I once melted off various chunks of my hair because I wanted to have white stripes in it and was chatting with a friend while leaving 40 volume bleach in my hair extra-long. Parts of my hair were literally reduced to mush. Fortunately, I have thick hair to begin with and I was wearing it in stripes anyway, so it didn’t look as disturbing as it might have otherwise.

My best friend in ninth grade had naturally platinum blonde hair and I saw Heavy Metal that same year. Seeing white-tressed Tarna chopping off heads in her leather underwear was a formative moment for me. Whenever there is a real albino in a movie with humans (as opposed to cartoons), they often end up being a villain. I think the whole lack of pigment thing strikes some people in a primal off-kilter way which makes them associate it with danger.

Punk rock hairstyles are partially based on trying to evoke this response in others. I know, I know, you have a blue mohawk solely because you like how it looks, and you totally hate it when anyone stares at you in the street or when you frighten annoying passers-by or when anyone thinks it is sexy.

Maybe I wouldn’t have a thing for dangerously sexy if I hadn’t seen Heavy Metal when I did. But, not a lot of English language movies came to the theater in the country I was living in at the time, so I was going to go see whatever came through, whether it was an old movie or R-rated or even if it was a wretched doomed romance movie. I suppose, given that I still hate doomed love flicks, and I saw those at the same formative age, perhaps Heavy Metal is not wholly to blame/credit for my adult tastes.

So I admit that I watched and enjoyed the first season of America’s Next Top Model where the cool sorta rivethead chick with the good work ethic won. I stopped watching ANTM some time during the second season when I suddenly realized that Tyra Banks was appallingly egocentric, sadistic, and disingenuous and wasn’t really trying to select a top model at all. How this took me until the second season I do not know. Maybe it is something about Tyra Banks. Many years ago, when Trya Banks was a big deal model but not yet a brand, a sibling of mine scouted her for his modeling agency while she was on a date with John Singleton. Without noticing that she was, ya know, already a model.

So ANTM has apparently made it to its thirteenth season now or “cycle 13″. I guess they do more than one season a year. Part of each season includes an episode where Tyra dominates the wannabes by forcing them to get disturbing makeovers they have no say in. A lot of people (well, a portion of the people who don’t have pay cable and thus watch The CW) are all in a tizzy because Tyra Banks had three of the contestants this year get bleached kind of albino, eyebrows included.

Now I think albino features are seriously hot, but why is Tyra Banks suddenly all about albinism? A couple of models currently making a splash include Shaun Ross and Diandra Forrest, both from the Bronx. If Shaun Ross and Diandra Forrest were from Tanzania, however, their lives would be much less fabulous. Albinos in Tanzania have been being hunted. Tanzanians have been systematically murdering albinos and chopping off their body parts to harvest for supposed medicinal or magical properties or maybe for fun. These sorts of creepy things are difficult to parse when they happen in an alien culture. I think of Tanzania as a happy place with interesting animals because my grandparents lived there when my grandfather was helping Tanzania learn to utilize their leather resources. (Yes, leather, the apple doesn’t fall that far from the tree.) But I guess it has its downside. Ugh. Anyway, the Tanzanian government announced this week that it will be getting tough on albino killers and hanging some soon. Hopefully that is a deterrent. Positive Exposure is an organization working to help the victims of albinism discrimination in Africa.

Anyway, I think white hair looks lot. And soon it may even be sort of in. I would prefer, however, that fashions I like come into style because of factors other than genocidal events. But that’s just me.

Ashton Kutcher is the pretty much undisputed leading twit on Twitter. As of this moment, he has 2,839,413 followers, outflanking people like Barack Obama, Perez Hilton, Shaquille O’Neal, Britney Spears, and Oprah Winfrey, and even CNN and Twitter itself. He has held the number one spot for quite some time. So, when Ashton Kutcher tweets that his wife Demi Moore has gotten a mohawk, people listen.

I know an awful lot of extremely physically beautiful people, yet, even among celebrities, Ashton Kutcher is so freakishly good-looking that I remember him being in the movie Reindeer Games, even though I don’t think his character had a name. And I think his part was so small it consisted pretty much of stumbling into a bathroom or something at the wrong time. So I stop and think about it and realize that I can’t come up with any other movie Ashton Kutcher has ever been in. I know he was on a TV series called That 70’s Show which ran for a long time, but I don’t even know what network it ran on. So I go and check IMDB and I have actually never seen Ashton Kutcher acting in anything other than Reindeer Games. Yet he is clearly up there at the top of Mount Celebrity. I’ve apparently never really seen him act, yet I know that he dropped out of a biochemical engineering college program to become a male model.

