Hegseth Flies in Every General to Hear Him Rant About Beards
Archive article: https://archive.is/EfZkV “We don’t have a military full of Nordic pagans,” he said. “No more beards, long hair, superficial individual expression,” he added. “We’re going to cut our hair, shave our beards, and adhere to standards.”
https://www.thedailybeast.com/pentagon-pete-melts-down-at-generals-in-deranged-trumpy-rant/Open linkView original on lemmy.world492
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He is such an idiot. Oh yes, let’s lecture career officers about what a real fighter looks like. It’s all just optics. Idiot.
Bad optics, at that. Hegseth just created the single largest opsec failure that the US has seen in over a century and used it to complain to career military generals that they look too woke.
If literally any other man tried this at any other time in American history he'd be in front of a court martial so fast your head would spin.
We owe Benedict Arnold an apology. He had way better reasons for defecting, and was a legitimate soldier and commander before then.
I can't say the same of any member of the Trump Regime.
Meanwhile, the supporting act, Mr Droopeye...
Captain Bone Spurs
Dementia Donnie
Depending on Depends Donald
He used to work for Fox News, of course he has a skewed view on the importance of optics.
Our military needs to be wearing Hugo Boss, stat!
Next years
birthdaymilitary parade is gonna be fire 🔥🔥🔥General Grant would like a word
Hegseth complained that as leader of this department he is constantly surrounded by unattractive, hairy, bear types. He wants to see nice smooth skin that is easy on the eyes and the military will require a more metrosexual look! He also wants to see more exercise and he needs hard bodies out there. The harder. The better.
Unleash the tactical twinks!
Ah yes, the male version of Totally Spies
Thanks I love it
If we can channel nationalism into a question of who has the best gay people that would be great
Jesus. It's like if Mac from Always Sunny was the defence secretary.
That was made up by me btw. Just mentioning just in case. I mean he wanted no beards and more excersise I just filled in the rest.
Oh yeah, I know, it's just not much of a stretch haha.
Again, nothing sexual.
Which is weird because I thought he wanted more civil war confederate beards.
Doesn't Taco have issues with beards, by the way? I wonder if he has talked to "JD" "Vance" about that beard of his...
fun fact. vances beard is just trumps signature.
Pete Hegesth can't grow a beard
It's the only logical conclusion.
And his rape allegations were 100% true, apparently.
Too much facial surgery tends to do that
Wait .. a white supremacist who rejects Viking Age cultural appropriation‽
I mean. so he says. beards are required with all kinds of religions.
The beard thing is targeted at POC in the military. Most black men can't closely shave without catastrophic damage to their faces.
Oh I know. It's just unusual for a tatted up white supremacist to not have some misplaced affinity for Vikings, based on the Nazified version of them rather than the reality. So for Hegseth to specifically call out a rejection of Nordic aesthetic is odd. The pagan part of his callout is weird, because Christian Vikings were very much a thing, too.
Plus we learned in Vietnam that racial tensions in your military doesn't make a effective fighting force. All you end up with is a whole bunch of dead white leaders with no way to tell if the enemy killed them or their own men.
Probably because this meeting
shouldcould have been an email.It should have been no email. Nothing about this was necessary.
I'd feel so fucking stupid as a general being lectured by this dropout and a draft dodging president about how they won no war "because of woke". Absolute disgrace but to be expected for that admin.
This meeting should've been an internal thought if that
Train of thought should have ended in a resignation letter.
In fuedal Japan they´d have found his disemboweled body and wondered what caused it
Or maybe a Signal chat!
His comment about beards is iterally the least problematic/newsworthy part of his speech. Why the fuck would you focus on this and not, I don't know, his straight outta 1984 "war is peace" statement? Extreme journalistic malpractice.
An outsized portion of African American soldiers get beard waivers because if they shave they suffer from “razor bumps” (Pseudofolliculitis Barbae); which is not just razor burn that goes away but a painful skin condition with unsightly pustules.
Basically Pete’s trying to be like “oh, can’t be professional if you’re black, sorry you don’t meet our stringent requirements”
I know about razor bumps and I don't mean to make it out to be a total non-issue; my problem is with the headline and byline, which seem to make light of what was actually a deeply disturbing speech. "Look at this idiot, ranting about beards, much ado about nothing, don't even bother reading about what he said, it was just stupid fluff, shoulda been an email lol!" is not the message that the media needs to tell the public when both Hegseth and Trump made several horrifying, fascism-escalating statements today. (And let's be real, most people don't actually read the articles, so burying the lede like this is functionally similar to not reporting on it at all.)
