Close Shave

A Michigan city has backed off a plan to require all the men in town to grow beards for its 150th anniversary celebration (or buy a shaving permit).

This is, incidentally, a reversal of one of the earliest shaving laws: Alexander the Great used to require his men to shave after enemies grabbed hold of their beards during battle one time too many.

Comments

[Warren]

A crippling blow to the Zilwaukee Taliban.

[Yaron]

Another triumph for Big Shaving in BushCo's America.

[ed]

Slow news day, eh?

[Fred Gillette]

No comment. OK, OK. I own a few shares.

[me]

nhuh nhuh nhuh.. you said shaving bush

nhuh nhuh...

(sorry, had to say it, and it's pretty much the intellectual level of the whole story)

[c]

ok, what's funnier: the idea of shaving permits, or the word "Zilwaukee"?

[Todd Fletcher]

Didn't anyone stop to consider that maybe the Zilwakeeans are planning an invasion of Persia?

[Jean Bart]

What about the bear requirements in the Old Testament?

[Jean Bart]

beard

[megapotamus]

Hands off the Beard! Beard is Good. Beard is All. Beard marvelous beard.... makes everything scrumptious!!!

[Posted By at January 9, 2004 0]

Beards, and facial hair in general, are goofy. Can't wait 'til evolution finally gets rid of them once and for all. It's getting there, slowly but surely.

[jemezhobbit]

"Beards, and facial hair in general, are goofy. Can't wait 'til evolution finally gets rid of them once and for all. It's getting there, slowly but surely."

... an I, for one, feel that the daily ritual of putting a sharpened piece of steel against one's throat is goofy... why does society place such a great importance on making men's faces look like women's???

.. show some pride in your gender!! .. grow a beard!!!

[Steve in CO]

>>show some pride in your gender!! .. grow a beard!!!

[Rich]

Beards, and facial hair in general, are goofy. Can't wait 'til evolution finally gets rid of them once and for all. It's getting there, slowly but surely.

The assertion that we will evolve out of our facial hair is perhaps the most ridiculous assertion in the comments section since JB's massive misunderstanding of linguistic theory.

[Steve in CO]

Hey Rich,

If hair has truly become superfelous than why is it rediculous to think in a few million years (or much less) humans will be perfectly hairless?

Steve

🙂

[Dan]

If hair has truly become superfelous than why is it rediculous to think in a few million years (or much less) humans will be perfectly hairless?

Because humans know how to shave/wax/etc, now. Since humans can remove their own hair, they don't suffer significant negative effects from "hairiness" anymore.

The only drawback to hair, now, is that it requires a minor amount of effort for the body to grow it, and a minor effort for humans to remove it. Nothing that's likely to select for hairlessness. It's also worth noting that, in virtually all cultures, baldness is considered unattractive. This means that sexual selection favors retaining hair -- another factor likely to keep us from being completely hairless.

However, while evolution is unlikely to remove our hair, biochemistry probably will. I'd be extremely surprised if the next few decades didn't see cheaply available skin creams that completely suppress hair growth for weeks, months, or years.

[Rich]

Steve,
Because evolution doesn't get rid of things just because they are superfluous. If beards were responsible for early death (death before sex) or if they provided, to the opposite sex, a disincentive to mate, you would have a case (a weak case under the second condition as beards can be conviently shaved off without harming the beardee). Until such time as men carrying genes which code for beards are disallowed, through natural conditions or otherwise, to mate in greater proportion than their non-bearded breathren you have no case.

[Rich]

As an aside, there is an interesting theory which states that evolution is losing its grip on humanity. It is thought that we are now able to soften the blow of darwin because of advances in technology, and fewer and fewer localized populations among other reasons. In other words, we may homogenize a bit but don't expect any big changes. Pure speculation but worth some thought.

[Steve in CO]

Dan and Rich,

Thanks for the explanation! I had wondered about the effect of modern medical (and other) science on our evolution. Now that people that wouldn't have survived to mate in the past do so in enormous numbers.

Regards,

Steve

[Vic the Appraiser]

Yaron,

That was the funniest thing I read all week.

Seriously, do you think it's a coincidence that we invaded a country known for its mustaches? And once Bushie colonizes Iraq and remakes it in our image, what's the first thing that's going to go? Mustaches. Saddam had a mustache. Bush doesn't. Think about it.

Andy Card supposedly owns shares in Gillette. That's why we need to elect Howard Dean and get the Razor Fascists out of the Middle East.

[Mo]

I'm sure glad the appendix has evolved out. It has even less usefulness than hair.

