I have been cultivating a thick, full beard for almost two years. My last girlfriend loved it, but my hopefully soon-to-be girlfriend seems indifferent at best. What is the word on the street about facial hair? Should I shave it off for Movember? —Daniel
Movember is probably a worthwhile charitable pursuit, but as my friend Ben tweeted, “How many of you growing Movember moustaches are getting prostate examinations? You committed to ass fingering or just the ‘awareness’ fad?” Yeah. Personally, I’d be inclined to donate more money to something that encouraged guys to not grow a moustache, but do what you want.
This year, Match.com surveyed more than 1,000 Canadian singles for a facial-hair study, and most of the women, like 62 per cent, said that they find clean-shaven guys the most attractive. Stubble was considered the second-most attractive facial-hair style, at 16 per cent (and that number doubles for women between the ages of 18 and 34, since we have the most exposure to cute, lazy dudes). Mysteriously, moustaches beat out beards, eight per cent to five per cent, and even more mysteriously, beards tied with The Upstairs Cameltoe, a.k.a. the goatee, a.k.a. why Brad Pitt looks like a sad terrier in that Chanel ad. (FYI, goateed guys are also the most likely to have had a one-night stand, which seems…correct.) Not that you should base your decision on a survey, obviously. If a beard has you feeling the thing you want to feel about yourself when you look in the mirror, then keep it. But a guy’s facial hair is rarely a neutral quality for a woman, because every style and texture is inexorably related to sense-memories and sex-aesthetic preferences.
What I can tell you is to pay attention to how your girl responds to changes in your beard, haircut, sac grooming, shoes, or winter coat and respect it. Most of us are too nice (or think we’re too nice) to tell you we think your red razor burn is less appealing than three-day stubble, or the opposite, or whatever. If what you want is maximum sex, do what she likes.
I volunteer with a guy who I’ve had a crush on for months, but he has a girlfriend. At a party, it struck me: he’s gay. He could be bi, but I have it on good authority from mutual friends that there is something “going on” under the surface that isn’t entirely heterosexual. All of this is fine and an unchangeable natural fact about who he is. How might one suggest that he be honest about his sexuality? I could see this being very self-destructive for him. —Jane
This couldn’t be less your business. If you were a 90-year-old white Republican it might be less your business, but that’s it. The sum total of a person’s sexuality, in terms of liking boys and/or girls and/or the less-decisively gendered, might not even be the business of who they’re sleeping or sharing a life with. Desire can’t be mediated like you want it to be, and there are a zillion happy couples whose sex stuff isn’t readily apparent from a few seats over. Even now, when we totally understand “bi” as a “could be” thing, the assumption that another soul’s wants and needs and habits are in some way predictable is only based on a) your personal sense that having a girlfriend and being less than entirely hetero is “very self-destructive,” b) a distanced understanding of his relationship, and c) the imaginary realities that a sex crush can create.
Don’t direct any of your weird, ingratiating, uninteresting judgment rays at him. Don’t approach him. Instead, become
the kind of person who other people can come to, if they want, with their secret hearts and tricky stuff, and then just listen and
listen and listen; if you don’t, you’re usually going to be wrong.
Have a question for Kate? Email kate@thegridto.com.
