One of the main reasons for the disappearance of facial hair has to do with a change in military discipline. In World War I, the gas mask would not seal around a beard, so the military began to require clean shaveness. Whereas prior to this time the beard and moustasche wee regarded as signs of manlines, since the Great War, the soldier, our icon of bravery has been clean shaven

I say that if God had meant me to have a beard, He would have put hair on my face. Besides, the last time I shaved it off the wife complained.

Which is interesting when you watch dramas or whatever on TV or at the movies about tines past, especially the more distant past.

All of those heroic good guy white men with their clean shaven faces.

Some of the classic modern pictures/paintings of Jesus also come to mind. Not a whisker to be found.

Plus did you ever notice that Tarzan, who lived out in the wilds without access to any kind of modern technology. let alone soap, shaving brushes and razors was always clean shaven. Plus he was also bare chested and had hairless armpits too.

Plus did not the old Hollywood “morality” codes essentially forbid the picturing of white men with hairy chests? And even sweaty chests too.

Benjamin Harrison, #23, was the last president to have a full beard. One of Harrison’s famous quotes was, “We Americans have no commission from God to police the world.”

While I’m at it, here is a list of all other US presidents that had facial hair, and a quote from each:

#16 Abe Lincoln:
“These capitalists generally act harmoniously and in concert, to fleece the people.“

#18 Ulysses S Grant:
“Labor disgraces no man; unfortunately, you occasionally find men who disgrace labor.”

#19 Rutherford B Hayes:
“Let every man, every corporation, and especially let every village, town, and city, every county and State, get out of debt and keep out of debt. It is the debtor that is ruined by hard times.”

#20 James Garfield:
“I am an advocate of paper money, but that paper must represent what it professes on its face. I do not wish to hold in my hands the printed lies of the government.”

#21 Chester A Arthur:
“I may be president of the United States, but my private life is nobody’s damned business.“

#22 & #24 Grover Cleveland:
“Sensible and responsible women do not want to vote.”

#25 Theodore Roosevelt:
“A thorough knowledge of the Bible is worth more than a college education.”

#26 William Howard Taft:
“The world is not going to be saved by legislation.”

Many US presidents had beards. Not any more. Can anyone recall the last president to have a beard?

What changed?

The culture changed. Men changed…in their thinking.

Growing a beard is something men can do and women can’t. Men without facial hair look more like women.

The way I see it, if you got facial hair, grow it out. It’s a “man thing.” It’s a countercultural statement. It’s fun. It’s liberating. It saves money (less razors needed).

I shaved my beard off a year ago. I intend to grow it out again this fall.

See the preview for the movie Good Hair by Chris Rock.

Alas, your beard was fabulous. But your wife is ever-more fabulous, and you are wise to make her happy.

For me, the beard was never about self-expression or my own sense of identity. I just think shaving is painful, tedious, and perhaps even unnatural. When people comment on my beard with mild condescension, I often tell them that if God wanted me to wear a beard he would have put hair on my face. It confuses people just long enough for me to change the subject.

Charlene published the results of a survey she had organized, in which a few hundred women were asked for their opinions. Essentially all of them said that they preferred clean-shaven men to those who were either stubbly or bearded. In short order, Charlene proved that having a beard was just one element of a syndrome strongly correlated to racist and sexist attitudes, and to the pattern of emotional unavailability so often bemoaned by the female partners of white males, especially ones who were technologically oriented.

“The boundary between Self and Environment is a social con[struct]. In Western cultures this boundary is supposed to be sharp and distinct. The beard is an outward symbol of that boundary, a distancing technique. To shave off the beard (or any body hair) is to symbolically annhialate the (essentially specious) boundary separating Self from Other…”

And so on. The paper was rapturously received by the peer reviewers and immediately accepted for publication in a major international journal.