[Larry]

"Alexander's men sure must have hated shaving if the fear of being speared wasn't incentive enough without also needing an order! (A case of "imperfect information" perhaps...?"

Sounds reasonable. Back when I was in the Army (Vietnam era) a lot of soldiers resisted shaving, even though it made gas mask fit less than optimal. I knew several who got profiles because shaving caused their facial hairs to ingrow.

Rather than imperfect information, I would guess it's the "won't happen to me" theory.

[fyodor]

Alexander's men sure must have hated shaving if the fear of being speared wasn't incentive enough without also needing an order! (A case of "imperfect information" perhaps...?)

[fyodor]

Or perhaps Alexander overreacted to isolated heresay cases of hair pulling against soldiers who were wimps and would have gotten speared before much longer anyway!! 🙂

[Osama bin Laden]

This relaxation of beard-growing requirements is a call for Jihad! We must bomb the disbelievers of Zilwaukee!

--

Shaving the beard involves altering the creation of Allah, which is forbidden as stated in the Qur'an: "Allah cursed him. And he (Shaytaan) said: 'I will take an appointed portion of your slaves. Verily, I will mislead them, and surely I will arouse in them false desires; and certainly I will order them to slit the ears of cattle, and indeed I will order them to change the nature created by Allah.' And whoever takes Shaytaan as a Wali (protector or helper) instead of Allah, has surely suffered a manifest loss" [4: 118-119]. Sheikh Al-Albany said regarding this verse that it is "a clear statement that changing Allah's creation without His permission is obeying Shaytaan, and that there is no doubt that shaving the beard for beauty reasons comes under the rule of this verse" [Adabul-Zafaf, PP 119-120]. There are also numerous verses which command Muslims to follow the tradition of the Prophet (s.a.w) as Allah (s.w.t) says: "And whatsoever the Messenger gives you, take it, and whatsoever he forbids you, abstain (from it)" [59: 7].

Shaving the beard involves disobeying the order of the Prophet (s.a.w) who commanded us to grow our beards, as he (s.a.w) said "contradict the non-believers, grow the beards and cut the moustaches" [Bukhari and Muslim]. Ibn Jarir have also narrated to the story of the two messengers of Kisra (the Persian king) to the Prophet, who entered to where the Prophet (s.a.w) was, and they had shaved their beards and grown their moustaches, the Prophet (s.a.w) hated to even look at them and told them: "Woe to you! Who ordered you to do that?" They replied: "Our lord (i.e. Kisra) ordered us". The Prophet then said: "But my Lord ordered me to grow my beard and clip my moustache". Here we see that the Prophet (s.a.w) hated to even look at the unbelievers, so how would his reaction be had he seen those who claim to be his loyal followers imitating the unbelievers and shaving their beards? Also, it is important to note that the Prophet (s.a.w) attributed the order of growing the beard and clipping the moustache to Allah (s.w.t), so it becomes an order from Allah (s.w.t) to the believers, which makes it mandatory on the believers to follow, and forbidden to disobey.

Shaving the beard is a way of imitating the disbelievers, as mentioned at the beginning of the article, and the Prophet of Allah has commanded us in numerous hadiths to contradict the people of the book (Jews and Christians) and to contradict the pagans and Magus. So since shaving the beard is a tradition practiced by non-Muslims, it makes it mandatory for the Muslims to contradict them by growing it.

The imitation of women, and there is no doubt that shaving the beard is an imitation of women, and Imam Ibn Hajar Al-Haythamy n his book "Az-Zawajir" stated that such imitation is amongst the Major Sins in Islam.

Contradicting the traditions of the Prophets and righteous men. Imam Al-Shanqiti said in his commentary on the verse "He (Harun) said: O son of my mother! Seize (me) not by my beard, nor by my head" [20: 94], that it is a Qur'anic proof that growing the beard is the tradition of the Prophets of Allah.

Finally, shaving the beard is a contradiction of the Fitrah (nature) which was intended for us by Allah, since growing the beard is one of the ten natural instincts as maintained by the Prophet (s.a.w). The fact that Arabs before Islam used to grow their beards can be explained by the fact that they inherited it from the Prophet Ibrahim (a.s).

[MJ]

Semi-related to Steve's point:

According to OC Weekly or Savage Love or some combination thereof, male pubic shaving is in. They quoted some pediatrician saying that many of his early adolescent patients had shaved it off.

[joe]

Similarly, Osama, towns in Massachusetts used to throw people in jail for "wearing the beard," based on similar, though inverted, religious proscriptions.

[AJMB]

But what of someone acting as a 'beard'?