The media isn’t going to start being honest now because the moment they do, Trump’s going to pull their licenses/sue them for “defaming the government”/jail them/whatever.
People keep wondering why the news won’t report on what is actually going on? Why they keep capitulating to Trump.
The reason is that even when they want to, they have a gun to their heads.
Yeah but this is Daily Beast; calling out the DT administration (albeit in click-bait ways) is their shtick.
I agree they literally declared war on American citizens
So, I thought this was going to be some secret strategy briefing heralding some awful new global project. Instead it’s a couple little boys peacocking around bragging about how masculine they are to a captive audience.
I wonder how the generals and admirals feel about being pons in this loser’s bruised ego theater?
The least cool thing a person can do is brag about how cool they are. Same thing applies to masculinity. When you preform like this, you’re expressing how weak, afraid, unsure and incapable you are. That’s the maga cultural movement in a nutshell.
Fuck every single person in civilization leadership at this moment.
Were you trying to say "pawns?"
Porns
Prawns
Yeah.
[sad trombone]
It's kind of a relief in a way, of all the ways "fascists war department leader calls all the generals home suddenly for a meeting" could go, raving about aesthetics is probably one of the least immediately dangerous for everyone else.
He's trying to force black men out of the military, it's not like he's giving fashion tips.
Well and women.
Uhm, well there was a lot of that stuff, but Hegseth spoke for like 45 minutes and inbetween the usual incoherent rambling and machismo, and the book plug [!], there were some actual important announcements thrown in. Internal investigations is to be gutted, records of wrongdoing will be expunged, "DEI" purges will continue, and a whole lot of "you can do whatever the fuck you want now, we will back you" messaging. This was a rallying cry to the fascists in the audience, and I fear there is a subset that will act on it.
Haven't made it through the entirety of Trumps speech yet, but most of the first ~20 minutes have been his usual meandering.
Edit 1: Heh, nice Freudian slip a bit later into Trumps speech:
I wonder if the public version of this pageantry is cover for the secret meeting where he singles out leaders for not being loyal enough or where they plan to coup ... antifa?
Eh, after that public humiliation of the leadership, I am certain that any secret meeting won't remain a secret for much longer.
A talk like that makes you no friends.
I literally just got added to the Super Secret military stuff group chat
That and they declared war on American citizens and said war crimes are encouraged.
What did Hegseth think was going to happen? That all the generals were going to stomp their feet and hoot and holler? That they were going to pump their fists in the air and shout "YEEEAAAH!" ?
That sh*t might work on Private Pyle but those Generals had more important things to do and places to be. They're pissed that they've been summoned from all over the world by a guy who calls their troops "suckers and losers" to take part in a pep rally.
This is what CEOs of failing companies do to make themselves seem important on their sinking ship.
I feel like the chance of a military coup in the USA just went up 1000%. I’m sure there’s plenty of MAGAs in that military but there’s gotta be a lot who take their oath and tradition very seriously.
If they did they would already be doing something. There's a line in that oath about protecting from domestic threats.
If they are doing something (and I'm confident that someone is. Likely quite a few of them), then we won't know until they put the plan into action. That information leaking right now would be disastrous.
I really hope the people in that room know better than to allow this to continue. They should have couped him right there.
Since you mention it, by summoning leadership to the pentagon he just gave them plausible deniability for being in the same place at the same time, without being monitored (e.g. off base). If you wanted to jump-start a coup, that's a helluva way to do it.
fucking lol
Yes, he insulted very high ranking officers.
Yes, it will piss them off.
But most unfortunately, some of them are going to resign "in protest" and be replaced by bootlickers who do whatever trump says.
That is the goal, it's not to get them on Trump's side, it's a desperate attempt to get the ones willing to fight to quit before they can really fight in a meaningful way
The military brass are well aware of the result of them stepping down in protest. These guys are warriors and see themselves as patriots. Many, if not all, are pretty politically savvy as well. If they're not strongly aligned with fascism, they will stoutly defend the Constitution from this idiotic horde and that means keeping their post and making difficult choices if the need arises.
