If you’ve ever browsed through discussions about hair loss treatments and hair loss medications on the internet, there’s a very good chance that you’ve encountered a prolific figure by the name of Kevin Mann.
Kevin Mann is currently best known for his Youtube channel Haircafe. Self-proclaimed as “the world's finest source of hair loss information,” this channel currently features over 400 videos and 44k subscribers. Its content ranges from Mann’s own daily hair loss routine to the latest medical news in the field.
Mann is particularly known as one of the most outspoken advocates for the controversial prescription drug finasteride. He often claims that there is a conspiracy against finasteride, and that its purported side-effects are exaggerated. These erroneous arguments are often made against the evidence that has been presented otherwise.
However, it has recently come to light that Kevin Mann has a hidden dark side that includes racism, antisemitism, pedophilia, and incest.
In the past, Kevin Mann has been known to take to his social media to make unprovoked racial statements. One of the most infamous examples can be seen below, where Mann declared on Facebook that while he “hate(s)” people of color, he chooses to withhold his hostility because he is against “empowering the Jews” more than anything else.
This viewpoint is in line with certain white supremacist conspiracy theories, which often assert that powerful Jewish cabals are trying to provoke a race war in order to solidify their control over society.
Another incident occurred when Kevin Mann decided to insert himself into the drama that was arising between the media critic Noah Antwiler, known as The Spoony One, and Antwiler’s ex-girlfriend April Von Lon.
It became public knowledge that Von Lon had cheated on Antwiler during their relationship, with an unsubstantiated rumor that she had been involved with an African-American man named Tyrone. Despite having no connection to either party, Kevin Mann felt compelled to “politely” confront Von Lon with a long and vulgar Facebook message filled with racist, homophobic, and misogynistic language. His message is a barrage of insults that ends with an encouragement of suicide towards Von Lon. Afterward, Mann proudly reposted the entirety of this message on his own Facebook page, which can be viewed above.
When Von Lon rebuked him for his unsolicited message, Mann claimed the role of a victim and decried that he was being attacked “personally” by her. This is ironic given the defamatory contents of his own message. It is clear from this incident that Mann is either an extremely disingenuous person, or he has a severe inability to judge what is an appropriate social interaction.
Mann has also used Facebook as a place to share his deviant sexual fixations. For instance, take the following post in which somebody had posted a childhood photo of a porn star and asked their community to try to identify them:
In the comments under this post, Kevin Mann can be seen lurking and speculating whether the child in the photo had experienced any penetrative sex at the age in which the picture was taken. His disturbing reply can be seen here:
This is not the only time that Kevin Mann has openly displayed pedophilic tendencies. In another post regarding a TeenHut, a forum for underage teenagers, he jokes that age is “just a bloody number.”
The “age is just a number” fallacy is often used as an excuse to ignore age of consent laws and justify statutory rape. The fact that he is using this sort of language while prowling around posts about preteens should raise eyebrows at the very least.
This history of disconcerting remarks stretches further back, as Kevin Mann has also been known to post under the aliases KevinBusomJack and BusomJack in the past.
He often used the Busomjack moniker on the forums for Ebaumsworld, the entertainment website, where he shared further anecdotes regarding his sexual predilections.
In the post screencapped above, Kevin Mann shares a memory of frequently masturbating with his older sister’s underwear, and how he was eventually caught by his mother. Rather than express any shame or regret about this, Kevin Mann seems to view the experience fondly as a step in his sexual self-discovery. He also denied that this activity was fueled by any incest fetishization on his part.
Mann also admitted on the Ebaumsworld forums that outside of soliciting prostitutes, his only other experience with sexual intercourse at the time was with his cousin:
He continued to recount the details behind his sexual relationship with his cousin, who he claimed was only 15 years of age at the start, while he was 21 years old. At the time he claimed that their sexual interactions went on for “a few months,” with them often engaging in unprotected intercourse that ended with him ejaculating inside of her. This relationship reportedly ended when her father discovered it, though no charges were pressed.
If the contents of these posts were true, then that would mean that Kevin Mann had committed what is considered statutory rape in most states.
These examples are only the tip of the iceberg of his activity on Ebaumsworld. His presence on this forum included hundreds of posts, many of which involved him desperately begging its members for friendship and looking for potential sex partners.
When confronted about his posts on this website, Kevin Mann acknowledged that the account was his own, but claimed that it had been “hacked.” This is especially difficult to believe given his abnormal sexual comments that have continued across various platforms.
Later in a Reddit post under the handle Rider_Of_Roach on the Tressless subreddit, Kevin Mann would contradict this statement about having his account hacked, and claim that he didn’t even know that Ebaumsworld had a forum and never had an account:
Here Mann acknowledges that he had used the username BusomJack in the past, but tries to obfuscate whether it was him by implying that it was likely a different person who may have been a fan of the same “obscure gaming magazine” that it reportedly was inspired by.
While this is a remote possibility, the fact that he previously admitted ownership over the Ebaumsworld account and gave a completely different excuse for the shocking posts throws this explanation into doubt.
Either the account was his own and a hacker took it over, or the account was somebody else entirely with a coincidentally similar name. Both of these narratives that Kevin Mann has fabricated cannot coexist.
In this reddit post, Mann refuted the idea that he ever had sex with his cousin, and that his only cousin is actually close to his age and lives in a different country. Unfortunately given his inability to keep his stories consistent, the veracity of this counterclaim is questionable at best.
