Thrashbrowns Loses his Religion: Pt. 5

 

Can You See the Real Me?

I've been gone for a while and maybe it's different now, but back when I was still active in church, it seemed like an awful lot of Mormons had trouble with beards. 

But Thrashbrowns, I hear you say. Do you have any anectodotal stories supporting your claim? Why, of course I do.

-AHEM-

My ex-girlfriend's dad was convinced that I grew out my beard because I wanted to feel macho. Sure, dude. That's it. My growing my beard has nothing to do with the fact that I hate shaving or that I feel better about myself when I can't see my flabby turkey neck. Riiiiiiiight.

That one was fairly harmless, but another LDS dad demanded that I be kicked out of me own home before he'd let his daughter babysit my nieces and nephews. When I did a little digging, I found that he was worried that I might be a pedophile. And what might give him that idea? Because I had a beard.

Mind you, that was back during one of the most religiously active phases in my entire life. 

It's not like all the LDS folks I knew back then had a negative attitude towards beards. I got a lot of compliments for my facial fro. 

I'm also aware that LDS general authorities have advised against grooming yourself in a way that might cause people to think you're a rebel against society. But back then, I put a lot of work into my beard to keep it clean and trimmed up. But apparently, even that wasn't good enough for some people.

*****

In trying to put this post together, I repeatedly hit a dead end. No matter how I tried, I arrived at a pair of conclusions that seem to contradict each other. On one hand, Mormons tend to judge peoples' characters based on appearances and actions they can see and not the qualities and flaws that make up who people actually are. You know, kinda like what Batman said that one time.

On the other hand, actions people take often are reflective of who they are. For example, if you constantly wear Slipknot gear, it's fair to assume you're a Slipknot fan. Likewise, if you do things like pay your tithing, attend your meetings and fulfill your church calling, it's fair to assume you have a strong testimony of the church.

I was trying to reconcile these two issues, beating my head against the brick wall of my lack of understanding. And then, perhaps because I gave myself a concussion trying to figure it out, the answer came. The problem is that Mormons tend to judge people on very shallow, external criteria without really getting to know them. And because they don't know who these people are, it makes it so much easier to dismiss them.

Let's get back to grooming and bearding and shit. I can understand how someone may look at a bearded gent and draw conclusions that they might think they're tough or superior to those who can't grow a good beard. I know this happens cuz I give my oldest nephew shit about not being able to proper face fro all the time. So yeah, I get where the "macho" thing might come from.

But if someone doesn't get to know me, they don't know what actually motivates me to grow a beard. It's not because I want to show my attitude toward society or God or anything like that. 70% of why I grow a beard is because it prevents me from having to see my flabby chin when I look in a mirror. Another 15% is purely because I HATE shaving. Thank the Maker I wasn't born a woman because shaving my legs sounds like pure torture.

So why didn't you just shave and not give them a reason to speculate about your motivations or level of righteousness, I hear you asking. Well, because I didn't want to. I could spin you a yarn about how I didn't want to betray myself self or be dishonest about who I am or give the haters a win. But I like how I look with a beard better than I do without one. I like not having to shave my whole face. I feel better about myself when I'm bearded up. Why is that an indicator that I don't love God?

Answer: it's not. Also, though I just said I wasn't going to get carried away on the subject of shaving being a betrayal of who I am, I have to say that shaving my face to better adhere to the expectations of others does feel like a betrayal of self to me. I mean, how can I be true to myself if I'm willing to change how I look to make them happier? Is conforming more important than being content with oneself?

But this focus on the exterior is not restricted to grooming standards. It also extends to actions Mormons undertake in public. They seem to believe that anyone who does outwardly apparent acts like attending meetings and the temple, paying tithing, quoting scriptures and the like must have a heart full of love for the Lord. Those actions are even more indicative of goodness if the person does them while "properly" groomed.

In most cases, I agree that a person who lives like a Saint has the heart of a Saint. But it could be possible that some people might perform the outward actions to advance in church leadership or get something else they want. It doesn't even have to be anything that nefarious. 

It could be for something as simple as love. I'll use myself as an example.

When I was attending the Sugar City singles branch, I found that I was falling for a young lady I went to church with. I wanted to date this woman, I wanted to be her boyfriend. I got way ahead of myself and started seeing marriage and kids and a whole future.

One problem, though. I perceived that she was in much better standing in the church than I was. She told me that she wouldn't consider dating anyone who wasn't worthy to get married in the temple. Because I was convinced she was the one for me (that's right, I was THAT kind of psycho), I was determined to do everything I could to appear to be an exemplary Mormon, even if I was struggling with my personal faith the whole time. 

In an effort to impress this chick, I came up with an activity: members of the branch would line up several service projects which we would film and cut into a documentary about the benefits of serving others. It was an extremely successful project and probably the best thing I will ever do in my entire life. And I did it to impress a girl. That's right. I did the RIGHT thing for the WRONG reason.

I don't believe most people are as deceptive or duplicitous as I was. But I do believe it's an issue that's more prevalent than you might want to believe.

*****

So what't the point of all this? The point is that it's pretty fucking aggravating that a people who are counseled by their leaders to be empathetic and slow to judge, since you may not know what's going on in someone's heart, so consistently judge the character of others based solely on what's visible on the outside. It's angering to see genuinely decent people dismissed and their efforts to do good invalidated because they have tattoos, long or multi-colored hair, piercings or because they dress in non-conservaative clothing. And it's mind-boggling to see people's misdeeds hand-waved because they are well-groomed or because they do the actions of someone who's heart is turned toward God.

While looks can reflect some aspects of an individual's character or personality, much of what makes someone them isn't visible on the surface and you don't really know who a person is without putting some effort into getting to know them. I'm reminded of that Silent Bob quote from Chasing Amy: Bitch, what you DON'T know about me I could just about squeeze in the Grand Canyon. 
 

This has been a difficult subject to break down. Even in the act of doing so, I realize I may be committing the very wrong I'm bitching about here. I did my best. Look, just don't assume you can look at how someone chooses to wear their hair or their clothing and assume you know everything about what they're about. Don't judge a person to be absolutely worthy just cuz they're well-groomed or they do churchy things. Instead, if you're curious about a person, get to know them. Find out who they really are. Realize that we only know people as well as they let us know them, and if you don't do the work to get past their outer defenses, you'll never know who they really are. 

And if you don't know that, you don't have the right to make any sort of judgements about them.