I promise you, all of these guys have mentally prepared for this moment. Threats foreign and domestic. They know the "domestic" line is the least likely to occur but the most difficult to navigate. And they likely play out scenarios in their heads all the time to be prepared. They're well-read on historical coups and not blind to what is on the line in front of them. It is not uncommon for military leaders to appreciate the benefits of authoritarianism, but when it occurs, historically, it's easily spun as using authoritarianism to protect the country in some way. We can all see the grift. A teenager can logic what these chucklefucks on stage are trying to do. The military leaders are not going to give up their country for anything the Trump administration is selling.
The administration is full of idiots and headed by a narcissist. This meeting was likely a test. If they thought the military was with them, they'd ramp up project 2025 and try to take control. Seeing that the military isn't fully with them, they'll pivot and try to foment even more fear among the citizens. Get that divide going which they think the military will react to. The military leaders likely will see through that as well. But I also don't think the administration has the support anymore to bring about the civil war they want. There are too many cracks forming in their supporters. They will still try it. They have to. They know the harshest elements of Project 2025 will cause upheaval and dissent. Without the brainwashing, without the military I don't think they can pull it off. But they will still cause a lot of damage before they're stopped.
Lol
Ok buddy, they definitely are in all the movies
In real life you can't get that high up without fucking more than a few people over.
Military officers mostly have college degrees and are professionals and leadership experts. In addition to this they have extensive military training. High ranking officers are some of the most intelligent and experienced folks you will meet. Certainly more trustworthy than the majority of CEOs, politicians, and talk show hosts that have far more power than they should.
Lol
Have you literally ever interacted with any military officer in a professional capacity?
Yes, yes I have. It seems that you have not, nor do you understand the requirements of becoming even a low ranking CO.
Once you've watched a Captain get relieved of his command and get sent to the sandbox to count ammo in a connex and then get PROMOTED to Major, you know that it's all made up.
O-1 through O-4 are basically the same as E-1 through E-4, Automatic.
A college degree and a pulse?
Yeah man, it's super fucking difficult...
The regulations and guidance are publicly available if you would like to educate yourself
Yeah. That's why I mentioned the politically savvy part. A very few seem to get there on just time and merit. Most have the political acumen and ruthlessness to rise through the ranks within a terrible system.
Still completely wrong...
Do you even know someone who's been in the military?
Or are you basing opinions on Major Dad reruns?
Because the multiple issues with the promotion system was actually a multi episode arc on that show, even back then...
I've spent the last decade as a proxy voice for conscientious objectors and my girlfriend's dad just retired a few years ago as a major general in the national guard. Does that count?
Edit: The governor threw him a gala event for his retirement and all.
Nope.
It's your GFs dad, but I'm sure he is very impressive to a teenager.
Not even getting into the "guard" aspect...
No, they won't. This is a childish humiliation ritual... Every one of them has gone through basic. They can sit there are zone out when someone screams at them, I'm sure they can handle watching a content creator make a fool of themselves for an afternoon
These aren't politicians or powerless administrators. The people Hegseth pulled off their jobs are the final line of defense for the constitution
They have actual power, they're not going to performatively give it up and comply in advance
Yeah. Top Gun is super realistic too. Just v-ball all day and racing motorcycles
This same group of people basically quietly removed Trump from power after Jan 6
The national guard is picking up trash in DC, they had to be ordered to carry weapons. They managed to throw a military parade without marching, if you watch the footage you can see individuals accidentally matching up their steps and staggering them again
The military as a whole is not on board with any of this, and they're a very critical key to power
It's like a Nazi Ted Talk.
Thanks melania for making them look like Nazi foot soldiers too:
Not a single beard in the crowd... might Hegseth be a ridiculous pedantic asshat? Some people are saying it.
Maybe he’s targeting Sikhs that have beard exemptions for religious reasons?
That is DISGUSTING! There's a
WOMAN!DEI in that Picture!What could they possibly be taking notes on?
They had no idea of what the meeting was about, they were probably being prepared.
"Military leaders will need to pass height and weight tests each year."
Each year? Height tests? How many ppl losing height year to year?
The Army tests Height and Weight every year. Those rucks will take an inch or two off you as your vertebrae get crushed.
But, yeah, army already does annual height and weight.
No beards on generals? Must be the cope from having this handsome gentleman beat their asses all the way to Dixie and back!
If this is the case then it is to drive out black people. Most black people get no shave chits due ingrown hairs. Unless you are on the front lines, who gives a fuck. Fuck President kid fucker and his drunk lap dog.
