Are there any historical or modern human societies in which ‘male-type’ coarse facial hair has been considered a female beauty ideal? Not as in ‘let’s not bother to bleach/pluck/shave it’ but as in ‘let’s braid it/add mascara/call attention to it.’ I suspect that a Google search would show me many hits for individuals or small groups who fetishize female facial hair, but I’m thinking about more universally accepted standards.
Inspired by this thread on beards.
Goodness - over a hundred views and not even a mother-in-law joke? Am I to take it that the answer is no, then?
It seems very unlikely, because facial hair is a male secondary sex trait. Some differences between men and women have been accentuated by a long period of natural selection, to the point where there are some hardwired rules for what’s attractive in a man, and what’s attractive in a woman. Societies don’t seem to cross those boundaries, even though they vary considerably within them.
Ultrafilter nailed it, and for those reasons I imagine “The Bearded Lady” was a freak in the freakshow even waaay back in caveman carnivals.
From a list a South Pacific friend sent me, entitled “You know you’re from the Islands when …”
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You know you’re from the islands when at least one of your aunties has a mustache.
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w.
In the societies I know, no.
Washington Irving was surprised to discover that “those raven-haired Spanish beauties” had moustaches, but the moustaches in question where the soft-haired variety, not the kind you’d expect in a male sergeant of the Guardia Civil. Facial and body hair in females wasn’t lauded by Spanish poets, it was ignored.
“Hard” hairs usually got plucked; long hard facial hairs (perhaps a hairy mole) are sometimes mentioned in legends when describing an old woman, as an indication that she doesn’t care about her appearance.
There are fetishists who obsess about female facial and body hair. My knowledge of this is only anecdotal. About ten years ago I was involved in an online discussion group for a TV series, She-Wolf Of London, a show about a young woman who turns into a werewolf when the moon is full. The focus of the discussion group was meant to be the acting, plot and writing (all which were superb.) However, the discussion was disrupted by a couple of fetishists who insisted on discussing, at length, their fantasies of what sexual acts they’d like to perform with the she-werewolf and other hirsute women. It got to be a bore and we ended up banning them.