I think the biggest issue here is more the double standard with cabin crew and other parts of the business being able to express themselves by bearded dress wearing "thems/theys", but male pilots not being allowed to express themselves by having a beard, when there's no clearly proven safety benefit in banning it.

They spend so much time on ensuring we don't dare speak ill of the minority groups, but when someone who is a white male wants to grow a beard, OH GOD NO! Quick, let's find some outdated research papers put together with an agenda already written that supposedly spruiks safety as being compromised, so we can get rid of that idea.

I think this is 100% why you are seeing opposition and push back. Yes theres the likes of old Autobrakes sending people home, I get his/her/him/thems opinion but the reality is when you have males dressing like females and holding a medical, male flight attendants wearing high heels and dresses and evrything else thats going on. Telling blokes who want a beard to shave it off seems a little hipocritical, especially when the evidence leans in the direction that its ok (up to a certain length). I personally don't have skin in the game but it bugs me that QF seems to be making an issue of a non issue for no reason.

Disclaimer: I have a short beard, have done for over a decade and worked all over the globe without a single issue (even with the O2 on).

While you are pontificating you are unlikely to see reason but I’ll try. I’ve had a beard for 30+ years because of major irritation caused by shaving. Instead I have a neatly trimmed beard and a couple of times a week I can get away with shaving. The boss is ok with it too because the company is reasonable. And during covid we were ordered to shave in preparation for mask fit testing; I didn’t and guess what……my mask fit was well inside the required standards and much better than some of my colleagues. And that includes females! Face shape is actually the biggest influence.
So maybe step back and consider that there is actually no reason to ban the beard.

He'd fire up over a captains carpark though.

Can I ask why the QLink guys over west are so passionately annoyed about this, expressing their hate and annoyance towards QGroup, especially considering the dragging out of the IBD and negotiations in general towards their EBA… yet they wear the Qantas uniform so much more professionally than mainline pilots?

I’ve never seen so many guys go full battle armour, jacket and hats in the terminal like I see the beards doing in Perth

It is bigger than the Beard issue, it is indicative of an arrogant Qantas Management who always feel they know best and enjoy lecturing all who will listen. At Jetstar we are getting emails, online presentations and lots of information sent about this bloody beard policy when it is already in place here! Every week I get 'fake' test Phish emails to educate me about online security, at a time when Qantas allowed the wide spread theft of customer details, I get weekly missives from Hudson about reconciliation and our positive discrimination practices to address it, I get monthly emails about woman in aviation councils, sustainability initiatives..... All stuff I don't have any interest in. Give me the tools to do my job properly and stop with all this other crap, sure Qantas, you know more about beards in aviation and recognize the risk better that ALL the other airlines on the planet, now stop sending me crap about it :-)

Don't forget the new directive to "complete cultural awareness training" & the " commitment to spending at least $45 million with First Nations businesses"
All while WA Pilots go to work every day tired & dejected on an EBA that expired more than 5 years ago, with a wage below the award, totally forgotten about by mascot........

https://cimg0.ibsrv.net/gimg/pprune....684099d05.jpeg
https://www.emiratesgroupcareers.com/pilots/

Very good,
Any pilot wanting to wear a beard when flying for an airline can go there.
That would be win win.

Go away Grandpa. This involves current pilots, not past engineers, or whatever it is you did.

It might disappoint you to know that there's a fair majority of mainline pilots who are not in favour of the ban and are smart enough to point out the flaws in the research used to come up with their so called policy.

Perfect example

Your point is noted Michael.

So you don't have any interest in sustainability initiatives?
Do you burn your rubbish in the backyard as well?

From November 1, members of the Air Force will now be permitted to have facial hair, provided that it maintains a clean, neat, and professional appearance and meets health and safety requirements.

You might find an ability to breathe properly at altitude is considered a health and safety requirement

No problems with a grooming guideline or a silly white hat etc, just don't try and hide behind 'safety' as the reason.

Currently sitting at Helsinki Airport near the crew security checkpoint. A large number of captains and copilot have beards.
obviously EASA and Finnair do not believe beards are a safety hazard. Just saying

Ahh we will let the Austronauts be the judge of that mate. They invented aviation...

Yeah. Back yard burners are terrible.
Almost as bad as controlled burns for bush fire control and all the crap that goes into the atmosphere after a volcano eruption.
Oh pious one!

Obviously, if you want to wear a beard join Finnair, if they will employ you.

I can't help think of Roald Dahl's introduction to the "Twits" every time this debate comes up (usually every 5 years or so?)
(And yes that's how silly I think this debate is, that it reminds me of a children's book)
(as for the Air Force Comparison and they allow beards - don't they have Ejection Seats - should we install these for all the passengers?)

The Twits:

What a lot of hairy-faced men there are around nowadays.

When a man grows hair all over his face it is impossible to tell what he really looks like.

Perhaps that's why he does it. He'd rather you didn't know.

Then there's the problem of washing.

When the very hairy ones wash their faces, it must be as big a job as when you and I wash the hair on our heads.

So what I want to know is this. How often do all these hairy-faced men wash their faces? Is it only once a week, like us, on Sunday nights? And do they shampoo it? Do they use a hairdryer? Do they rub hair tonic in to stop their faces from going bald? Do they go to a barber to have their hairy faces cut and trimmed or do they do it themselves in front of the bathroom mirror with nail scissors?

I don't know. But next time you see a man with a hairy face (which will probably be as soon as you step out on to the street) maybe you will look at him more closely and start wondering about some of these things.

......

Dirty Beards

As you know, an ordinary unhairy face like yours or mine simply gets a bit smudgy if it is not washed often enough, and there's nothing so awful about that.

But a hairy face is a very different matter. Things cling to hairs, especially food. Things like gravy go right in among the hairs and stay there. You and I can wipe our smooth faces with a flannel and we quickly look more or less all right again, but the hairy man cannot do that.

We can also, if we are careful, eat our meals without spreading food all over our faces. But not so the hairy man. Watch carefully next time you see a hairy man eating his lunch and you will notice that even if he opens his mouth very wide, it is impossible for him to get a spoonful of beef stew or ice cream and chocolate sauce into it without leaving some of it on the hairs.

Mr Twit didn't even bother to open his mouth wide when he ate. As a result (and because he never washed) there were always hundreds of bits of old breakfasts and lunches and suppers sticking to the hairs around his face. They weren't big bits, mind you, because he used to wipe those off with the back of his hand or on his sleeve while he was eating. But if you looked closely (not that you'd ever want to) you would see tiny little specks of dried-up scrambled eggs stuck to the hairs, and spinach and tomato ketchup and fish fingers and minced chicken livers and all the other disgusting things Mr Twit liked to eat.