wokeman beardson watching fight club: it superficially appears that this movie glorifies going to basement to punch people but it’s actually criticizing this mindset and toxic masculinity in general! stupid dudebros don’t understand art critique! it’s so obvious! no wonder they are so stupid, they don’t even pay attention to movies they watch!
wokeman beardson watching inglorious basterds: this movie tells us an important moral lesson that all nazis need to be shot which is good and cool with no ambiguity
endorsed, minus the beardjoke.
Yeah, OK, derailing to ask:
How is it that “beard” has become a metonymic stand-in for “woker-than-thou young urban progressive dude?” I see this with surprising frequency, from @raggedjackscarlet etc. But I don’t think of that demographic even as being more bearded than average, let alone as being The Main Bearded Ones.
…of course, I have a beard, so my perceptions may be biased here.
It’s weird, though. Don’t the nerdy gamergater anti-SJ types go in for beards just as much, if not more?
Heyo, super late reply incoming.
I’ll cop to using “goony beardman” for no reason other than I believe it’s an effective insult. but as for how this concept got started, well…
it’s not just about the beard– it’s about the sort of smug, wimpy, unattractive dude who’d normally be pegged as a creep trying desperately to avoid that fate by making himself look as non-threatening as possible.
There’s this…. weird idea out there, buried deep in our collective sense of aesthetics, that “clean shaven = self-serious” and “bearded = self-effacing”.
I think it ties into age. “Ambitious young man” vs. “Contented old man”
The beardman is a dude in his twenties trying to look like your jolly old grandpa.
As for why it seems to be an effective insult, well, firstly, there’s something inherently unnerving about a guy who’s barely entered adulthood trying to appear grandfatherly.
secondly, (here’s where things get fuckin’ weird)… the beardman is a guy who is trying to, in some way, to escape his individuality. Like a priest, when he speaks, it is not he who speaks, it’s the Big Other speaking through him, reciting the latest woke talking points. The Purity Spiral is a way of life to him. He aspires to a state in which he has no particular or concrete characteristics– no identity other than “one step ahead of you, purer than you, not like the other boys.” The beardman dreams of being a walking talking negation of all other white males.
When your identity is based in asymptotically approaching a state of pure negation, simply being reminded that you have physical existence is an insult.
it’s not just about the beard– it’s about the sort of smug, wimpy, unattractive dude who’d normally be pegged as a creep trying desperately to avoid that fate by making himself look as non-threatening as possible.
There’s this…. weird idea out there, buried deep in our collective sense of aesthetics, that “clean shaven = self-serious” and “bearded = self-effacing”.
OK, so, like…I believe that you are getting this from somewhere, that there is some actual cultural construct that is causing these assertions to make sense to you.
But, to my ears, it sounds remarkably like someone saying “so the sky is green” or “there’s this widespread notion that rhinos can jump really high.” This is a baldfaced assertion that is just, like, completely incompatible with all my perceptions of the world and how it works.
I have a beard. I have been told by many, many people that it makes me look (unnecessarily) more menacing, imposing, and possibly-dangerous. I have gotten hassled by guards, cops, etc. in a way that none of my clean-shaven male friends has ever experienced. I am a short fat totally-not-physically-competent dude who regularly gets read as presenting a threat, as far as I can tell almost solely due to the terrifying power of facial hair.
The “hairy guy = dangertown” meme has been active in full force from the days of Greek satyr plays through the 1960s conversations about hippies, at the very least. And of course every lovable nonthreatening dreamboat idol is totally smooth, in every sense of the term. Jacob and Esau.
The idea of trying to make yourself appear less like a masculine menace by growing a beard sounds, to me, like trying to keep ants out of your house by covering the floor with honey.
But…maybe I’m just missing something here. Or crazy.
Anyone want to chime in?