Althouse: "We think it may be to reduce competition and intimidation in the kinds of close-cooperation, within and between sexes, that’s required to make our complex, highly cooperative societies function."

April 25, 2024

"We think it may be to reduce competition and intimidation in the kinds of close-cooperation, within and between sexes, that’s required to make our complex, highly cooperative societies function."

Said University of New South Wales professor Rob Brooks, puzzling out why men shave given that facial hair is a "sign of dominance."

He's quoted in "This is the reason why men with facial hair are hotter — could this explain the Mark Zuckerberg ‘beard’ appeal?" (NY Post).

45 comments:

Lucien said...: No wonder Osama bin Laden was so hot. He was the strong horse with big bomb energy.; 4/25/24, 5:07 AM
Ron Winkleheimer said...: It's just fashion, was society any less complex during the US Civil War when men wore huge, full beards? Or what about the Romans, who not only shaved their beards, but plucked out all the hair on their bodies?

However, one reason that men went from long hair and full beards to short hair and no beards in the 20th century was WWI. The need to be able to wear gas masks put the kibosh on beards and prevention of hair lice meant short hair. (Though I don't think short hair really helps with head lice.); 4/25/24, 5:13 AM
rehajm said...: I’m skeptical of the timing. He’s about to drop more Zuck bucks on the election steal so run a prop up before the hit posts drop on X…; 4/25/24, 5:29 AM
rehajm said...: What flavor ice cream does he like?; 4/25/24, 5:30 AM
rehajm said...: Also- Chinese ladies at home won’t allow…; 4/25/24, 5:31 AM
Enigma said...: Mutton chops! Mutton chops must return! I demand it! I'm gonna dominate you if you don't laugh at me!

https://beardstyle.net/wp-content/uploads/2018/04/50a693fa9b57b57c6afb4743e00ca195-1.jpg

Fashion is akin to a rotating clock and the same themes will be recycled every few generations. Fashion. Simple biology-driven fashion and personal taste. People who grow beards tend to either be (1) fastidious and take great care in grooming and hygiene, or (2) sloppy and lazy and have food crumbs in their beards and rotten teeth. Ask a dentist. Seriously.; 4/25/24, 5:38 AM
Sean said...: Beards are makeup for men. They allow men to hide flaws in their profile, sculpt a more pleasing look or appear more masculine.

Sometimes it is to appear fashionable and unique, like sporting a tattoo, but much of the current beard style is more to improve your look.; 4/25/24, 5:39 AM
Paddy O said...: Facial hair itself says nothing about dominance or masculinity.

Note the hipster trend of facial hair upon rather unmasculine males.

I think of the Friends episode ( I know, I jnow... I was in their target audience when it aired...) when Tom Selleck guest starred and Joey and Chandler grew mustaches. The joke was they were nothing near as masculine as Tom Selleck.

A beard without a mustache evokes pacifist Amish.

A masculine man has a masculine beard but a beard itself really just emphasizes what is already or already not present.

The current trend of fastidious beard management seems almost feminine.; 4/25/24, 6:08 AM
Wince said...: O.T. but at an adjacent NY Post article:

An Australian woman who bedded 22 men during a recent 10-day vacation has shared her horror at being horrifically “slut-shamed” online.; 4/25/24, 7:12 AM
Iman said...: Beard sculpture… moisturizers… body hair removal… pedicures… manicures… scents…

Careful, ladies…; 4/25/24, 7:12 AM
MadisonMan said...: Thanks Dad, for my bad beard-growing genes.
I let Noxzema cream my face, so the razor won't.; 4/25/24, 7:14 AM
wild chicken said...: Ugh, I hate the beard trend, especially the Bluto beards that look like they were painted on.

Such obvious insecurity.; 4/25/24, 7:52 AM
MadTownGuy said...: Every year during summer vacations with family, I grew a full beard. On return to the office, my co-workers called it the "Mountain Man" look even though it was properly trimmed. After about a week I'd usually tire of it and go back to clean shaven, though once in a while I'd leave the mustache. Later, as gray started to invade my upper lip, I ditched the mustache entirely.; 4/25/24, 8:13 AM
NorthOfTheOneOhOne said...: Said University of New South Wales professor Rob Brooks, puzzling out why men shave given that facial hair is a "sign of dominance."

Some men look menacing with beards, some men look much older than they want to look and some men have patchy, scraggly beards. Maybe he should spend his time puzzling out why some of the University of New South Wales faculty seem to be rather dim.; 4/25/24, 8:41 AM
Bart Hall (Kansas, USA) said...: So what's with the Anglo trend amongst women to shave their legs and under their arms? It sure isn't that way in Europe or Latin America.

I couldn't grow a beard if survival depended upon in. One of my great grannies was a full-blooded Mattaponi, and those male ancestors dealt with what facial hair they had using a pair of clamshells as tweezers. Moi? Shaving's a bother, so I grow a "beard and mustache" around my mouth, and a couple of feeble "chinstraps". Every week (or sometimes two) I use a 30-dollar tool to mow the grass back to 3 mm.