Ashton Kutcher has managed to parlay a certain kind of famous access into something far larger than most. He is a perfect spokesman for digital cameras and micro-blogging services because he has managed to commodify certain parts of his existence in such a flawless and innovative way that, in 2009, the rest of society is panting to catch up.

The Punk’d reality show Ashton Kutcher co-created with producer partner Jason Goldberg at Katalyst Films took the Candid Camera genre to a whole new level. By playing pranks on recognizable people, Punk’d made the viewer feel much more invested in the show; it made the show feel ironically more real and most of the punked celebs more humanized. Maybe this makes some sort of statement about the alienation of modern man and how so many people feel more connected to famous faces on television and online than their, err, IRL peeps. Punk’d was spoofed on The Simpsons as the show Chop Shop with the pranked person crying out anguished “Why would you do that?” in response to their car being chopped for the purpose of filming their reaction for reality television.

Why would Ashton Kutcher do that? To get paid? To become a powerful producer? To be feared? To amuse himself? To get MTV to foot the bill for expensive pranks he wanted to play? To be able to have people to play pranks for him? To come across as more of a man’s man and less of just a pretty boy? To become that special sort of celebrity of the new millennium where he is nominally a famous actor, but the real description is much more complex . . .

So anyway, it appears that Demi Moore would look really hot with a mohawk. But the widely-covered haircut is just a photochop (Chop Shop!) Ashton Kutcher posted to his Twitter via TwitPic. Most of the news covering Ashton Kutcher punking the news media with what is not the most convincing photo manipulation say that Ashton Kutcher actually photoshopped the image. Never mind that minutes after posting the chop with the tweet ” wifey just got a new hair cut what do you guys think? I love it”, he tweeted, “@mrskutcher I”m just playing baby but I think you’d look great with that cut”. Which apparently was enough to convince a large proportion of the news media that Demi Moore actually had gotten a mohawk hairstyle. Because the Punk’d guy would never play the prankster in such matters. And apparently some pundits have poor reading comprehension. Which is ironic, given how many serious think pieces I have seen about Twitter decreasing people’s aptitude to comprehend complex thoughts. How much more complex than j/k are they themselves capable of? And what makes them think Ashton Kutcher did that photoshop job? Surely someone, who can pay other people to do pranks for him, has people for that.

When I started writing this article, a short time ago, the Demi Moore mohawk TwitPic had 179,571 views and now it has 181,371.

Since 1992, Blue Blood has been about encouraging people to think critically and not just go along with the herd. My hair is purple and red at the moment. But the hair color is a signifier, not the endgame. What I mean by this is that all of us who fought the battle to convince the world that someone with primary-colored hair or tattoos could be beautiful or sexy, we can all pat ourselves on the back and go home, if that was all the whole thing was about. That battle is won. But the point is that the physical appearance was supposed to be about being a maverick and living on your own terms, about marching to the beat of your own drummer. If mohawks become trendy, then having one does not necessarily signify that one is a nonconformist. You can still aesthetically enjoy very tall hair, but the most important body part in the battle against conformity is slightly lower — your brain. You need to have an evolved intellect to avoid being a bah bah sheep conformist.

I’m about to tell you all the most important lesson of a liberal arts education and it is not even going to cost you a hundred grand or whatever higher learning is priced at these days. I was less enamored of the lessons I learned in school, while I was paying off the tab, so here is the most crucial stuff for free. My parents certainly deserve most of the credit for my brain, but my education really helped ingrain some of their lessons.

In order to have an intelligent and human approach to the world, you must learn to be analytical and think critically. Some people are born more or less disposed to having these abilities, but they are definitely learned skills. The direction culture is moving, driven by technology, does not nurture skills in analysis and critical thinking. First television advertisers, and then internet marketers, found that people respond most primally to sound bites and slogans, as opposed to actual data. As a result, a lot of modern debate, especially online, sounds like the old “Tastes great!” vs “Less Filling!” argument. A person capable of analysis and thinking critically would look at that argument and realize that a discussion of Miller Lite probably entailed a beverage which did not taste good at all to most people and which would indeed be less filling because fewer people would drink much of it.