Well, at least hopefully this is the moment some of those generals decide they will uphold the Constitution rather than back Trump's inevitable formal military coup in 6/12/24/36 months.
What's that narrator voice I hear nearby?
Narrator: They won't
Yeah... [sigh] yeah.
This timeline has truly jumped the shark. Like on the one hand we are so fucked, but on the other hand reality has become something straight off the cutting room floor of a mockumentary series
That’ll happen when your “Predisent” is a demented rapist fraud with face paint and unfortunate tendencies toward sociopathy.
I don't think pissing off the entire military leadership with something that didn't need to be said (or could have been an email) is going to make them particularly keen to support you...
How are fascists always so cringe
If they weren’t so cringe they’d have friends and be less insecure. These two things alone make it harder to be a fascist right out the gate.
Pete "Warrior Ethos" Hegseth:
Is that the same event where he threw an axe at a drummer?
Probably yes. He was a Fox host before
An important reminder that a large part of fascism is pure idiocy.
Ugh im up to the part where trump comes on. He is so delusional. Thinks everyone agrees with him. He is going on and on on gulf of america and talks like anyone but him uses it. Talks about how he built the us military and then it went to shamble for 4 years and magically is the best again. The magic of pure, unadulterated bullshit. He called putin easy so that was funny. Now he is telling them how they don't have to worry about him ever any wars he starts. Course that is typical for republicans. Our submarines are undetectable but the enemy ones are totally detectable. Oh and our submarines go above and below the water (presumably he is saying others don't do that?). He said at one point he was with the fire department. Oh and people are shooting at firemen on their ladders apparently. Also its animals shooting at them. Seriously find this on youtube and fastforward to trumps stuff. Jeez he is talking about how he calls biden the autopen and then is talking like he never uses it. Oh and hes proud of his pubic hair signature. Then he throws in that he had hunter sign stuff. This clown drives me nuts. He literally just did an indian accent explaining how he stopped india and pakistan from fighting. This talk is like a great example of trump talking. Oh he got rowanda war done. He has stopped 8 and the nobel prize will go to a writer talking about his great deeds but he does not want it but he should get it.....and on and on. Oh and ukraine/russia is easy. So easy he has not done it yet because he knows he can do it whenever because so easy. The furthest he ever saw two people in front of him was inside the oval office apparently. Can't be further. nope. nope. can't be done. These generals im pretty sure have been seated there for over two hours with no break that I can tell. Oh good news trumps says his tariffs have taken in so much money the us is rich again. He thinks we should have more battleships because he saw them in pictures and they look cool. now spouting 51st state bullshit. hes saying they want to be us because of our great tariffs. Now he is saying the us does not build ships only submarines. this man is our president people. sorry for this but you know it needed one of those threads like the state of the union.
continuing. he won all the states. except the ones he didn't. which are only on the coasts. biden let in murders but now presumably their are none. washington dc is now safe and no ones been attacked and now its the safest city. its perfect now but was horrible before. says 5 shootings in some of the large shootings is to much. should be none. portland told them on the phone they are fine but he checked and its a nightmare and on fire. announces they spit we hit policy. he says military can do whatever they hell they want to do if they see property damage. Its funny because you will notice he does not say he will keep the military folk from being prosecuted for their actions. just to do what they want.
ok got to the part where he says he has a special quick reaction force to quell civil disruption domestically. I kid you not he said the enemy within. and hes emphasizing foreign and domestic. your the domestic you fuck. also channeled hegseth for a sec talking about how good it is to give men a pounding. now mentions have not had a crime in washington now. I can't handle this crazy delusion. oh now he is talking about how no matter how much rehabilitation these people can never be good. wow. oh he said how he did such a great job at covid but everyone else was being devastated but he took care of that. especially apparently with theraputics over vaccines. now hes talking about blowing venezualens. now hes blowing iran and it was beutiful to see. thats why he chose cain because hes so good. man more hegsethisms. he took out 100% of isis and it was so easy. alls you had to do was say you did. everyday biden fell down stairs but trump is careful because he is smart and he realizes he barely keeps from falling every time. obama danced down stairs and he totally could but maybe he would fall. we were dead before but he fixed that. he fixed nato. now nato pays everything and they buy all our stuff. we have no money going out to nato. he does not want to say we are making money on war but nudge nudge wink wink. ukrainian soldiers are dying but they are not us soldiers so no biggie. its crazy though. worst since ww2. its the toughest (recall earlier he said it was the easiest). Hes complaining that russia should have done a better job and had the war over by now but he is getting the middle east done. He thinks the kings and emirs and shit from the middle east are cool because they buy our weapons and shit. They also said we were dead but now so hot oh and putin said it to. I mean and this is still with beards.
