Katy Guest: Rant & Rave (10/07/11)

Rant

Imagine if you shared a name with a famous villain. Or had a face just like a legendary pervert's. Or imagine you had spent 1938 cultivating a toothbrush moustache, and had just started to think that it really suited you. Now maybe you can understand how I feel, every time someone says, "Ooh, don't you look just like that Rebekah Brooks?"

I'd like to point out on behalf of my adopted hair colour that all gingers do not look the same. If Ms Brooks and I both happen to be too busy for straighteners, that is all we have in common, and there's really no need to go on about it. Do I compare you to Jeremy Clarkson, just because your hair is brown? How would you feel if you were openly jeered at every time you wore a pair of ill-fitting jeans?

I could of course ditch the dye, but why should I give in and let her have my hair? I looked like this back when she was founding Women in Journalism and objecting to the blatant sexism of Page 3. My values, like my colour (number 110: Light Natural Auburn), haven't changed.

There's only one solution, and that is for Ms Brooks to take the scissors to it. She might be reluctant to fall on her sword to save my reputation, but if we all appeal to her sense of fairness and human decency then I'm sure she will see that it's the least she can do. So please all join me in a boycott: no more looking at Rebekah Brooks's hair.

Rave

Rebekah Brooks could only be a ginger, of course. She has the hair of Boudicca; of Elizabeth I; of women seen as strong... but not entirely in a good way. Scientists recently claimed that women with red hair have a higher pain threshold, and the words "feisty" and "redhead" go together as naturally as "dumb" and "blonde". If you want to be seen as spirited, dynamic and probably dynamite in the sack, I would recommend dyeing your hair red. I would leave it for a few weeks, though, if you don't want to encounter a lynch mob.