When I was young, I learned early on not to use the word "fetish"...

because everybody, and I mean everybody, took that as a perversion and frowned on it.

To those I actually confided in, I said it was a "quiet passion" and that was generally accepted.

With most women though, even if it was them who brought it up (the word fetish),

I would simply state .... hey, I just love beautiful hair... and yours is beautiful... call it what you want...

Of course, that doesn't always have the desired result either... oh well.

But today, because I'm older with grey hair myself, I have to be very careful how I say anything to anybody.

Just mentioning to some young(er) lady that she has pretty hair sometimes gets me that

"what do You want, pervert" look. Geez... it's just a compliment chick. But older women will always take a sincere compliment and will thank you. I've learned to modify my compliments to defer to a third party and that generally works, old or young. Like saying... excuse me (being polite)... You have such pretty/lovely/gorgeous hair... whoever cut it/colors it/styled it last, really does/did a good job. That gets the compliment doubled by saying her choice of stylist is worth the money. Sometimes it even starts a conversation, which is what we all hope for.

But my favorite these days is this... excuse me, but if no-one else has said it today, let me be the first... you have absolutely beautiful/gorgeous/incredible hair... then smile and chuckle to yourself and see what they say... usually they'll thank you, maybe laugh or chuckle too... or maybe still call you an old pervert...

But that one has opened that proverbial door for me several times now.

As to the LGBT community, I'm not around enough of them to make a judgement, but since many tend to have a chip on their shoulder, and also prefer short or colorful hair styles, I simply ignore them... which sometimes pisses Them off.