Meanwhile, I read that crab lice are an increasingly-endangered species because so many women under 40 are opting for the "porn pussy", utterly devoid of hair. Maintaining that look cannot be a comfortable process.; 4/25/24, 8:53 AM
Wilbur said...: Ha, Bluto. Olive Oyl famously liked "a clean-shaven man". https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RNFsKcjjxZM

When I was in law school, there were some Saudi students in an adjacent building to ours. When I remarked that one of the heavy-set ones looked like Bluto, my friend remarked "bluto, blutere, bluxi, bluctus".; 4/25/24, 9:00 AM
Aggie said...: There was a fad during the 70's for beards, as well. My dad, ex-Air Force and with a fairly strong Boston accent, used to call them 'bearded geniuses', in a disgusted voice. It was an all-purpose pejorative, especially handy in traffic. I don't have a position on beards one way or the other, except to see them usually as an extension of a man's hair style - sometimes a Wild Man, sometimes over-barbered to the extreme, almost a form of makeup.; 4/25/24, 9:10 AM
RCOCEAN II said...: facial hair is usually a sign of laziness and/or the opting out of sexual competition by men. Its why so many Old guys have beards. They just don't care anymore.; 4/25/24, 9:12 AM
Rusty said...: My daughter thought I'd look good in a beard like the one I have now. So I grew it.; 4/25/24, 9:23 AM
n.n said...: My daughter thought I'd look good in a beard like the one I have now.

Daughter, girlfriend, wife... a man is sensitive to a woman's preference, and a woman to a man's preference, within reason, in a reciprocal relationship.; 4/25/24, 9:37 AM
Narr said...: No man, no matter how fussy he may be about his beard, is half as ridiculous as the man who dyes his hair.

I hate to shave, but my full beard is both sparse and too warm. I've settled on mustache (which I have worn without a break since I was 17) and chinstraps (thanks for the new word!) with a little soul patch. (Gotta leave the chin dimple uncovered.) You can almost see it in my profile pic.

For a while, I tried a Hindenburg,

I have to use the electric trimmer a couple of times a week on my cheeks and neck, and trim the rest at the same time.

My British history prof had a theory that beards flourish when women occupy the British throne.; 4/25/24, 9:55 AM
Narr said...: %#(&% Blogger just ate my %&)#!$ post.

URRRGGGHHHH.; 4/25/24, 9:57 AM
Yancey Ward said...: I had a full beard from age 16 until I was going on the professional job market at age 28 when I was finishing my post-doctoral work. I grew it because I hated shaving- no other reason. I don't know which looked better for me, but once I shaved it off, I never grew it again and won't. The furthest I let it go is 2 days growth.; 4/25/24, 10:20 AM
Michael McNeil said...: In C.S. Lewis's Screwtape Letters the Devil chortles over how he's managed to convince “nearly all the females” that beards on men are disagreeable—as an element in Hell's general purpose “… to guide each sex away from those members of the other with whom spiritually helpful, happy, and fertile marriages are most likely.”; 4/25/24, 10:21 AM
Bob Boyd said...: Santa’s beard and his girth are calculated to intimidate and dominate the skinny, hairless elves who are small, but strong for their size, extremely quick and utterly ruthless when their blood is up and who vastly outnumber the human population at the North Pole.; 4/25/24, 10:29 AM
Balfegor said...: I think it's primarily fashion -- it flip flops so much throughout history. Augustus is beardless, but Diocletian is bearded. Constantine the Great is beardless, but Julian the Apostate is bearded. George IV is beardless, but Edward VII is bearded. That said, for fat men or men with notably receding chins, the effect of emphasising the jawline might be a benefit that carries across historical eras. Though not necessarily decisive in particular cases (see, e.g. George IV, Vitellius, both fat), it's possible you see the effect in periods where both the bearded and beardless looks were acceptable. The mid-16th century, where there are plenty of examples of beardless portraits (e.g. John Chambers, Henry VIII's doctor) and bearded portraits (e.g. Henry VIII), might be an example, although my impression (just browsing Holbein's portraits from the era) is that clerics (of course), doctors, and lawyers seem more likely to be beardless than the nobility, so perhaps there's some kind of sumptuary custom at work.; 4/25/24, 10:31 AM
Paddy O said...: I live in the mountains, where we get snow and cold even here in SoCal. I'm a pastor and a professor, so the beard adds gravitas, especially now that it's getting mostly gray. My wife has always liked the unshaven look more than clean shaven. Saves me a lot of bother. I come from Viking roots (it's in the O name), so have a tradition to keep up.

So, a short beard it is. It gets longer in Winter, because honestly it really is warmer.

I shave under my chin, and my higher cheeks so it's not completely wild mountain man, once or twice a week or so.

Manly. Gravitas. Wisdom. Spiritual. Mountain local.

