackg

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See what I mean? Some people just don't want to know the truth or can't absorb it.
You prove my point.
Yup. Correct. But, the fact that they are here, on this forum, is proof that they intrinsically know this truth.
 

nameless

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That's sort of true, but from a government level that doesn't matter.

Attractiveness is a zero-sum game, if you make one portion of the population more attractive, you're just making another portion less attractive. To cure the baldness of bald men everywhere would be to take away a small advantage of non-bald men. There would then still be attractive and unattractive people, just as many as there are now, but the distinction would come from other factors.

One difference though, is that when private medicine designs extremely expensive cures for unattractiveness, for example $10,000 for hair transplants, breast implants, nose jobs, or $25,000 for liposuction, it transfers the distribution of attractiveness within society to richer people. I would guess that a lot of economists would then perceive this as making the economy "more efficient", since they believe richer people are intrinsically better, and thus they should live happier lives.

It DOES matter at the government level and it matters a lot. For example, I showed where unattractive people are convicted more often, given harsher sentences, and given the death sentence more often. We're talking about the court and the court IS government. I put that link about the courts there to show that even the government is hurting people because they're unattractive. And the government hurts unattractive people in other ways too. I just used the example of the court because it's an easy example to prove.

You're over-intellectualizing on the issue of attractiveness being a zero-sum game. Please allow me to explain: If you cured ALL unattractiveness (everything from hair loss to burn victims to elephant-man disease, everything) and made everyone equally attractive then all that would happen is that attractiveness could lose its' competitive advantage and people would truly start making decisions about each other on the basis of inner qualities instead of attractiveness. In other words, it would level the playing field. Of course they will never make us all equally attractive, and all I'm trying to say is that your point about attractiveness being a zero sum game misses the point. All that happens if you cure one cause of unattractiveness is that you level the playing field just a little bit more. The playing field still wouldn't be perfectly level because there would still be other causes of unattractiveness that wouldn't be cured. But each time you cure one cause of unattractiveness you make the playing field a little bit closer to level.

Bottom line - unattractiveness is detrimental to a person's financial future, health, well-being, and even risky to the person's life.

- - - Updated - - -

Yup. Correct. But, the fact that they are here, on this forum, is proof that they intrinsically know this truth.


You know what - you're smart dude and you're right.
 

Afro_Vacancy

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Nameless, nobody is going to cure all unattractiveness.

No matter what the government does there will be attractive and unnattractive people.

1.3 billion years of sexual evolution makes the brain very good at identifying attractiveness.

If baldness is cured, we'll collectively just discriminate proportionately more in other matters.

And finally you can't deny the impact of the current system. Rich people can be made moderately more attractive with relative ease. No such luck for poor people. That's the sort of system that people like Bush, Obama, Koch brothers, etc see as "efficient". If it's up to them and technology permitting, there will just be more effective and more expensive cures for various types of unattractiveness.

That's very different from curing breast cancer. You do that and you just bump up the life expectancy of women everywhere by 3 years or something. That's a real gain in collective well being.
 

nameless

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Nameless, nobody is going to cure all unattractiveness.

No matter what the government does there will be attractive and unnattractive people.

1.3 billion years of sexual evolution makes the brain very good at identifying attractiveness.

If baldness is cured, we'll collectively just discriminate proportionately more in other matters.

And finally you can't deny the impact of the current system. Rich people can be made moderately more attractive with relative ease. No such luck for poor people. That's the sort of system that people like Bush, Obama, Koch brothers, etc see as "efficient". If it's up to them and technology permitting, there will just be more effective and more expensive cures for various types of unattractiveness.

That's very different from curing breast cancer. You do that and you just bump up the life expectancy of women everywhere by 3 years or something. That's a real gain in collective well being.

I know all unattractiveness will never be cured. I was just trying to make a point is all. The point is that each time you cure one cause of
unattractiveness you level the playing field for the people who have that one condition, but the larger overall playing field still wouldn't be
level because there would still be other causes of unattractiveness, and the only way to completely level the larger overall playing field
would be to cure all unattractiveness, which will never happen.

That aside, if baldness is cured I think what will happen is that the people who were previously bald (both men and women) will go
back to competing against other people with hair (the people who already have hair) on the basis of the degree of attractiveness we
each possess, and other qualities.
 

winnyblues

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LIFE ISN'T FAIR GET OVER IT
everyone has issues/problems/hurdles they must overcome in life
yes baldness is ****ing bad but be glad your ****ing alive, geez. I thought fred was depressing on these forums you are another level.
 
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