- Okay okay okay. This is going to piss some people off. Some of you are going to turn
your backs on me forever, sorry to see you go. I have to tell you this reality. I have not shampooed
my hair for five years. And yet those five years have been some of the best five
years of my hair's life. No more itching, no more oily hair, no more dandruff flakes, just normal hair that does
weird stuff sometimes, but is generally happy. Let me explain. Go ahead, take a good look, I know everyone's already doing
it anyway, look at my hair. I've never felt so conscious about my hair because I'm talking about it. Okay, so five years ago I realized that I was in a cycle. The cycle looked like this. My head, which produces
natural protective oils would be washed with shampoo. Shampoo is just a chemical that attaches to these oils on your scalp, and then when you wash that shampoo out the oils are attached to them and they leave, ridding your head of oils. The shampoo also cleans off any pollen or dust that's caught in your hair. So my hair was now clean, very clean. Oh yeah and this guy isn't me, this is just a stock footage representation of me five years ago. Anyway, then goes in the conditioner, which coats your hair
with silicone material that makes it shine, and restores all of
that shine that was lost from stripping away all of those oils. Man, I haven't used
conditioner in a very long time but I do remember that it makes your hair feel like silky butter. Silky butter, is that even a thing? Okay, so you strip away the oils, you coat it with this
shiny silky conditioner, and then my hair would end up just being sort of like a fluff ball. In order to style it I
would put in some product, like some fancy pomade I bought at some fancy barber in Chicago. This pomade is made of, wait for it, oil. It is an oil based product. So I'm putting oil back in my hair after I just stripped it all out. Meanwhile, my scalp is like
whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa, dude you just stripped away
all this protective oil that we make to protect your scalp, wtf. And so it fires up it's
natural oil making machine to produce more oil for your hair. So now you have double oil, you've got the pomade
and the natural oils. So now by the end of the day you start you feel like
your hair is super oily and greasy and you have all these messages about dirty hair being greasy and oily. - You have got greasy hair though bro. - Aw come on man. - So what's the cure for
this oily greasy hair? Shampoo. - A deep cleansing shampoo. It helps take away the
excess dirt and oils that can be inside your hear. Right, I reckon we should give it a go and get you washed up. - Let's do it. - And the whole cycle starts over again. In my mid-20s I also started to realize that my scalp was starting to
become like itchy and flaky which is so embarrassing,
so uncomfortable, and yet luckily out there in the world there is a cure for this. - [Narrator] The problem
of flaking dandruff can be solved with just regular use
of Proctor & Gamble's new wonder shampoo, head and shoulders. - Okay, listen, just a quick moment to make it clear that this cycle is my hair experience. Which is based on not only
my physiology and genetics, but also on my standards and relationship to society and what society tells
me to do with my hair. So just to get this out of the way, I'm not here to preach
what's right for your scalp, I'm simply telling you
what's right for my scalp. In fact there's this whole movement, sort of a political
movement around shampoo and not shampooing, it's called no poo which is a very unfortunate
name for this movement. I'm not a part of that
movement, I'm not pushing that. This isn't political for me, I just want to tell you a story about the journey of my hair using a little bit of history
and data and research, and again most importantly,
my own experience of five years of not shampooing my hair. Okay, so let's dive in. Let's get some context here. Human beings used to not wash their hair very much at all. It was only by the 1970s when ads targeted mainly towards white women would come out saying you
need to wash your hair every single day, and that the dirt in your
hair was weighing it down. - That attract dirt and
weigh hair down like this. - And that in order to
prevent this weighing down and to get body, you would have to use this product. This also started a whole
new set of messaging around greasy hair, dirty hair, which even saying it is like repulsive. So demonizing the idea of greasy hair and pushing this daily shampoo regiment was seen as the only way to fight back against this greasy hair epidemic. Today, Americans wash their hair around five of the seven days of the week. By the way that's about double how much they was their hair on average in Spain and Italy. And it's way more than the once a month Americans used to wash
their hair in the '30s. So let me tell you the story
of how this all went down, because I didn't grow
up as a non-shampooer. Five years ago I had bought
this really expensive fancy tea tree oil based dandruff shampoo, because I had so much itchiness
and flakiness everywhere. I was so tired of that, and I was so embarrassed by it. So I was diligent. I would wash my hair with this tea tree oil shampoo every day. The marketing on this told me that I shouldn't use any other shampoos, that all the other
shampoos were the devil, and that this was the
only thing I could use to treat my dandruff. I ran out of this shampoo while we were on like a trip, so I couldn't order it. And I was just like okay when I get back I'll order the shampoo