This is the way.; 4/25/24, 10:54 AM
mikee said...: My Colorado-based brother in law has for 30+ years sported a winter beard of extremely enviable thickness and luster. It takes him almost a whole weekend of not shaving to get it started and requires lotsa trimmig to avoid him being mistaken for a Sasquatch or Werewolf. He keeps it from October through March or so. On the other hand, he has been totally bald for almost as long as I've known him. Testosterone is a fickle friend.

The first time I tried growing a simple mustache, at about 30, on a Monday at the three week mark a female coworker coyly asked me, "Are you growing a mustache?" I had to honestly reply, "I'm not sure." And that was that for face hair until the pandemic, when I had time, leisure and lack of public exposure to grow a fair to middling old redneck bristly 'stache and an utterly disreputable goatee. That hideous stuff finally went when I saw myself in a mirror one day. But I have a full head of hair, which is nice.; 4/25/24, 11:26 AM
Joe Smith said...: My humongous cock shows dominance.

I don't shave often because I'm lazy : ); 4/25/24, 11:51 AM
Paddy O said...: I think a girl needs to write Trump and suggest he'd look better with whiskers. It would get a lot of folks to vote for him, so the tradition goes.; 4/25/24, 11:53 AM
Paddy O said...: The last president to wear a full beard in office was Benjamin Harrison in 1893. Sad!; 4/25/24, 11:55 AM
James K said...: Facial hair usually goes grey/white much earlier than scalp hair. Some say it looks distinguished, but my wife and daughter both said mine (which I let grow during the Covid lockdowns) just made me look older, and they didn't like it, so I got rid of it.; 4/25/24, 12:44 PM
mccullough said...: Don’t grow a beard.

It only chafes the insides of her thighs.; 4/25/24, 12:53 PM
effinayright said...: Alexander the Great was clean-shaven, and as a result most Greek men imitated his style for decades. Alexander obviously epitomized male domineace.

Napoleon was clean shaven. So was Mao. So was Churchill.

The hypothesis is doo-doo.; 4/25/24, 12:53 PM
Howard said...: These are recommendations that really only apply to pudgy men under 6 ft tall. An artfully trimmed beard does wonders for a fat face and bulbous chins, eg: George Lucas.; 4/25/24, 1:27 PM
loudogblog said...: Men shaving goes back to Roman and Greek times. I suspect that soldiers started shaving because having a beard gave their opponents something easy to grab during fighting. (Which is probably why they had short hair, too.) There's also an element of vanity involved because being clean shaven made the older men look younger and more soldier like.

About 25 years ago, I had a beard. I shaved it off when senior citizens started calling me "mister."; 4/25/24, 1:32 PM
Oligonicella said...: RCOCEAN II:
facial hair is usually a sign of laziness and/or the opting out of sexual competition by men. Its why so many Old guys have beards. They just don't care anymore.

Bwahahahahaha!; 4/25/24, 1:39 PM
Narr said...: Please ignore the loud curses at 9:57.

I left out of the regimen the weekly (or so) close shave of the cheeks and neck.

My wife likes facefur.; 4/25/24, 1:46 PM
Jim at said...: Anytime I grew a beard, I couldn't stand the itching after 3-4 days and shaved it off.

It's been at least 30 years since I even tried. Maybe if I live long enough, I'll grow one to cover up my drooping jowls.; 4/25/24, 2:32 PM
Meade said...: Joe Smith said...
“My humongous cock shows dominance.”

Now Ernest T Smith, you need to come on down from there. You’re scaring all the women.; 4/25/24, 2:42 PM
Prof. M. Drout said...: If there's any Evo-Psych reason at all behind this, it's one of those Zahavi "handicap principle" things: A beard can hide a weak chin and other physical imperfections, so if a man shaves and still looks sufficiently masculine, that would trump men who only look masculine if they have beards.
At some point someone figured out that the combination of no facial hair (youth) with strongly masculine features (adulthood, high testosterone) was attractive to women. Then everybody copied it. Then someone else realized that when everybody shaves, having a beard can make you look more masculine, and a bunch of people copied that. And back and forth it goes: fit in / stand out / fit in / stand out.

Probably somebody could make money creating an expert system (call it an "AI" so you can get venture funding) that would tell a man, based on facial structure, age, hair color, and quality of beard growth, if he would be better off with or without a beard.; 4/25/24, 4:03 PM
Joe Smith said...: So what does it mean when women are growing beards?; 4/25/24, 5:23 PM
Rocco said...: The real reason “men with beards are hotter” is because a full thick beard helps trap heat. I grow my hair out more in the winter and shorter in the summer for the same reason.; 4/25/24, 8:10 PM
Mason G said...: "So what does it mean when women are growing beards?"

It means you're dealing with a Democrat.; 4/25/24, 8:29 PM
loudogblog said...: The bearded lady
tried a jar.
She's now a famous
movie star.
-Burma Shave; 4/26/24, 3:20 PM