He also asserted that none of his Facebook posts were made in earnest, and that they should have not been taken seriously. This is an incredibly convenient way to justify making racist and pedophilic statements without ever owning any responsibility.
Another username that Kevin Mann was known for is UnemployedCSCS, which he used for the BodyBuilding.com and T-Nation forums. Mann has confirmed that this was him, and that the name was an “inside joke” from when he worked in the fitness industry:
Mann posted on these two forums during the mid 2010s, and was eventually banned from both. Looking through his history of comments on both, it is not difficult to see why.
For instance, on the T-Nation forums he was known to publicly lust over teenage women. He talked about his ultimate goal of having sex with them, which he believed that his hairless was preventing:
He had also admitted to the other forum members that he was attracted to girls under the age of consent, which he referred to as “jailbait,” though he assured them that he refrained from acting on his desires:
It should be noted that Kevin Mann was over the age of 30 when he had made these admissions, so he was an adult who was fully aware of his words and behavior. He continued to make similar statements about young women and “teen vag” on the BodyBuilder.com forums as well:
He also was prone to discussing his job as a personal trainer, and his grievances against the clients that he worked with. For example, Mann was vocal about his dislike of clients of the Indian diaspora, which can be seen here:
Mann is notoriously litigious about his unsavory past, and has been known to issue defamation lawsuits to silence anybody who tries to publicly document or expose any of it. This includes the lawsuit Kevin Mann v. Encyclopedia Dramatica LLC, et al, which he filed against several entities in 2020.
Regardless of whether any of these posts contained truths, or were misinterpreted attempts at off-color humor, the important underlying factor is that Kevin Mann is incapable of accepting fault and presenting a consistently truthful account of events. He is also eager to use the threat of legal action to hide information from the public.
One of the greatest issues that we are currently facing in the age of social media is a lack of transparent sources of information. Our feeds are filled with countless individuals vying to be influencers. Many of these types use purposefully misleading information to accomplish their ambitions, whether they are guided by monetary gain or their own personal agendas.
As a consumer, it is becoming increasingly difficult to find sources with integrity. The internet is filled with stealth marketers and individuals who twist facts with their own biases. Their goal is to influence you to make a decision based on what they want, rather than focus on presenting objective information to help guide you towards an informed decision.
To have integrity means to be honest, guided by strong morals, and willing to put aside self-interests for the sake of assisting others. It also means apologizing for being wrong or acting out of line. Kevin Mann has repeatedly shown himself to have none of these qualities.
The problem is that Kevin Mann has positioned himself as an authority on hair loss treatments, and his videos are being used by viewers to make important medical decisions. Male pattern baldness is experienced by 80% of men throughout the course of their lifetime. It is an important issue that affects millions of people, with a documented impact on mental health and well-being, and deserves to be handled seriously in an impartial and critical manner.
This definitely does not describe Kevin Mann’s content or his approach to the topic. Instead, his videos tend to feature flippant meme humor, as well as personal insults lobbed towards anybody that Mann views as an opponent. He’s particularly known to take unprovoked potshots at bald men, referring to them as “slapheads.”
For somebody who claims to work in the pharmaceutical field, it is unusual that he decides to harbor such a strong vendetta against people who are suffering from varying types of alopecia. Most would assume that somebody in his position, who has had his own issues with hair loss, would approach these people with empathy and a desire to help. Instead, Mann seems entirely motivated by his own ego and compulsion to feel superior to others.
Mann is also prone towards making straw man arguments about figures in the hair loss field that he disagrees with, as well as cherry-picking research and ignoring any inconvenient data that conflicts with his own pre-determined arguments. His greatest strength is that he does all of this with supreme confidence, which is often what wins over viewers that trust that he is arguing in good faith.
As previously mentioned, Mann has often been a zealous advocate for finasteride. His enthusiasm for the drug borders on fanatical. He’s even gone as far to say that anybody struggling with hair loss should “take the damn drug like an aspirin” and not worry about any potential side-effects.
This is an extremely irresponsible and dangerous statement for anybody in the pharmaceutical industry to make. Regardless of his own experience with the drug—which is only anecdotal evidence at best—he should understand and acknowledge that side effects have been documented in individuals that have taken finasteride.
The side effects of finasteride can range from erectile dysfunction to severe depression with suicidal thoughts. While not everybody will experience these side effects, they have been reported enough to make them a concern that should be taken seriously and discussed with a medical professional before taking the drug.
When Kevin Mann first started taking finasteride, he reported having issues with erectile dysfunction. This can be seen here on his post submitted to T-Nation:
Mann now believes that he never experienced this side effect, and that he had tricked himself into having what is known as a “nocebo” effect. The nocebo effect is when a patient taking a treatment has worse results than they normally would due to expecting a negative result.
While this could possibly account for a few cases, the nocebo effect cannot be used as a catch-all explanation to handwave any reports of side effects with finasteride. There have been enough verified instances of erectile dysfunction, depression, and suicidal ideation that government agencies within countries like the UK have issued public health warnings to finasteride users.
This is why Kevin Mann cannot be regarded as a trustworthy source of information. He is unwilling to compromise and admit when he is wrong, even when his lies might potentially hurt others. At worst, Mann is a sexual deviant with pedophilic tendencies that he has been trying to cover up to save his reputation; at best, he is a dishonest manipulator of information that has espoused racist ideology and expects you to take it as a “joke.”
Either way, we’ll let his words speak for themselves.