Have we reached peak mullet? I thought we had, but it seems they are breeding. Is it the haircut we intend to wear for the end of the world? Is it a sign that we have lost hope for a future? Certainly a mullet-free future.
The mullet has become the cane toad of the haircut world. They gather under street lights. On every street, inside every cafe or bar, in every family home lurks the mullet. Family photos are infiltrated every day.
It’s an extraordinary haircut. Seemingly attractive people become less attractive with just a few snips. The short on top, long at the bottom, never fails to really reduce your sexy. Although some may beg to differ, but they’ve probably got a mullet.
The mullet is like a pair of Ugg Boots. Everyone has had one at some point in their life and secretly loved it. I had one in my teens. It was a curly mullet. I looked like a teenage girl version of the Hoff. My mum loved it. I don’t think it was because she thought I looked good – I think it was because she knew that with that haircut I probably wouldn’t be having sex any time soon. And she was right. The mullet was better than the pill.
So where did the mullet come from? The haircut found its way into fashion in the 1970s. We all remember the coolest mullets. Rod Stewart will be buried with his mullet. It has been loyal. He is king of the fluffy blowdry. David Bowie’s Ziggy Stardust mullet was very cutting edge. Somehow mullets on everyone else never looked as good as they did on Bowie. It’s the bogan cut of choice, but did you know the mullet was first worn by French fashion guru Henry Mollet, and later anglicised as ‘the mullet’? I love that the most bogan of all haircuts was at one time the height of French fashion.
The mullet isn’t just a haircut. It seems to have some evolutionary purpose. It keeps the neck warm. Bald men everywhere weep into their pillows on cold winter nights wishing for neck curtains. It’s like a hairy scarf. For warriors, the short on top also meant their helmets fit better.
So why did the mullet make such a ferocious come back? Some theorise that it was covid. People had to cut their hair at home for their zoom meeting – so they just did the front half. When they went back to work everyone had the same haircut so they mistook it for a trend.
Is the mullet the root cause of the decline in fertility? Sperm counts around the world are down. While science points towards increased obesity, poor diet and exposure to environmental toxins – I am wondering whether the mullet is to blame? Maybe it’s not the sperm count that is decreasing, it’s the mullet count that is increasing?
Look, I get the fact that the mullet is the great equaliser. It’s the haircut for all. You can be a country music fan, a biker, a corporate banker and this haircut is the one that binds them all together. You are in a club – the mullet club. It fluffs in the breeze and screams shamelessly to the world, ‘I am fun. I party and I enjoy riding in open top cars.’ It also does seem to scream ‘arrest me’.
So, let’s use the mullet for good. How about a run for charity? Maybe to raise money for research into declining fertility we could have a ‘mullet run’? … And maybe they could keep running?
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