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The story
An article from the Mainichi Shimbun’s “My Life Shift” series was highlighted, about a 50-year-old man who once struggled with thinning hair and walked the runway at Paris Fashion Week, saying “I never imagined my life could change this much.” On 5ch’s News Express+ board, reactions poured in over his 189cm (6’2″) height and the confident way he carried himself despite his thinning hair. The thread lit up with a wide range of topics — from opinions that it’s better to just shave thinning hair off than try to hide it, to jokes that in Paris even thinning hair gets embraced as a form of individuality, to debates over whether he looks old or young for his age.
My Life Shift: A Thinning-Haired 50-Year-Old Turned Dashing “Ikeoji” (a slang term for a stylish, good-looking older man) Heads to Paris Fashion Week — “I Never Imagined My Life Could Change This Much” | Mainichi Shimbun
By Moe Yamamoto — Paid article
2026/9/29 10:00
Source: mainichi.jp / Original article here
What people said
41 Anonymous Donburako 2026/03/20 (Fri) 05:35:08.12 ID:Az+IKYP60
Re: #2
If 70% of the raw material for window sashes disappears,
then sash makers' work drops 70% too, right?
43 Anonymous Donburako 2026/03/20 (Fri) 05:42:48.27 ID:Az+IKYP60
Re: #42
If raw materials drop 70%, production drops 70% too, so the work drops 70%,
and you cut staff by 70% as well.
51 Anonymous Donburako 2026/03/20 (Fri) 05:55:14.23 ID:zlyhQQA/0
Re: #46
Because we've never actually been affected by it.
So mind if I save this?
Because I'm hoping you're not a liar.
A 70% drop means if you're getting 100 orders a month, that falls to somewhere around 30-something.
That's easy enough to check later, so I'll go ahead and save this properly — that okay with you?
52 Anonymous Donburako 2026/03/20 (Fri) 05:58:58.36 ID:Az+IKYP60
Re: #51
Sure thing.
I'm just saying it's pathetic to keep flailing uselessly once you're already going bald.
Seriously, exactly this.
If you're gonna keep struggling with a "barcode" comb-over or a scraggly "defeated-samurai" hairline, you might as well just go full skinhead.
to stylish baldness, it makes sense they all flock to Paris, the city of art.
First time I've heard "Rococo-style" mentioned since Mahoujin Guruguru (a fantasy manga/anime).
everyone looks way too old.
I still look like I'm in my early 30s.
He's the only one who thinks that.
Probably because he never leaves his room, so he's not getting any UV exposure.
Looks like he could be a Monk class from Final Fantasy.
Did he catch a giant sea urchin and hang it off himself?
That's a face baldness actually suits.
Way too cool.
Baldness doesn't suit round faces.
彡⌒ミ (ASCII art shaped like a bald head)
(´･ω･`) (a plain, unimpressed emoticon face)
Nice try, Anpanman. (a round-headed Japanese superhero character)
If you have a long face, going bald makes it look even longer.
Like Kotouge. (comedian Hironobu Kotouge, known for his long face)
Well, skinhead upkeep is a pain too, but I guess it still beats having hair.
Just get a haircut that doesn't need styling.
Mine's buzzed to about 10cm max, and I don't style it even when I'm in a suit.
Even if I get bedhead, I just fix it with my fingers.
Looking at this, when he was young he had a bit of a young Masaharu Fukuyama vibe — though maybe that's still just average?
👇
https://bunshun.jp/articles/photo/78163?pn=2
Instead of going full skin, leave a few millimeters.
I love rubbing it like a lawn.
Genetics are terrifying.
Once puberty hits, male hormones and balding genes team up and really show what they can do.
Even before it falls out, it starts thinning.
Yoga is great.
https://imgur.com/U2ijpFW.jpeg
That's AI-generated, right?
Even Yoichi Nukumizu (a Japanese character actor) landed a beautiful wife looking like that, back before he'd made it big.
Don't laugh at a man fighting on the edge of a cliff 😡
From a trypophobia (fear of clustered small holes) standpoint, how's this head?
His wife, kids, and the staff around him probably can't say a word about it.
Background and Talking Points
The article is framed as a personal story from the Mainichi Shimbun’s lifestyle series, about someone who overcame an appearance-related insecurity to take on a new challenge. In recent years the fashion industry has drawn attention for casting that isn’t bound by age, body type, or hairstyle, and this case caught people’s eye as part of that trend. Where opinions in the thread split was on aesthetics: some argued it’s cleaner to boldly shave off thinning hair, while others said that precisely because it’s Paris, thinning hair reads as a form of individuality. Comments about his 189cm (6’2″) frame and his age also went back and forth between “he looks old” and “he doesn’t,” suggesting how much impressions of looks vary from person to person. It’s worth noting that since the original article is behind a paid subscriber wall, the 5ch discussion is a reaction built up from just the headline and summary.
*This article is compiled from excerpts and a summary of the 5ch (News Express+) thread “[彡⌒ミ] A Thinning-Haired 50-Year-Old Turned Dashing Ikeoji Heads to Paris Fashion Week — ‘I Never Imagined My Life Could Change This Much’.”
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