I could Google up the specifics, but many will recall the story of the man in 1820’s New York who grew a full beard and suffered for it in an era of clean-shaved men: “Persecuted for Wearing a Beard” is on his gravestone. The funny thing was that fifty years later most presidents and kings were wearing them.
But the Mullet and now the Shaved Head/Goatee seem different. Back in the early 1970’s, when David Bowie wore one, mullets were an extreme alternative to the free long hair of the hippies. In my high school most of the glam rock girls got them. But, by 1985 when Hall & Oates wore them, the mullet was a joke. No president of the United States, or Ken doll, for that matter (is there a difference?) will ever wear a mullet. It went from cutting edge to working class, bypassing the median income mainstream.
Back in 1965, when Hell’s Angels and satanists Anton LaVey were the only people who wore shaved heads & goatees, it seemed kind of menacing, but now when young men get their first square gig, selling car stereos or whatever, and they have to “clean up” for the first time, they can keep their shaved heads and goatees while changing into the white shirt and tie. Yet another look started by trendy homosexuals that went to Corporate Country & Western to die.
No offense to those of you whov’e adopted this look, but now that shaved heads and goatees are as common a sight as straw boaters were in the 1910’s, is anyone else thinking “Gee, this look is getting annoyingly ordinary.” (?)
I think the goatee (shaved head optional as it always has been) is here to stay and it wouldn’t surprise me at all to see a President in the next 20-30 years sporting a goatee.
Radical haircuts - shaving, mohawks, dreadlocks, whatever I can understand but certainly middle class rebellion should be avoided.
I believe the modern day mullet is the “gell your hair and tease it out like you just got out of bed” look. I look forward to the day when people look at their photos with an appropriate sense of shame.
I work with several exponents of this look and marvel at the stupidity involved in creating it. They get up, wash their hair, dry it, comb and brush it…and then proceed to gell it and make it look unwashed and uncombed.
I try to explain to people that it is like dressing in your Armani suit and then distributing food stains on it, but I am a voice in the wilderness.
silenus hit it sqare on the head, I’ve been shaving my head for years because I don;t have to worry about it. I’ve also always worn a mustache, the added goatee was easy.
Yep, I agree with the OP. Shaved head 'n goatee used to mean you were a diabolical tie-the-maiden-to-the-train-tracks sociopath. Now, it means that you are the defacto “wild” member of a R&B boy band singing “baby baby, it’s you baby, phone me baby” with a sentimental tear in your eye.
This fashion was “in” a year or two ago at a local highschool, All the cool kids were into wearing formal dress wear, carefully ruffled to look like they slept in it on a park bench. very odd, didn’t last long.
Well, I tend to think it’s a matter of conveneince, mostly. The goatee is the easiest way to both have facial hair and appear well groomed. You still have the smooth cheeks ladies like, and you can avoid having to shave the most nick-plagued area of your face- the soft tissue under your nose, around your mouth, and chin.
As for the shaved head- I have a pretty full head of hair now, but at the first sign of balding, you bet your ass it’s getting shaved off. I refuse to do any sort of comb-over.
I sincerely hope not: mine have been trendily unfashionable (eh?) since 1991 but as soon as 'boards start sprouting everywhere I’ll have to shave them off!
This is why the shaved head & goatee look prevails. While I was getting my SS card replaced today, I had the misfortune of sitting the 2 1/2 hours in the office waiting my turn. While the parade of people passed I pondered the precise moment they chose to freeze their style in fashion time. It must have been when they felt the most “bad ass”. Some of the more prominent looks were:
boogie board shorts, ray bans (the topper would be if they had painter hats on!)
My 20th Century History professor once showed us a surrealist movie that ruined goatees for me. One of the scenes I remember most vividly (aside from the guy dragging the two dead donkeys on a piano across the room) was a scene involving a woman cowering as a man stared at her in brooding anger. The camera kept cutting back and forth; cowering woman, glaring man, cowering woman, glaring man, etc., etc. Finally the woman throws her arms up in fear, and shazam! suddenly the man has a goatee. The woman looks at him, mystified, then examines her armpit, from which all the pit hair has magically disappeared.
So now everytime I see a goatee it reminds me of the guy with the pit hair all around his mouth, and it kind of grosses me out.
I like the shaved head and goatee look, because its waht MING THE MERCILES wore in the old “Flash Gordon” series! Love that Frank Middleton look!
If we could only dress that way…where did Ming get his bathrobe from? That thing would’ve given you whiplash!