and I'll get back onto it. And it took a while, we
were on some long trip, I get back, I forget to order the shampoo, I was getting worried about this. But soon, after like three weeks of this sort of fear
of using other shampoos I noticed that the itching
started going away. and that the greasy hair feel started to actually level out. It was actually okay,
and I was secretly like oh I'm probably, I probably just got
used to it or something. But the key moment happened when I went in to get a haircut having not washed my hair
with shampoo for like a month. I was actually really
nervous and conscious of what the barber was gonna say to me, and he didn't say anything. So I asked him, I was like hey how does my hair and scalp look to you? And he was like looks
good, it's a little dry, but overall pretty healthy, and that was the moment for me. I was like wait what? This guy who sees like
dozens of scalps every day, dozens of scalps, that's
actually really gross, like dozens of scalps, I'm just never gonna say that again. This guy sees a lot of scalps every day and he blessed my unshampooed scalp, and was like you're actually okay. Now let me just remind you that I've told some of my
close friends this story before and they have tried it and it hasn't worked for them. I'm not saying that this exact thing is going to work for you. The reason I am making this video is because I want us to
have reasons to be skeptical of all the messages that we get fed around this topic. - [Narrator] Nourishing damaged
hair back to healthy life. - Regular washing is the only way that you can get rid of that excess oils. - I feel no grease. - A few years ago I read
this kind of obnoxious business book that said that the best way to market a product is to
create a psychological trigger that makes people need your product. The example used in the
book was this toothpaste in like the '50s or '60s where
the ad for this toothpaste called attention to this
quote dangerous coating that robs the teeth of their whiteness. Like this film coating
that's on your teeth every time you eat, and it's like dangerous and bad and socially unacceptable. Turns out that this
dangerous film on your teeth is a harmless residue
from food consumption, and toothpaste doesn't remove it any better than eating an apple. So yes you should
totally brush your teeth, but not because there's
this dangerous residue, and now I can't unfeel it. The psychological
trigger is just baked in, I can't not feel it and I feel judged because I maybe have
this dangerous coating. This same dynamic happens today with the 100 billion
dollar hair care industry. They push all sorts of scary ideas about dirty things lurking in your hair that only their product can fix. And they get very rich because of it. Telling you that you
have grease in your hair makes you feel dirty psychologically. And what it does is it turns these naturally occurring lipids,
or fats in your hair which are totally protective
and naturally occurring into this gross feeling dangerous thing. And more and more these commercials have these like fancy 3-D diagrams to make it feel totally legit and medical. There are medical things here like dandruff is a real skin disorder, that's something that has real symptoms and should be treated
in a real medical way by a professional. Not by a commercial with a fake doctor showing you 3-D diagrams
to sell a product. And no, this lady is not a
legit doctor, she's an actor. While we're on the point of
dandruff and itchy scalps, let it be known that dry scalp, which is not a skin disorder, literally means that you don't have enough hydration in your scalp, is not dandruff. - But he's scratching his
head, could be dandruff. - And yet they share
effectively the same symptoms, itchy, flaky, but dry
scalp, unlike dandruff, is caused in part by, wait for it, shampooing too much. Drying out your scalp by stripping it of its natural hydrating oils. This was my problem in my 20s. I didn't have dandruff,
I thought I had dandruff because I was shampooing my hair too much and it was drying out my scalp and making it dry and flaky. All of this gets conflated when corporations present
their advertisements as legit science that's meant
to help you feel better. But let's just quickly say it like it is, the only thing they're doing is trying to sell you a product to make sure that you feel like you need it as much as possible. Where this becomes totally
below the belt in my view is when these commercials tell the story of how you will be socially ostracized if you don't use their product. - [Narrator] Use Head
and Shoulders every day. - And this gets to the last
point I wanna make here, and potentially the biggest
reason why I made this video. I don't are about you
shampooing your hair, you probably should, you need
to determine that on your own, but let us just recognize that we are social animals. We live and die by what
others think of us. We strive to be accepted
by the group at any cost. And my big fear here is that we have given the power of what we need to do to be accepted to these big corporations,
these giant machines who use this psychological dynamic to sell us more of their stuff. They have successfully turned hair into a discussion of
hygiene and cleanliness, and now we talk about this almost as a form of epidemiology. Cleanliness and hygiene turns into an issue of health and safety, which let's be honest,
