Defensive Secretary Pete Hegseth seems to have an obsession about stamping his toy soldiers out of identical molds. Now, if you listen to him, he seems to be all about combat preparedness and making optimal warfighters and other such Defense Department things. But when you look at him actions, they all seem to be about making sure that all the good troops fit some idealized appearance, regardless of what it means to discipline, morale, or “warfighting” ability.
The current diktats concern facial hair, with orders Coming From The Top that no soldier can have unshaven facial hair (which seems mostly directed toward beards, though presumably mustaches would also apply).
I am passingly familiar with military history, and I’m pretty sure that no battle was ever won (or lost) due to the presence or absence of beards. This is solely an aesthetic judgment and an ability to impose meaningless discipline on the troops. Which is a big thing in some quarters of the military, but isn’t exactly what you would think a Defense Secretary would be obsessing over.
The newest twist is a bit more disturbing. There are people with sensitive skin conditions, pseudofolliculitis barbae, or PFB. Shaving can cause ingrown hairs, and subsequent irritation. For decades, the military has cut soldiers with such a condition some slack. Not Pete Hegseth, who explained it this way:
The Department must remain vigilant in maintaining the grooming standards which underpin the warrior ethos.
Really? The “warrior ethos” (which, I guess, is a thing we actually want) is underpinned by grooming standards?
Rather than accepting that folk with PFB cannot stay clean-shaven, Hegseth has decreed that any medical exemption can only last for a year, after which the service member will be kicked out. For not being able to shave without .
More importantly, PFB impacts Black men in much higher numbers — about 45-80% of them. By definition, this kind of policy will kick more Black men out of the service than White or other racial groups.
It’s a policy that impacts, that discriminates against, Black soldiers, plain and simple.
But, hey, we are assured by Hegseth and his boss, Donald Trump, that we don’t pay attention to racial distinctions any more (except for ICE profiling purposes) because that’s “divisive.” Which sounds good, except that it means that policies that do discriminate can be dismissed as, “Well, certainly it’s not about the discrimination because we don’t pay any attention to race.”
It seems kind of nuts to discharge qualified people — folks who have gone through not-inexpensive training, and who have clearly shown the desire to serve the nation — just because a medical condition requires they don’t go clean-shaven. I mean, unless your top priority is being able to put on some sort of weirdly uniform Military Parade — you know, the sort of thing that Americans used to poke fun at — then it might make some weird sense.
But, then, if you were really looking for uniformity … well, surely standardized skin tone would be a big part of that, would it not? But, I’m sure, that such a thing would never be what is being consciously driven at, since the Trump Administration is all about not paying any attention to something divisive like “race.”
Nevertheless, it is still a policy that discriminates against Black men for no reason other than that someone thinks that you can’t have a “warrior ethos” if you don’t have everyone shaving the same way.
Which seems a pretty stupid way to run a Defense Department, let alone a War Department.