CounterPunch Exclusives

CounterPunch Exclusives

Beards Are Back: Fashion Statement or Sign of Masculinity Crisis?

After being out of fashion since the beatnik-hippie era of the 1950s through early ‘70s, beards, mustaches and the perpetual 5 o’clock shadow are back.  Trumpsters — including Donald Jr., Sec. of Commerce Howard Lutnick and Sen. Ted Cruz (R-TX) — are sporting whiskers. There are a number of ways men can fashion their beards and Men’s Health identifies 29 “best beard styles.”

One commentator, Andreas Ramos, recalls that he “first saw beards in Nashville in 2009.”  He notes, “It was the working-class guys who first had rough beards. Finally, it started showing up in the college-educated classes and somewhere in 2012, it exploded. By late 2013 and early 2014, everyone everywhere had a beard.”  He adds, “In 2014, we talked about this. I repeated what I saw a few years earlier in Nashville. But everyone said it was a San Francisco / Brooklyn hipster thing and the working classes copied the upper classes.”

So, why the appeal of beards over the last decade or so?  Numerous commentators concur with a 2013 Voice of America assertion, “facial hair is more than a fashion statement.”  As a BBC report noted, “The beard became almost the emblem of manliness, upheld as a symbol of natural male........

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