Yes, JD Vance’s Beard Matters. Here’s Why.

Politico ^ | 07/25/2024 | Emily Schultheis

[MinorityRepublican]

Beards are seemingly ubiquitous in pop culture and public life. From sports stars to country singers to Hollywood actors, facial hair has made a noticeable comeback in recent years — except in politics.

It’s been more than a century since a sitting president or vice president sported a beard, and nearly 80 years since a candidate for the White House had any facial hair whatsoever. Even in Congress, those with beards remain few and far between.

Enter Republican vice presidential nominee JD Vance. The Ohio politician’s full beard is so novel on a presidential ticket that it’s been the subject of a disproportionate amount of the chatter surrounding his selection.

Pundits had speculated as to whether it would ultimately be a deal-breaker for Donald Trump, whose well-known aversion to facial hair reportedly doomed some potential picks for his first-term Cabinet. Trump’s preferences mirror the long-standing societal stereotypes, which is part of why most pols have avoided facial hair in recent decades:

For most of the 20th century in the United States, beards were seen as unprofessional and unhygienic. More recent research has shown that voters perceive facial hair as deeply masculine, which can come with both positive connotations (like competence) and negative ones (like aggression and less support of feminist issues).

[Qwapisking]

I’ve worn a moustache for more than half of my 70+ years and a full beard for the past 15. the only problem when it comes to food is eating soup, which is a strain. the big plus is, because its a biker-style beard...there are snacks to be found occasionally. they can come in handy when out on the road. cheers!

[kiryandil]

Take off Neil Cavuto’s glasses, and you have your Worm.

[9YearLurker]

Simple truth and explanation for this pol being better off with a beard.

[mellow velo]

I think the beardless pic looks more like pollster Frank Luntz, except without the dead squirrel on top of his head.

The beard definitely suits JD well.

[sasquatch]

I quit steel-on-skin about 50 years ago. Stash gets trimmed to expose the mouth when needed. (dentist) Shaving pretty much sucks if I remember.

Also:
which is a strain
Should be strainer.

[mewzilla]

Very mean to Rickles.

Much better comparison...

Rush Limbaugh to Marshall Applewhite...

You know, this guy....

https://criminalminds.fandom.com/wiki/Marshall_Applewhite

[mewzilla]

Tampon Tim is Marshall Applewhite.

[HamiltonJay]

He’s an attractive man, and don’t think women don’t notice.

One of the first things my wife who’s only a casual political observer stated when watching some of the VP debate was how much better JD Vance looked, now she meant it overall in terms of body language and confidence etc, but she also couldn’t help but at he’s an attractive man to the end of her comments.

It will be interesting to see how the polling looks this week. VP debates don’t usually move the needle and I wouldn’t expect this one to, but I wonder how many casual women voters who watched may now have moved based purely on nothing more than JD looks good

[DrHFrog]

My wife said he has amazing eyes !! How many will vote based on looks? Probably not as many that will vote for “indiscriminate baby-killing” loving Kamala !

[cyclotic]

My daughter is getting married tomorrow. I haven’t met all the guys who are standing up yet but so far every man in the wedding party, the groom, the ushers, both dads have beards.

Don’t know about the pastor.

[HamiltonJay]

No I don’t think you are going to see some massive shift, but I suspect some will

And close elections are about the small shifts

No one is voting for Kamala or Trump based on their looks. Trump back in his prime perhaps but not now.

[HamiltonJay]

I don’t get the beard thing myself.

I’ve had them. And I admit I shave about once every week or two so I usually have stubble to a 1/4 inch beard.. just because I am lazy honestly

But a full long crazy big beard not for me. Too irritating

[TheThirdRuffian]

I have a beard and it ironically started it in Afghanistan.

Culture in the ME is young men who are shaved are signaling homosexuality. Plus it just helps keep the Sun off.

Permission started with special forces and then just spread. Needs to be close cropped enough for gas mask, should the need arise. I think stateside they are still strict, but now that is going away.

Basically every recent veteran I know still sports a beard of some kind.

[NFHale]

Re “…. less support of feminist issue….”

Annnnnnnnd there’s her problem right there…….

[cyclotic]

I’ve had a short on 1/4-1/2” for a few years. I let it get to an inch and my wife complained.

I wouldn’t mind it getting real long but it’s probably too much work. I’m fully bald so hair care is pretty foreign to me.

[HamiltonJay]

I had a full beard back in the 90s for a bit. Not the grizzled Adams or ZZ Top, but probably about an inch to inch and a half.

It was great for winter, used to walk about a 1/2 mile a day to work.

Didn’t realize how much it helped keep my face warm until I foolishly decided I had enough oof it and shaved it all off in Mid February.

Also was kind of Amazed at how sensitive my face was for a little while after I got rid of it. Had it for like 1-2 years and so skin was not used to direct touch so felt everything for a while once I shaved it skin was far more sensitive. But after a few days/week it went back to normal.

[Lowell1775]

The de-bearding of Western males was driven by the military use of, and the prophylactic against, poison gas first used in WWI.....gas masks require a clean shave to seal properly.

Prior to this effeminate affectation.....beards were the very definition of masculinity.

Many men now shave their entire bodies as well....a womanish practice that American chicks themselves started only with the widespread use of silk stockings and sleeveless blouses.

Bikini’s required further trimming until a 100% clear cut is now normal.

Now most women glisten like slicked down naked mole rats.

Don’t get me started on hatless men with shaved heads...barbarism!

[FlingWingFlyer]

I think the “progressive” gasbag Tiny Timmy cookie makers are more into the toxic anti-masculinity “man buns.” Woo Woo.

