With all due respect to the male members of the SF community

[james_davis_nicoll]

When did goatees/van dykes become the mandatory facial hair arrangement for male SF readers/writers and fans? My facial hair arrangement comes from a long family tradition (Well, early 1950s but my father's family is American and sixty American years is like five or six thousand European years).

Seriously, anyone using an identikit to portray the men they see involved with SF would never get to use most of the lower facial options.

I suspect the appearance of similar beard arrangements on the faces of folk singers in the 1950s was not entirely unconnected to my father's choice of facial hair. Well, that and the fact that chin hair can conceal a weak chin.

Comments

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

I thought the stereotype was the neckbeard.

Googling, I see "neckbeard" has become a "derogatory term for slovenly nerdy people who have no sense of hygiene or grooming. Often related to hobbies such as card gaming, video gaming, anime, et al," or at least according to Urban Dictionary,

Encyclopedia Dramatica, no unbiased source, says that "a neckbeard, also known as a neard, is the strange under-the-chin hair growth only seen on fatties and UNIX programmers... Its purpose is to delineate the neck from the chin when the two have merged due to obesity. The wearer hopes his neckbeard will make him look like a badass from Hackers or The Matrix, but it actually just reminds observers that he lacks a fucking chin. A neckbeard is never, ever cool... All neckbeards are Dungeons & Dragons-obsessed losers, and vice versa. It is not known at this time whether growing a neckbeard causes one to play Dungeons & Dragons or playing Dungeons & Dragons causes one to grow a neckbeard."

Huh. I've been using "neckbeard" in this manner for some time, but I've never heard anyone else do so. Convergent evolution in action, or did I start another trend by accident?

Anyway: goatees imply the person is at least trying. So maybe you're experiencing a sampling effect among the upper reaches of fandom.

[tandw.livejournal.com]

"a neckbeard, also known as a neard, is the strange under-the-chin hair growth only seen on fatties and UNIX programmers...."

I had no idea Kyle Orton was a UNIX programmer.

[carloshasanax.livejournal.com]

Why not? the Bears once had a molecular biologist as QB.