so before no one wanted to join the military but now its the only thing anyone wants to do. same with police forces apparently. seariously he said everyone wants to be in the army, navy, air force, marines. yeah he said it like that and then remember and said oh and space force to. He wants the military to be large because so many people want to join but he also wants to not take people because they are not good enough. Hes telling the military brass the citizens are gonne take ur jobs. I guess to incentivize their use in civilian areas. Hes going to make a board of peace (the context sounds like through war) and all the world leaders want to be on it and want him to be chairman. Hes talking about how nato is paying more instead of us even though he said we are not paying and says how all the leaders like to call him the president of nato and he does not like it but they insist. now he is talking about how biden never talks smack but he talks smack which is why he is better. now he is saying how everyone wants to buy our military shit and they all have to wait in line but he is cracking the whip on production because the companies don't want to. Everything is going to be made faster. He thinks using the name department of war will stop war. especially if we are as ruthless and relentless and evil as our enemies or even more so. thats how we become the good guys. we knocked out 14 incoming missiles one time. weeeeeee. we have the most nukes. weeeeee. oh and lore is spelt l-o-r-e. I just learneded it.
I was gonna complain about the lack of paragraph breaks, but then, this is literally how his speeches feel. Which is, uncomfortable, to say the least. Thank you for your hard work here.
I didn't think I'd ever say this to any one, but "HubertManne, thank you for your service" o7
Thanks a lot for the transcript. I hate listening to these criminals talking, and this way it's more digestible. 👍🏼
I am glad that the Trump Regime is so horrible at instilling loyalty within the old guard...though I could do without the secondhand embarrassment.
What I heard is hegseth promises to have his son sign up on his 17th birthday as frontline infantry marine. Thats what I heard. Anyone else hear that? Im pretty sure that is what he said. His kid is 15 so should be ripe before trump term ends. Military will be in the borders so can pick him right up when ready. Oh also he does not want the head of the us military to be fat or out of shape and wants to get rid of the head of the military that are fat and out of shape. I can really get behind that. Lets get rid of him.
He literally gave an example of a good reason to have a beard (special forces). This shit is racism. Full stop. Everyone I knew in the military who had a shaving chit was a dark green Marine.
It's so thinly veiled that it's raising my blood pressure. Those guys (with the shaving chits) were damn fine Marines. Fuck this administration!
All the brass right now: "this could have been an email".
Fuck, it could’ve been a Signal chat.
Exactly. Even the press could attend.
That's exactly what I was thinking. He's probably extremely insecure that he can't grow a beard.
Thia myth has been wandering around for too long. The two people I know with extreme testasterone levels have no beard growth
Sorry, but yearly height tests?
Weight vs height for approximate BMI
Ought to be required for Commander-In-Chief
As yes, BMI, an incredibly generic measurement used more as a rough first step and also worth less when someone weighs more due to muscle mass, which I imagine soldiers have a fair amount of.
Look, the test is really bad about detecting weight issues so if you score high enough on the annual fitness test, you don't have to take it. So that leaves all the soldiers with much more muscle out of the outliers. Meaning the soldiers who are overweight and don't have high enough scores can waste the rest of the afternoon getting tape tested.
This is a good read and its more than just beards. All right men we are going to be running this department of war the way jesus would...:
"But over 45 minutes, a very animated Hegseth railed against what he called “stupid rules of engagement” in the military, cited Jesus, talked up his book, and repeated a litany of talking points."
Wait, what was that about "stupid rules of engagement"? He and Trump want them changed to allow full fire on US civilians, don't they? Fuck this shit.
OMG! Im listening to it and he is going on about lowered requirements like its dei and I know people who have been in the military. What lowers requirements is needs. Guy gained weight till they kicked him out. Would not have worked during war time. They have been big on drone operators and that has done a lot because they want the best person to pilot the drone not look good doing it. Its like a right leaning plan for last millenium.
They need to tear shit up. Regardless if its the enemy or friendly fire or civilians. Whats important is the violence, not the objective. People need to be afraid. The enemy, our friends, our citizens, even our military. We. All of us. NEED to be pissing ourselves.
