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The latest edict from beard-obsessed Secretary of War Pete Hegseth adds strict new regulations to his crusade on facial hair, which rights groups have characterized as an attack on troops’ civil liberties.
In a March 11 memo, Hegseth, who has made grooming and appearances a central focus in his time at the helm of the U.S. military, raised the bar to qualify for a religious exemption to his blanket ban on beards. The guidelines lay out a strict new process by which service members may apply for a religious exemption and subject those who’ve already received one to a reevaluation, arguing they need to ensure their religious beliefs are “sincerely held” and have a genuine conflict with the grooming standards.
Service members who have spoken against Hegseth’s focus on grooming standards say his restrictions on beards are exclusionary to people from religious communities that require adherents to follow specific tenets of faith around beards, hair, and other grooming matters.
Sikhs, for example, who have served in the U.S. military since at least World War I, are required by their faith not to cut the hair on their head, to keep a beard, and to wrap their long hair in a turban. Members of many schools of Muslim tradition likewise have rules around beards and hair length.
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The more this pissant and others of his ilk rage against beards the more I’m tempted to grow a big auld John Brown beard. I have the capacity to and simply choose not to because it gets right fucken itchy.
Beard oil. It exists, it is amazing, and it stopped my itching. I comb a little into my beard every one or two days, takes like 5 minutes if I go slow.
I’ve had a beard for years now. The itchiness goes away after the first few weeks.
Anti dandruff shampoo also helps.
Either everybody should be able to have beards, or nobody. Believing in a fairytale should not be tied to special privileges.
That’s an easy and convenient stance to take when you nonchalantly disregard other’s religious beliefs as a “fairytale.” Those “special privileges” aren’t a “privilege,” but a duty to one’s faith.
I’m not religious, closer to modern atheists than anything else. Even I can understand and respect the nuance to the situation.
The right answer, in my opinion, would be to ban them from any form of service which would require conflicting grooming standards. That’s how you address the safety issue, not by implying “fuck your religion.”
Edit: if you so please, you can even make it illegal to (officially) change your religion during a single contract term. That way the issues are resolved then and there, before they’re assigned any duty.
For a nation that is all about personal freedom, they sure spend a lot of time telling other people what to do in areas that don’t really matter. Even for the sake of military uniformity, facial hair must be maintained and groomed seems like an acceptable stance. Anything else is just power tripping.
It’s just him in a pope hat, bare nekkid while wearing a giant strap on, saying the lord demands they do body shots.
I wonder how “JD” “Vance” feels about all this beard hate.
Anyway, glad that Kegsbreath is focusing on the important things: attacking the Scouts for having girls as members, awkward videos of him improperly exercising, and…beards.
His beard is all drawn in with a mascara pencil I’ll bet. /s
The old testament also says “Do not cut the hair at the sides of your head or clip off the edges of your beard”, but he’s got a pretty good haircut. It also says no clothes of mixed materials (so that poly-wool suit and poly-cotton shirt he’s wearing are no-gos). And it says no tattoos too, but he pretty famously has quite a lot of tattoos. Sounds like his own faith isn’t sincerely held.
Yes, but you see Leviticus is from the old covenant and none of that applies anymore, because the blood of Christ washed away the original sin so now humanity no longer has to follow those rituals.
Except the part about gay people being bad. That part still applies even though nothing else does. Because… Reasons. Yeah. That makes sense, right?
Sincerity isn’t one of his strong suits
Frankly if Christians are following anything in the OT, they aren’t real Christians anyway.
I am of a sect that only follows the Old Testament, we are called The Only Real Christians.
You mean Jews?
Interesting, this wouldn’t happen to be a Scottish sect would it?
Isle of Man, ironically
he pretty famously has quite a lot of tattoos.
The Department of War’s grooming standards tribunal has determined his tattoos are violations and must be brought to standards immediately. The flaying will commence in 3…2…
They love their grooming.
After everything my wife has told me about the Sikhs she serves with, I’ll honestly be happy if the US kicks them all out; if it comes down to a war between Canada and the US, the last thing I want is for our troops to be going up against some of the most relentlessly committed, brave and selfless soldiers you could ever hope to meet. The US military will be weaker without them, and at this point that’s a good thing.
What are the odds he just can’t grow a beard and is weirdly insecure about it?
Nah, he’s just a fucking racist targeting black people (which it’s odd this article doesn’t mention, right alongside with Sikhs).
Most shaving waivers are for soldiers diagnosed with pseudofolliculitis barbae, or PFB, a condition in which hairs curl back into the skin after shaving and cause irritation. The Pentagon may cover the laser treatment, but that can cost thousands of dollars per soldier, depending on the number of sessions required. It’s unclear how many soldiers would require the procedure.
The American Osteopathic College of Dermatology estimates that up to 60% of Black men are affected by the condition. Laser treatments can cause scarring and changes in skin pigmentation.
“Of course, this is racially motivated,” one senior noncommissioned officer familiar with the plans told Military.com on the condition of anonymity to avoid retaliation. “There’s no tactical reason; you can look professional with facial hair.”
Huh, apparently he used to have one when he was on Fox News but they made him shave it: https://www.foxnews.com/video/5829694071001
And yeah you can see it’s kind of patchy, in the image in OP’s article too. But I don’t think it’s insecurity because he was on live national TV like that. (I also found pictures of him with stubble and he actually looks good like that. But no, the culture war takes priority.)
Must be a leftover policy from Fox Entertainment stuck in his head.
After all, Trump’s entire cabinet is just Fox Entertainment on a global scale, figuratively and literally.
Man it took me way too long to realize the goatee fad in the 00s was because most tweens couldn’t grow a full beard.
I thought the Joe Dirt:
You’re just so white trash it grows in like that?
Was a complete joke, and didn’t have one foot in reality.
He sure does like his men smooth.
Continuing the Republican tradition of focusing on all the most pressing problems first.
He looks like he’s about to kiss a butthole.
Well, he works for that guy, so…yeah.
Nothing wrong with that fetish, he should just keep it private
I think journalists have started exclusively using unflattering pictures of him after his fit
He just a salty bitch because he can’t grow one himself.
Ah yes, give them baby face. That will make them more intimidating.
He’s like this guy from Generation Kill, only somehow less serious.
This guy is a chin supremacist
