Sexual Dimorphism -- What's the point?

By all rights I should concentrate on the intricate areas while shaving, but I lapsed into a reverie. The subject at hand--the beard. Why? Why do human males grow hair on their faces. What's the point? The beard is completely valueless except to Gillette and Schick and now Harry. 

If the beard had a use and honestly kept a person warm in winter, then why in the world would evolution deprive the gals of equivalent protection?  

Do bearded males garner a larger share of the nubile maidens than the beardless? Or a disproportionate share of the wealth. I know of no evidence that they do so. The fact that most men shave their beards argues that beards lack a function. 

It's sexual dimorphism without purpose or logic. My guess--and it's only a guess--is that the beard-gene clung to a gene with a useful male purpose a couple of hundred thousand years ago and never let go.  

I suppose that sexual dimorphism can sometimes be useful. Those magnificent manes sported by the lions of the Serengeti certainly make a formidable statement--noli me tangere and by the way remember to keep your paws off the the ladies in my harem. I can see that--but then, the males of the extinct European lion managed without a ruff, as did the Bengal tigers. 

The gorgeous display of the male peacock is exuberant but inessential--many more subtle birds manage to signal their gender and their availability without such a prodigious waste of resources. 

I should be relieved that it's only the beard that I have to worry about. Imagine if by some quirk of evolution, males of our species grew a big rack of antlers. Way more inconvenient than a mere beard. I can see myself lodged in a doorway, or lying in bed trying to get comfortable while the antlers scratch the headboard or poke the beloved in the eye. 

Perhaps civilization would demand that we disbud the antlers at birth? Or we might go the other route and decorate or color or polish the antlers. "How are you wearing your antlers this winter?"  "Natural brown, I think, this year, but with golden highlights." Chains of "Mr. Antler" ("discount on sharpening this week only"). Prosthetic antlers for guys declined into the vale of years.

Better a beard than antlers. Definitely.

Comments

[SD]

My views on sexual dimorphism are vague at best but I'd like to say here that I have a beard, with moustache, and I like it. I've had it in fact since August 6, 1978, which also marks the death of Pope Paul VI. There is no significance to those two unrelated facts other than their coincidence.

I'll only elaborate here by saying that beards and body hair in general are to my way of thinking undeniably attractive male secondary sex characteristics. I've both sensed and concluded over time that many women like beards and my guess is that they are especially attractive on bald men. And the age of the man does not matter either, as long as there is some semblance of shaping and trim to his beard. My own beard and head hair these days are gray veering toward entirely white, with the additional ability to attract young children because of the suggestion of a sort of year-round Santa on the premises and the promise of photo ops, festive cookies, and possibly gifts as well.

Additionally beards, such as my own Brillo-textured face pelt, can arguably act therapeutically as a sun screen for the lower part of the face. Ditto for thick and luxuriant chest, shoulder, and back hair distributions on the rest of one's body -- and yes there are still men who are covered thus.  And I suppose that evolutionally these hirsute body distributions could have acted -- with useful male purpose -- as protective and warmth-providing coverings for naked female face and torso flesh in dank and draft-prone caves.

And what of natural selection in the longer run? Will beard and body hair gradually evolve into facial and head and body feathers? On bald men in particular? On females as well as males? Or God forgive on females only? I fear that fashion print and online rags, as well as science fiction fanzine lit, are pointing the way inexorably in that direction.

While there's something to be said for antlers and their grooming, I would myself be apt to opt for small tan curved cuckold-like forehead horns that have the evolutionary ability to turn red if and when required.

But for now where my beard is concerned, purpose and logic and fantasy do not come into play. And it's staying on my face for the long haul too, popes and sexual dimorphism be damned!