Which is a tongue-in-cheek way of saying that you need to make up your own mind. When you are presented with a debate or controversy, you need to deconstruct what is actually being discussed. What are the sides of the issue? What is each side actually trying to accomplish? Who are the people presenting the sides of this issue? What, if anything, do these people stand to gain from one or another outcome? Are the people debating a particular side anonymous?

Politicians and salesmen will frequently present their own viewpoint as the side that all people of a certain type will be on. This is to induce everyone who is that type of person to side with them. For example, “if you care about children, you have to donate to my campaign.” Or, “if you are artistic and independent, you have to buy my product.” You need to analyze what the actual issues are and what the actual qualities of a product are. If you do not, then you are doomed to sheepdom.

Once you figure out what the actual issues and values being presented really are, as best you can discern, you need to think critically about them. You might love children and think of yourself as very artistic and independent. But that does not mean you need to buy what a politician or salesman is selling. Thinking critically means deciding for yourself, being able to process new data as it becomes available for your analysis, and determining for yourself how the real issues actually fit with your personal values. Thinking critically means not just wholesale swallowing whatever the last person you talked to told you to think. It means questioning authority and thinking for yourself.

I am often asked why I permit dissenting opinions on the Blue Blood boards. How can I permit people to disagree with me, with the only rule being that they have to be capable of explaining and supporting what they say, preferably without sloganeering or name-calling? So many forums online censor what can be posted in order to make sure as many people as possible will eat the sound bite argument and site owners will not have to back up what they say. So I try to provide a venue where people from many different walks of life can come together to exchange their varied points of view.

Thinking critically combined with being analytical means being able to find the real answers which are best for you, means being your own person. Even if some of your tastes and decisions end up being common ones, coming to your conclusions via critical thinking and analysis means being a nonconformist inside your own gray matter. Where it counts the most.

I believe there is nothing more important than individual liberty. Black eyeliner and glitter lipstick might be ways of expressing your love of freedom, but they will not make you free. Only application of your unfettered brain can do that.

Any kind of extreme hair makes a statement, but none so unambiguous as the Mohawk. A shaved head makes a statement, but you have to parse it out. A shaved head can say near anything: “I’m a javascript programmer who cuts his own hair,” “I’m a 136 lb. passive-aggressive Vegan dickhole,” “Welcome to the Brotherhood, prag,” “Hi, I’m Dave Attell, and welcome to Insomniac,” “The girls can come in, but you losers have to leave,” or “No, I’m not the Dalai Lama, I’m Hunter S. Thompson, you little screwhead.”

A Mohawk says one thing: “Fuck you.” A Mohawk is a tonsorial middle finger to the world.

A Mohawk is different from a set of whitewalls, which is frankly not so far from a mullet. Lank, greasy sk8hawks also verge into mullet territory. A Mohawk stands up, bristling and sharp, and does not flop onto your forehead giving you a comical strip of extra-dense forehead zits.

When seen in nature, the Mohawk is there to intimidate. A raised strip of fur along the spine is the universal sign for “I’m ready to kick your ass, boy.” Rhodesian ridgeback dogs have permanent Mohawks, and they were bred to take on lions. You don’t want to get caught with your hackles down when your job is fucking with bigger, badder species. Think hyenas, or wild boar.

The name comes from the Mohawk tribe of native Americans, who held a bunch of territory around what’s now upstate New York. They actually didn’t sport Mohawks any more than the Huron and Iroquois or anyone else did at the time, but “Mohawk” sounds more badass than “Algonquin”. Brits call the haircut a “Mohican”, which is cute.

(Daniel Boone was captured by Indians around 1778 and given a Mohawk as a test of his courage. They did it the old-fashioned way, by pulling the hairs out one by one. The story’s probably bullshit and the Indians were Shawnees anyway.)

Mohawks were popular with paratroopers in World War II, for obvious reasons: “We jump out of planes, and most of us will be dead when we hit the ground. Fuck you.” Paratroopers also yelled “Geronimo!” when they jumped; all this proves is that people don’t give a shit about the particulars of native American history.

Regardless, the Mohawk wouldn’t have come into its own if WWII hadn’t fucked the British economy gutless. By the mid-70s, things were bleak, dull, and awful enough that kids were wandering around with safety pins through their faces and all kinds of shit in their hair. Punks adopted the Mohawk to say, “There aren’t any jobs; just booze, drugs, noisy music and general collapse. Fuck you.”