**They declared war on America.
Encouraged war crimes (against American citizens)**
Enacted a bunch of racist and sexist shit (beard thing)
Announced they were planning on starting wars as soon as they feel like it
Rejected and alienated large portions of the American population from serving on the brink of WW3
Dementia Don rambled incoherently for a long time
Threatened the generals if they didn’t show fealty to the pedo king
Said the generals aren’t sexy enough for Pete
I'm convinced that the real purpose of this meeting was to gauge the willingness of top military officers to support a coup. I would be surprised if their private conversations in response to this spectacle were not spied on.
Fortunately, at least in public appearance, they don't seem thrilled with this administration.
I think you're crediting them with more foresight, shrewdness and competency than has ever been demonstrated by this admin.
Trump and Hegseth are not the sharpest tools in the shed, for sure, but they're also not the ones really making decisions. Stephen Miller is possibly in charge? JD Vance's vassalage to dystopian surveillance tech titan Peter Thiel is another influence channel.
That's a fair point about where the buck ultimately stops, but I'm not sure the "AI regulations bring about the anti-christ" guy is the Lex Luthor he wants us to believe he is either.
"this meeting could have been an e-mail"
OMG! The music after his speech but before trumps. LOL. Its like kinda military music but the kind they use for circuses to. OH OH OH. Its doing the monty python theme. I think this is intentional from either the players or the sound guys.
The Monty Python theme is a Sousa march called Liberty Bell. I bet someone ran it past him & he said great, because he's never watched the show and has no idea. That is hilarious.
Yeah I feel like he would be all giddy with the clown music. its like that pony ride he got from the brits.
Just the thing our military needs to encourage enlistment....
They'll probably bring back the draft once the war with Venezuela kicks off.
Never forget the primary lesson of Vietnam.
They draft, you frag.
hundreds of senior officers most of which are probably keenly aware that America will possibly be at war with China in the next 5 years, and with Russia uncomfortably sooner. And this cokehead carted them all to Virginia basically just to do hyper conservative virtue signaling like it was an election campaign.
This is the most fascist speech in a while, and there's competition
Did you see all that winning in that room? So much winning. Shave. Don’t be fat. And then the orange man rambled about fucking nonsense for like an hour. I mean he said literally nothing coherent or relevant to the meeting. I was so fucking inspired and filled with warrior ethos I shit myself. It was awesome!
troops to Portland because TV.
That was the most closeted TedTalk I’ve ever seen.
Wait what? This fucktard summoned every General not for a forced loyalty pledge, but because of beards? What in the every loving fuck?
"Shit. Everyone figured out we were going to force them to take a loyalty oath to President Pedophile! Now we can't do that, or we'll look stupid. Better just talk about beards then. Maybe I can take the opportunity to sell some books."
This. I honestly thought Hegseth was going to make them all take a loyalty oath to Trump or fire a bunch of . . . you know . . . "those" generals. But Hegseth can't even do a purge properly. Trump didn't even bother showing up to turn it into a rally.
The beards are a metaphor for the Epstein thing
This is not the thing about that meeting that the press should be focusing on.
Horrifying stuff. Truly chilling.
This guy reminds me of every dick-less wonder that issues "return to office" orders just so they can walk around and micromanage people.
https://www.ft.com/content/c23292f8-c69f-4162-8c78-83258a55b8a2
Sounds like interesting times ahead.
Boo censorship
Deliberate censorship
Nordic pagans? Does he think America is Rome in the 4th century?
Because the Romans, while they had their flaws, probably wouldn't let their equivalent of a Fox News anchor run their military. They were smarter than that.
Well kinda, the 4th century is when they went head over heels for Christianity after which the Western Roman empire fell only a century later.
What a fucking dipshit
Lol, there are a shit ton of those in the Navy so many Valknut and Vesgir tattoos
Okay, but how much booze is every soldier supposed to drink? 🍻
As a bearded man for decades now, I actually have slightly less respect for men who bend the knee to the shaven. I don't care if you're a billionaire - I even know one - but yeah I think less of you. I know people look down on me for having one. Whatever.
I do understand appearance standards for soldiers though. There's a purpose to the uniformity. But if I was in charge I'd mandate soldiers wear short beards (long beards are superior, but are a liability in hand to hand combat).
It was originally about gas masks, they don't seal properly when you have a beard. That's why a mustache is ok.
Granted, that's not what this is about.