Back in his One Direction days, one of his bandmates made a comment that Niall Horan wouldn’t want to be superman because he’s colorblind. Is that true?
Niall Horan is colorblind. He suffers from what is known as blue-yellow colorblindness. This means that he has trouble distinguishing the difference between blues and purples, and yellows and greens. However, he is not completely colorblind.
Scroll down to read more below about what causes colorblindness, what the types of colorblindness are, and what other celebrities are colorblind.
What Causes Colorblindness?
Colorblindness is usually passed down genetically from parents to their children. Most people are colorblind right from birth, but, sometimes different diseases can cause a person to become colorblind like glaucoma or Alzheimers.
In Niall Horan’s case, he has been colorblind since he was born. It is also more common for men to be colorblind over women. How though?
Well, colorblindness is passed down through the X-chromosome. Men have one X-chromosome and one Y-chromosome, whereas women have two X-Chromosomes.
So if the colorblindness gene is passed down on only one of a women’s X-chromosomes, she will not experience colorblindness. For women, colorblindness has to be passed down through both of their X-chromosomes.
For men, they only have to have colorblindness passed down on their only X-chromosome in order to experience colorblindness. That is what has happened to former One Direction member, Niall Horan.
The Types of Colorblindness & Niall Horan’s Colorblindness
There are also a few different kinds of colorblindness. There are red-green colorblindness, blue-yellow color blindness, and then complete colorblindness.
Within these categories, there are a few different types too. Under red-green colorblindness, there are four different types.
Deuteranomaly makes the color green look more like red and protanomaly makes the color red look more like green and seem less bright. These two are fairly common, very mild, and don’t have much effect on a person’s day-to-day life.
The other two types of red-green colorblindness are protanopia and deuteranopia. These make it impossible for the sufferer to see a difference between red and green.
Blue-yellow colorblindness has two different types known as tritanomaly and tritanopia. Tritanomaly makes the sufferer have trouble distinguishing between blue and green, and yellow and red.
Tritanopia appears to be the colorblindness Niall Horan suffers from. It makes the sufferer have difficulty with blues and greens, purples and reds, and yellows and pinks.
In a tweet from February 10, 2019, Niall Horan said “Nahhhhh I am actually colourblind. Big problem with blues and purples/ yellows and greens.”
The Irish singer often reminds his fans and followers via Twitter that he is indeed colorblind. Just not completely colorblind.
Complete color blindness is very uncommon and it is called monochromacy.
You can watch Niall Horan answering the web’s most searched questions with Wired in the below video.
Other Colorblind Celebs
Niall Horan isn’t alone when it comes to not being able to see or distinguish certain colors. There are tons of other celebrities out there who are also colorblind.
The American actor and racecar driver, Paul Newman, is colorblind. His colorblindness prevented him from pursuing a career as a pilot.
Former US President Bill Clinton is another colorblind celebrity. So is the Facebook founder Mark Zuckerberg.
Prince William, Duke of Cambridge is another person who is colorblind. His colorblindness meant that he couldn’t be a pilot like his younger brother Prince Harry. Canadian actor Keanu Reeves is a celebrity who believes that he may be colorblind but he also has not confirmed whether he is.
Fred Rogers, aka Mr. Rogers, was red-green colorblind. He often had trouble determining whether he was about to eat pea soup or tomato soup and would have colleagues tell him the color.
As you can see, there are a lot of male celebrities who are colorblind. That also has to do with the fact that 8% of men are colorblind versus only 0.5% of women.
For Niall Horan, his creative talents lay in music and not in visual art so his colorblindness has not had too much of an effect on his goals or his career. Of course, if he had ever wanted to be a pilot or an artist those dreams may have come crashing down on him.
Instead, we can all just relish his musical talents and quirky personality.
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