The punks brought the Mohawk into its own, but anything that looks that cool is going to get co-opted by the generalist media culture and diluted to pisswater. Punk didn’t sell enough records, so it got watered down and re-branded as “New Wave”, and instead of razor & glue Mohawks, 80s audiences got the “fish fin”, which was basically long 70s hair brushed up the sides and glued in place. Worse yet was the wighawk, a strap-on cotton candy confection seen on tarts in Duran Duran videos and on Sigue Sigue Sputnik.

The 80s also saw the rise of the jockhawk, as sported by Mr. T and the bad-guy wrestler in that Matthew Modine movie. Jockhawks were and are undyed, accompanied by a half-inch minimum of stubble on the sides, allowing them to grow out by Prom time. The jockhawk endures, depressing all who are not fans of WWE Raw.

The 80s did, however, give us The Road Warrior, which remains the Mohawkin’est movie ever. It should not be blamed for inspiring a slew of crummy post-apocalyptic wighawk extravaganzas, or for sticking us with Mel Gibson for two decades.

The 90s were a dire time for the Mohawk, what with lank, greasy hair being all the rage and the Cult of the Mullet looming. Yes, I know, Rancid and all that. They were fun, but I saw Repo Man when it came out and unlike the Baby Boomers, I don’t cream my khakis whenever I see stuff from my youth repackaged and resold. Times just weren’t shitty enough in the 90s for a distinctive ‘hawk to emerge. It was too easy to get a job and keep your fucked-up hair during the Boom, and easy times breed weakness and complacency. Thank god that’s over…

A Mohawk seen on the street these days says, “I’m a bike messenger. Fuck you.” Or, “I’m 16 and I know everything about being punk. Fuck you.” Or, “I’m in a band that will implode after two months for better or worse. Fuck you.” A Mohawk seen in the media says, “I’m a Finnish snowboard champ and I’m totally extreme. Dude.” Or, “I’m David Fucking Beckham and you wanted to Fuck a Spice Girl and I did it, and here’s my stupid fucking haircut this week.”

The 21st Century Mohawk is still waiting to be born, says me. The time is ripe. We have a repressive, conservative, bullshit-spouting administration in office. By the most optimistic estimates, the economy will stay in the toilet for three more years. War is declared, and battle come down (in a few weeks or months, count on it). Things are going to suck so much more before they suck less. There is no better time to take those hot, thrumming WAHL clippers in hand and strip away everything but a bright, bristling strip of Fuck You.

The world is waiting.

100 AD: Roman Legions. Actually they all had those Eminem haircuts, but the helmets had bolt-on Mohawks. Original wig-hawkers: Romans suck.

1976: Bobby DeNiro as Travis “Taxi Driver” Bickle. Travis’ hawk was a wig (DeNiro had another job lined up and needed to keep his hair), but it got the job done with style. Inspired presidential assassin John Hinckley, who was apparently too busy beating off over Jodie Foster to watch all the way to the end.

1977: Wendy O. Williams of the Plasmatics. Hatchet-faced punk rock bitch W.O.W. is owed by everyone who gets off on electrical tape pasties, shaving cream shirts, and women rocking chainsaws and shotguns onstage. The Dark Bros. classic New Wave Hookers vidporn series never would have happened without Wendy O. Tell me I’m wrong.

1982: GBH. Seminal UK triple-initial punk rockers. A bunch of jolly Thatcher-era working-class kids, the sort who would more likely use broken pint glasses on your face like cookie-cutters than bore you with student Marxism. The initials stood for Grievous Bodily Harm, but those were some Great Big Haircuts.

1982: Lawrence “Mr. T” Tureaud. Beat the shit out of Sly in Rocky III, shot AKs with eyes closed in The A-Team. Took the long way around rationalizing beard/hawk combo, mostly relied on the “YOU tell him he looks ridiculous” factor. Must shoulder no small blame for the jockhawk.

1984: The Kid in Suburbia. Come on, you choked up when the little bastard hit the windshield.

1986: Sigue Sigue Sputnik. Wig-hawkers extraordinaire. Looked like post-apocalypse Rip Taylors. Supposed to be some sort of post-ironic Max Headroom anti-consumerist performance screed that would make money no matter how much it sucked because we’re all sheep and deserve to be told it. The music sucked plastic dogshit and the whole thing sank without a trace, resurfacing recently as a hideous side-effect of VH1’s “I Love the 80s”.