(u/[deleted])
Does anyone else here think that Beards are some sort in-your-face reclamation of white masculinity? It's all the rage these days...

Sure, beards come and go. It's the law of fashion. But how much of it do you think is influenced by the current climate? The current climate is that China is rising in power. Yellow Peril has always been a thing, but it sure has been given a lot more attention this year.

So is the recent trend of white men donning beards a racial thing? Is it to mock Asian men while at the same time, show dominance over Brown men who get called "Terrists" if they grow one?

What do you guys think?

([deleted])
Beards are becoming more popular because white people want to go back to a "better" time. More rustic styles are becoming the norm for the same reason. And movies like "The Revenant" are extremely popular. It is a fantasy they sell to white america. They cant build a fire and wouldnt know the difference between a 12 gauge and 30-06 but they can look rustic and pretend they are frontiersmen or something.

(racismisformorons)
Yes, absolutely.
I noticed this as well and posted about it a year ago under a throwaway:
https://np.reddit.com/r/AsianMasculinity/comments/3erm34/has_anyone_noticed_how_even_hipalternative_images/
To save a click, here it is:
Inspired by that terrible Buzzfeed page 'proving' that Asians (all 4.427 billion of them) can too meet white standards of masculinity, I wanted to point out how even images of cool or hip masculinity are exclusively filled by white men.

This is interesting to me, because it shows that the Other (i.e., non-white men), are not even portrayed in culturally alternative images of masculinity. That is, these alternative fashions constitute an Other that is not an Other, to put it philosophically. While these fashions are posed as being outside the mainstream to give them part of their allure and edge (to an extent - my guess is that they are becoming more popular), they are not associated with any persons outside the white mainstream (East Asians, Indians, etc.).

This could be understood as another instance of how whiteness dominates all discourses, but these cases are pernicious because of the presence and history of these fashions in places outside the West such as Japan.

Consider 'manbuns' (a word I'm embarrassed to use). The manbun is just the contemporary American vocabulary for "chonmage", the topknot hairstyle worn by Samurai. This hairstyle dates back several centuries in Japan, and yet, its history and popularity among a class of Japanese warriors is a historical irrelevance. White men wear manbuns, period. Have you seen an Asian man as the image of masculinity in any discussion about manbuns?

Consider beards. The bearded man, as adored among audiences, is a white man. Despite the fact one can literally search for images on Google using queries such as "Japanese beard", "Korean beard", "Chinese beard", "Indian beard", non white men do not feature in any of the media of the beard frenzy in America. It is not uncommon for me to read someone writing online that "Asians can't grow beards" or "I've never seen an Asian with a beard". This, despite the fact that a 5 second search on the Internet will prove otherwise. However, this is irrelevant. In this discourse of masculinity and beards, Asians CAN'T have beards, which is the more interesting observation, no matter how many terrible Buzzfeed articles are created. Take a look at the images of the beards on display on the Bristlr Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/Bristlr All white men. Are there any brown men with beards on display in these media? Of course not. Persons of color literally do not exist as desirable images of masculinity in the cultural imagination of those who curate these media. To them, it would be like bringing up random animals such as giraffes or baboons as worthy of inclusion - a prima facie nonsensical and unthinkable suggestion.

Tattoos are pretty universal. Yet, the images of tattooed, sexy masculine men are always white. Again, despite the fact that groups in different cultures (the Yakuza in Japan: http://blog-cdn.tattoodo.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/12/yakuza_2.jpg?09b2aa , the Maori in New Zealand: http://zealandtattoo.co.nz/wp-content/uploads/2014/05/maori-tribe-face-tattoo-300x199.jpg ) feature men (who are probably much more dangerous than a hipster fashion model) bearing tattoos of intricate design and symbolic significance.

Is this really surprising? Sadly, no. But I believe it's important to see what is really being said when certain features/fashions are said to be desirable. It's not the features/fashions in themselves, but the boundary of whiteness they reaffirm and exclude non-white persons from.

(the0clean0slate)
Definitely. When I see a beard fanatic, who is really forcing the creation of beauty standard where more beard is better and they try to shame the one with less, I just see a clever white supremacist.

https://www.instagram.com/p/BQ4A60Yl7Pi/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BP8_ywRB0kW/

https://www.instagram.com/p/BNDj5CJBdkh/

Cringe. It is a bunch of grown men trying to feel superior because they grow more hair on their chin, with no purpose at all.

We should create a tan club and do the same thing. Talk about how unmanly it is to not have tanned skin. Brag about how my skin is tanner than yours. Darker the better. Paler skin on a man is inferior. But we aren't racist, you know.

Whiteys figured out another way to create an exclusionary masculinity value spectrum. Be vigilant.

Also, the reason why they have more beard is just because they convert more of their testosterone to DHT, which has no use at all, other than getting prostate cancer, getting bald, growing hair on the chin. It is useless. It is literally just a genetic evolutionary way of faking a higher testosterone signal than you actually have. You know Asians are the actual ones with highest T. Whites actually have the lowest.

(blublas)

So is the recent trend of white men donning beards a racial thing? Is it to mock Asian men while at the same time, show dominance over Brown men who get called "Terrists" if they grow one? What do you guys think?

I would say your interpretation is in accord with other analysis we can make on the facial features that are seen as positive.

Sorry if I can't provide further reflexions, in my defence I do lack data to make a point here.

(cookiehead333)
White boys grow beards to look more masculine, to compensate for the emasculation by feminism and Blacks. Same thing for the prevalence of tattoos last 10 years or so.

(KhanHohii)
I noticed it started after September 11th when many Marines and U.S. soldiers entered Iraq and Afghanistan. They had news reports where these Marines and Special Force started growing beard to try to fit in with the locals. From then on the rage of growing full beard became popular.

I guess a majority of the American youths started to copy soldiers came back from these wars with that style and every hipsters want to copy that. Trying to show their toughness and masculinity.

Also the 300 movie was also the catalyst. The movie was about the masculinity of the West conquered the feminine Persia.

http://www.gstatic.com/tv/thumb/movieposters/163191/p163191_p_v8_aa.jpg

https://s-media-cache-ak0.pinimg.com/736x/db/f9/3e/dbf93e6b82b86c16e2d860ce10daebfb.jpg