brushing your teeth, or washing your hands, that stuff is there to stop
us from spreading diseases. I haven't washed my hair in five years and there's not some virus
that's gonna pop off my head and go infect my family. Oh that's a very strange
image, head virus. There are real skin disorders having to do with the scalp, those should be treated seriously. But my sense is that we've conflated that. We're not talking about
health and disease prevention a lot of the time. We're talking about beauty
and self-perception. That's not epidemiology,
that's personal psychology, personal self-esteem,
and societal standards. That feeling of being dirty or greasy, who determined that feeling? Who set the parameters for that feeling? It's not nature, it's not epidemiology. If you had been born 50 years ago, you wouldn't have that same
feeling of being greasy. It's not natural. And even in 2021, if
you were born in Spain, you would less likely have that feeling of just being dirty that drives you to consume more
and more of these products. Which helps you build the
nearly 100 billion dollar hair care industry, a huge portion of which is
owned by just three companies. L'Oreal, Proctor and Gamble, and Unilever which find a million ways to feel like you are dirty, you are undesirable, and if you don't use their product, you will be ostracized from society. Just look at these commercials. These companies have cracked
the code on what drives us, and it's fear and a desire to be accepted. And this isn't just with hair, this is with a million of these products that tell us that we're inferior. And if I'm saying this
as a man in this society, it is a thousand times worse for women. So am I here telling you
not to shampoo your hair? No, do whatever you want. You have a totally different
hair experience than I do. I'm sure stopping cold turkey like I did probably isn't the right choice for you, all I'm asking you is to
scrutinize your standards, and who is in control of the narrative of what clean even means? Okay, that's that. Speaking of the psychology of self-esteem in the 21st century, I wanna tell you about the
sponsor of today's video which is Better Help. It's an online tool that allows you to connect with a professional trained counselor so that you can have
therapy, but do it remotely. I've been in therapy for
the past year and a half, and for the majority of
that it's been remote, I haven't been sitting in
the therapist's office. And I can't stress enough how important it has been for me, my
understanding of myself, and my well-being as a person, and as a husband, and as a father, and as a brother, and as all the roles that I play in my life, therapy has been amazing. Better Help is not a crisis line, it is not a self-help scheme, it is a platform for finding a counselor and starting therapy so that you can start to make strides
in your mental health. My favorite part about Better Help is that it makes it free and easy to change your counselors. It often takes a while to find the right therapist for your life. With Better Help you
have a ton of options, as well as the ability to, if you don't find a good fit, at first or second or third you can keep trying until you find the right counselor for you. Better Help is more affordable than traditional counseling, which can be fairly expensive, and there is financial aid available. Better Help wants you to start living a happier life today, and I am a major component of therapy as an ongoing practice, I wish it was more accessible,
Better Help is making it so. So go to BetterHelp.com/JohnnyHarris, that's BetterHELP.com/JohnnyHarris and join the over one million people who are taking charge
of their mental health with the help of an
experienced professional. Clicking that link helps
support this channel, but it also gives you 10% off
your first month of therapy. Thank you Better Help for
sponsoring this video, thank you all for watching, thank you patrons for
your ongoing support, hope some of you stick around even though I don't wash
my hair all the time. Okay, see ya.
Dat video made me do the switch!
I am using water only in my hair for 1 year now, never have had a better hair like I have now, it doesn’t feel dirty or smelly, it feels just like hair 🤷🏻♂️
One thing I do though is using a yolk for once a week to wash out the excessive grease on my hair and it has been working really well ☺️
I shampoo only after I get new haircut.
I am only about 3 weeks in (I was only washing about twice a week before), but I highly recommend.
It is interesting to hear someone talk about the social pressures of washing your hair because I've almost felt the need to explain why my hair looks 'greasy' in this transitional period. But the truth is the flaking and itching I was experiencing before is almost completely gone. I have much longer hair. I was worried that my ends would dry out and I would need to cut it to keep it looking healthy but so far that has not been my experience. The human body is pretty incredible.
I watched this on youtube and it brought me to this sub!
As a newbie, I want to ask a question. If I regularly use hair pomade and hairspray to style my hair, will rinsing my hair with just with water (and without shampoo) be enough?
Reason I am here!
Interesting video, and what brought me here. I'm thinking of trying this out, I'm just wondering how he styles his hair and with what product and then rinsing it out of his hair, only water to rinse?
Such a great video, brought me to this sub actually
Reason I am here!