{"id":17645,"date":"2011-11-01T21:44:48","date_gmt":"2011-11-02T02:44:48","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/?p=17645"},"modified":"2011-11-01T21:44:48","modified_gmt":"2011-11-02T02:44:48","slug":"clean-shaven","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/2011\/11\/clean-shaven\/","title":{"rendered":"Clean-Shaven"},"content":{"rendered":"

I shaved today. My beard (of at least the last two-and-a-half years) is gone.<\/p>\n

Why, you ask? Was it a calling? or guilt? or professional pressures of some sort?<\/p>\n

No, no, and no. Notwithstanding the near-constant Sturm und Drang<\/em> that Mormons seem to feel about beards, I don’t believe for a second that anybody outside of BYU actually cares.[fn1] And that argument has been beaten to death, in any event, in the bloggernacle, to no solid conclusion.<\/p>\n

As for professional pressures: I’m a professor.[fn2] I can wear a beard.<\/p>\n

So why shave? Because it’s Movember<\/a>. Which is an excuse to grow a mustache. The last time that I remember having a mustache was my senior year at BYU.<\/p>\n

Which brings me to why I’m posting this on a Mormon blog: whatever you think about beards (the BYU Honor Code<\/a> calls them “unacceptable”), mustaches are (apparently) perfectly acceptable in even the strictest Mormon circles.[fn3] Even you BYU students can have them.<\/p>\n

So anybody else out there up for a mustache this month?[fn4] The mustache has an odd, acceptable place in Mormon culture and society, but we don’t often embrace it. It’s not an #occupy movement, but it is a perfectly acceptable way to set ourselves apart this month.[fn5] Plus, in December, you can grow your beard back.<\/p>\n

—<\/p>\n

[fn1] Note that this assertion is entirely anecdotal, based largely on the number of bearded fellow Saints I had in New York and, even moreso, here in Chicago. In my current ward, as of Sunday, the bearded in my ward included: a member of the bishopric, the EQ president and one of his counselors, a Sunbeam teacher, a nursery teacher, an EQ teacher, a ward clerk, and at least one other. (Clearly, with my having shaved, we’re one down on that list. For now.) Also note that I do know you can’t work in the temple or be a missionary and have a beard.<\/p>\n

[fn2] Not that professors are the only professionals who can wear beards. The head of my department at a major law firm in New York had a beard for all six years that I knew him.<\/p>\n

[fn3] I don’t, of course, vouch for their acceptability viz-a-viz your significant other, of course.<\/p>\n

[fn4] But come on, it’s only a month, and I’m sure she can deal with it for a month.<\/p>\n

[fn5] I was going to make a cheesy joke about putting the Mormon back in Movember, but I wisely decided against it.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

I shaved today. My beard (of at least the last two-and-a-half years) is gone.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":138,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[56,54],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-17645","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-bloggernacle","category-mormon-life"],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17645","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/138"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=17645"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17645\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17646,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/17645\/revisions\/17646"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=17645"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=17645"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/timesandseasons.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=17645"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}