Do you think there’s nothing manlier than facial hair? I have long been an advocate of equality of the sexes, however growing a thick beard or mustache is something only men can do.  I will concede some women also have some facial hair, especially after menopause, though typically much less than men. Yes, there are exceptions but those women who produce impressive facial hair normally end up in a fairground sideshow. In contemporary western culture, almost all women shave, tweeze or otherwise depilate facial hair that does appear, as there is considerable social stigma associated with facial hair in women. A woman with an abnormally large amount of facial hair is often made to feel embarrassed and is looked at as somehow less feminine than other women. Most men develop facial hair in puberty.

The growing of facial hair (beardedness) in males is called pogonotrophy. It is often culturally associated with wisdom and virility and this is presumably the reason many men style their facial hair into beards, moustaches, goatees or sideburns. However, many more completely shave their facial hair. A man’s facial hair, especially short hairs that were missed in shaving, is often referred to as whiskers, although only certain nonhuman mammals have true sensory whiskers.

Women typically have little hair on their face, apart from eyebrows and the fine fuzz nearly all people have covering most of their bodies. However, a few women have noticeable facial hair growth. Excessive hairiness (especially facially) is known as hirsutism, and is usually an indication of normal hormonal variation.

Abraham Lincoln was said to have grown a beard because a girl (Grace Bedell who was 11 years of age) wrote to him saying he would look better with one. The amount of facial hair on a man’s face varies from individual to individual, and also between ethnic groups. For example, men from many East Asian, West African or Native American backgrounds typically have much less facial hair than those of European, Middle Eastern or South Asian descent, with Native Americans typically having little to none at all. Northern East Asians and Eastern Africans can grow conspicuous amounts of facial hair.

Everyone has facial hair, men and women of all ethnic backgrounds. Actually, most people have some amount of hair over most of their body. The only differences between people’s facial hair involve thickness and quantity.

In most cultures it is perfectly acceptable to have thick and large amounts of facial hair if you are male. In fact many cultures highly encourage facial hair for men, and thick beards are seen as a symbol of male virility, wisdom, and or power.

I asked a friend of mine why he wears a giant beard. These are his reasons:-

“Before I grew it I looked meek, pathetic and useless.” I responded by telling him he looked like a ‘badass’, which he isn’t. He laughed. Then he asked me if I wanted to “touch, stroke and even frolic in his beard?” I laughed but declined. He pointed out that beards can make a handy disguise. Whilst agreeing I told him his was so big he could hide a weapon in it. He thought that might be worth investigating. He was even nonplussed when I suggested he didn’t need a sail on his boat. He just invited me out on it for a trip out on the North Sound.

Researching beard sand mustache styles I never realised there were so many. I found these:

Full beard, goatee and mustache, extended goatee, balbo, chin strap and moustache, chin strip, goatee, petit, goatee, soul patch, chin curtain, chin puff, friendly mutton chops and mutton chops (unfriendly?), Van Dyke, Spanish beard,  A La Souvarov (a sideburn/mustache combo), anchor, copstash standard, dali, ducktail, El Insecto, federation standard, Franz Josef, French Fork, Fu Manchu, Garibaldi, handlebar, Hollywoodian, hulihee, Hungarian, Imperial, Napoleon III Imperial, Klingon, Norse skipper, old Dutch, rap industry standard, short boxed beard, sparrow, super Mario, toothbrush, Verdi, Winnfield, Zappa, and stubble. If you have anymore please write and tell me (preferably with a picture.)