What are your opinions towards a white male with dreads?

Basically i want your opinions, Maybe from someone who has dreads and is a white male? Want some help with them too because I think i'm going to do it, What's an ideal length to start the process?

updated by @jamie-r-exley: 01/13/15 09:31:05PM

last i checked i was male

i started at a few inches but 6 is recomended for natural dreads (the best way) 5 for tnr (next best)

whats my opi9nion on me? i guess im ok..i like me so..yea

is that what ya want?

to know what my opinion of myself is? i wouldnt wanna be anyone but me

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My new book Ban The Taboo Vol 1
updated by @soaring-eagle: 02/05/15 10:12:49AM

i get alotta looks, i backcombed and have no maintenance and they are about 8 1/2 months old. I get a bunch of looks and comments. alot of good but more negative. You will be judged but if its what you want then nobody else's opinion matters. my hair was about mid back and thick and curly. after dreading and they tightened up quite a bit and they are shoulder length. its not a hairstyle its a lifestyledefinitively.

The only negative comments I have ever gotten were from family. I've had my locks for 6 years, and my mom still thinks I should cut them and go to a salon to have them "done" nicely. My dad is a racist bigot who thinks I am trying to look black, but he has stopped saying it to my face in the recent years. Until I went to Ireland, no one else has given me dirty looks (That I've noticed), or said anything but the random questions about how I wash them or how long they took to grow. In Ireland I was 1 of only 2 people I saw with locks in 16 days. and I traveled around the entire country. And funny enough, only in Dublin did I get looks. One woman (I didn't see it, but my wife noticed) looked me up and down and had thatdisapprovinglook on her face. Another woman, I did see, kept scowling and me in Newgrange. And a drunk guy in a pub bought me a drink but kept telling me I should cut my hair.

I feel like you will get more compliments that negative feedback. Some people wont understand the messy stages. But that is because they haven't spoken to someone starting the journey. They see people with locks and they see people with really messy nappy hair and don't ut 2 and 2 together that that the messy haired person might have been starting them.

All that said, there's nothing wrong with white guys and locks. I have them, and I don't do drugs. I don't call myself Rasta. So I just laugh it off when I get comments like that. It's an unfortunate side effect of societies ignorance, but you can't fault them for it. Just rock your locks and try to inform people as you go

I started when mine was about 8-10 inches. My hair was gettign to the point where I'd have to comb out the tangles with about 1/2 cup of conditioner each time I took a shower, and that took about 30 minutes each time (Ive got REALLY thick and REALLY curly hair). So I figured i'd start dreads like id always wanted to. Had a friend section it off with rubber bands, and I kept it bunched back with a cut off piece of a t-shirt to keep it presentable and intact. About 1-2 weeks later, I cut out the bands, and started washing my hair.

As far as the connotation and reactions to a white guy w dreads, it all depends on your lifestyle and location. I live in Austin, TX, which is generally a super liberal place, so I havent gotten any dirty or condescending looks at all. I had a couple of friends tease me once or twice and call me a 'trustafarian', but it was all in good fun. I try to keep a semi-clean-cut appearance in general, so the dreads dont necessarily make me look like a 'dirty hippy' or a bum. I actually think my dreads look pretty dang good when I'm wearing a suit on stage with the soul/funk cover band I play with. I dont really care much if people assume that I may be a pothead based on me having dreadlocks, cuz its Austin, and its pretty much assumed that 80% of people 18-60 like to get high on occasion, lol.

With a job, it depends on what kind... I work in the video game industry, so absolutely nobody cares how you dress or present yourself at the office. I imagine it would be harder to get a job in the service industry with dreads, especially if ur in a conservative town.

If you want to keep a presentable look, you can try keeping the dreads wrapped up if they are long enough. It makes it a bit less noticeable (which is one reason i did it early on, when they were really poofy, and looked exactly liek Sideshow Bob). There are lots of ways to wear dreads when they are long enough; u can find that info all over the web.

So yeah, it all depends on where u live, what kind of job u work at, and how sensitive u are to how you think other perceive your appearance. Good luck on your potential journey, and I hope I helped.

I worked as a cook for 5 years. You'd think that working with food would be hard to keep long hair, let alone locks, but I've never had a problem. I wore a hair net when they were shorter and messier and then got a black tam that I could tuck them all into when they got longer.

If you live in the US and are growing your locks for spiritual reasons, you never have to do anythng about your hair unless it poses a safety risk like firemen or pilots that need to wear masks. Some jobs might ask you to cover them or tie them back, but they never have the right to ask you to cut them or not hire or fire you because of them, when spirituality is involved.

I know some conservative areas might try to do it anyway, but if you feel strongly about your locks and the work you want to do, you can bring the law into it and you will always be in the right