I see that Hegseth wants to administratively separate service members who have medical waivers for shaving.

It's hard to imagine this as anything other than a targeted means of pushing Black people out of the military.

For those that don't know, the military has "personal grooming standards" that are enforced across the services; this includes a requirement to shave daily, if applicable. This is for a few reasons: to ensure a "uniform, military appearance", but also nominally to ensure a good seal with a gas mask.

However, so-called "no-shave chits" can be issued to service members for a variety of reasons, and these waivers exempt those people from this requirement.

For example, I once saw a guy who had one because a tree branch or something whacked him in the face during an exercise and gave him a gnarly slice that needed stitches. He couldn't reasonably shave _over_ the stitches, so medical gave him a no-shave chit while that was healing.

But the most common reason for issuing no-shave chits is for folks with "Pseudofolliculitis Barbae" (PFB), more commonly known as razor bumps, which are ingrown hair follicles on the face and neck.

Razor bumps are a real thing, and while I understand they are extremely painful, more concerning is that they can become infected, rendering a service member mission incapable.

But here's the thing: razor bumps affect Black folks more than others; up to 60% to 80% of adult Black men who shave regularly will experience them. The percentage among other demographics is much, much lower; like close to an order of magnitude lower. The military's own data, snapshotted in 2023, says that 63.5% of PFB cases since 2000 were among non-Hispanic Black service members (https://health.mil/News/Articles/2023/08/01/Pseudofolliculitis-barbae).

And let me be clear here: this is a real, known, diagnosable medical condition, studied and recognized by dermatologists. It's not like there's some kind of conspiracy to get out of shaving or something dumb like that. And from everyone I've ever known who's had it, they'd really, really, rather they didn't. I understand it sucks.

So separating service members who have medical shaving waivers will disproportionately affect Black service members. There's no way Hegseth et al don't know this.

"But wait a minute! What about the gas mask thing!?" I hear someone ask, "that sounds pretty legit." Ok, here's the deal: the waiver says you don' t have to shave down to the skin; it doesn't say you don't keep things trim and keep facial hare short. No one with a no-shave chit is running around with a full beard that's keeping them from putting on a gas mask.

But even if they were, what about all the SpecOps guys with their "operator beards"? And anyone who's been on a multiday mission outside the wire knows there are times when adherence to the grooming standards takes a backseat to operational necessities; most of us have gone a couple of days without a shave.

And if there were really a serious threat of chemical warfare and you absolutely needed to ensure you could get a seal with a gas mask, you'd shave regardless of the chit or you'd be in MOPP-4 anyway (with no exposed skin). Note that a gas mask really only covers the face and eyes; you'd be putting on a hood and other equipment to cover up the rest including, you guessed it, the area of the face and neck where the seal isn't perfect.

So yeah. I fail to see any way in which this effort is anything other than explicitly racist.