[rlmorel]

(NOTE: This is a long (and as such, is vulnerable to the deserved “TL-DNR” category) but I know a lot of guys (and some women) are tuned into the concept of what men have to do to be presentable with their facial hair. Women are sometimes curious about it, and guys, well, each guy does what they like best! I write about this, because shaving had always been painful and even bloody for me, and when I was in the USN, they wanted you to shave your face in four different directions. But I have always preferred a clean face.

I've had all manner of facial hair, mustaches, goatees, beards, etc. but I've never liked it on myself. Just doesn't suit me. It itches like mad on me. And I get fixated with trying to keep it clean when eating, to the point would obsessively wring out my mustache with a napkin after each mouthful of food because it just felt like something was there. When my dad passed, I missed him terribly, and for a year I grew a full beard. Then, when I couldn't stand it anymore, I shaved it off in phases to see how different things looked on my face, and that was kind of fun so I took pictures as I shaved pieces off!

I grew up a military brat, and enlisted, so I never saw a lot of facial hair growing up, and nobody in my family ever had facial hair.

Probably different in the military now. Like most things, they look good on some people and some look better without them.

I have a very dense beard with very curly hair, which caused me no end of problems in the military because the hair would grow back into the skin, and nothing I could do helped.

I have always tried to be squared away, well groomed and cleaned for my work because I feel personally most presentable that way, but I had to have constant stubble for my whole post-Navy life. I would have much rather been clean shaven, but it was a big issue for me for a long time.

I have an issue with facial hair, it is curly, and it grows back into the skin causing raised bumps and infected follicles. Black men have the issue to a greater degree than white men do, it is fairly common and many black men have scars from it.

I first discovered the issue when I joined the Navy, and they teach you to to shave in four different directions. For the next four years, my face was a mess, really unsightly, but...the Navy doesn’t care. You gotta shave. I even had a barber repulsed by the sores ask me if I was doing anything about them. I didn’t understand the issue, and tried EVERYTHING but nothing worked. I have tried all varieties of razors from an old unit from the 1930’s that came in a nice chrome “case” with a built in strop (only tried that once) to safety razors, to all varieties of multiblade razors. I have purchased and tried at least four high end electric razors, but my hair was too thick and curly, they didn’t work.

Worst of all was a multi-year phase with facial depilatories made especially for men. Some black guys I served with used it. It was a powder, and I had a special cup and straight metal spatula (a little sharper than a butter knife) and I would pry the top off the can, measure out some powder into the cup, add water and stir it to make a paste. It stunk to high heaven. If you ever lived with a woman who used a gentle depilatory on their legs (like Nair) you know the sulfur smell...but this paste was many times stronger and worse. The fine hair on a woman’s legs is nothing like the coarse, thick hair on a man’s face. That hair, to dissolve it so it could be scraped off, demanded a chemical far more powerful and malodorous to do the job.

Then, I would spackle my face with the paste, applying the paste like shaving cream. It was thick and gray, and it took practice to do it right, and even then mistakes could be made. You had to mix it correctly and leave it on for a specified amount of time.

If you didn’t make it thick enough, it not only wouldn’t stay on the face correctly, it wouldn’t dissolve the hair correctly. When you went to scrape it off (and hopefully take the hair with it) you would get swatches of beard you couldn’t scrape off. You had two choices, and only one was correct: either take a razor to the patch, or reapply focally to that area. Reapplying focally was a bad idea, but shaving would give you bumps. After a few incidents, shaving that patch was the only alternative.

Reapplying could burn your skin.

If you did it correctly and made the paste thick enough, it would be concentrated enough to do the job. But you had to time it very carefully. If you left it on for too short a time, it wouldn’t dissolve the hair enough, and when you tried to scrape if off with the spatula, you had the issue where you had to shave the patches which would cause problems with ingrown hair.

But far worse was leaving it on too long or reapplying. There were several times I got chemical burns on my face, several times because I wanted to be sure I got a good clean face , and the other times because I reapplied the paste.

In both cases, my skin burned and turned red, and once, it turned beet red. I made the timing mistake a few times until I figured out the pitfalls of mix vs time, and only made the mistake of reapplying twice.

I had purchased the facial depilatory a case at a time...it was called “SoftSheen-Carson Magic Regular Strength Shaving Powder” and when I went to look if it was still available (I had last used it about 28 years ago) it is still available, and the white can with the steel blue band on it saying “Formulated for Black Men” looks exactly the same. When I got out of the Navy, I just let my stubble grow, and only used the paste for special occasions to shave. I only threw out that old, nearly full case a few years ago when cleaning and reorganizing the closet.

But I have been able to shave as often as I want for the last 25 years or so with no problem.

How?

Well, I worked for an Indian-American woman who had been a Bird Colonel in the Army, and she was very outspoken and quite particular about things. She liked my work (I was ex-military, so I treated her like I would have treated an Army Colonel or a Navy Captain) but one day she stopped me in the hall and said “You always dress well and are squared away. Why don’t you shave? It detracts from your appearance.”

Very matter of fact, not meant as an insult, so I described the issue to her, and she, being a physician and probably used to seeing this issue in black men in the military, said simply: “Use an antibacterial liquid soap like Dial and wash your face with it before and after you shave.”

So...I tried it. Never had a major issue with it after that. It made me a little angry, all those years I struggled with it, and SOMEONE could have clued me in. But I was grateful to her for that advice. v Now, I don’t stockpile the “Magic Shaving Powder” in the white and steel blue can, I stockpile Dial Gold Antibacterial Liquid Soap in the large, golden jugs!

[metmom]

LOL!!!