Beard Liberation Front

The Beard Liberation Front (BLF) is a British interest group which campaigns in support of beards and opposes pogonophobic discrimination against those who wear them. It was founded in 1995 by socialist historian Keith Flett who continues to organise and represent the organisation. Apart from its numerous campaigns in support of beards and against pogonophobia in the workplace and discrimination against those who wear beards as part of their religion, it currently hosts the annual Beard of the Year award.

On the face of it, the campaign is semi-humorous, with its outwardly frivolous aims, its occasionally outlandish claims of discrimination and conspiracy, and its founder, who is also the spokesman for the Campaign for Real Conkers. However, the organisation has drawn attention to more serious issues, having spoken out against, among other incidents, the suspension of a fireman for refusing to shave off his goatee and the banning of beards among ExxonMobil oil workers (in both cases employers claimed that beards interfered with breathing apparatus). Flett believes that an issue of "real discrimination" exists against men with beards. Although he admits that a beard, unlike race and gender, is a matter of choice, he has claimed that beardism is associated with more serious forms of discrimination:

Those employers who ban their male workers from having beards – a growing number, incidentally – are also the same employers who demand that their female workers wear skirts not trousers, and who rigorously discriminate when it comes to annual appraisal time against anyone who does not conform to the stereotype of a young, single white man in a suit.

The size of the organisation is unknown; Flett refers to the organisation as "an informal network" and has claimed "a few hundred supporters" in the past. He is the organisation's sole spokesman in the media.

On the occasion of its founding, Keith Flett claimed that "Beards are politically progressive. All the great revolutionary socialists had a beard. Stalin had a moustache." The BLF soon took up the cause of beards in British politics. In 1996 the BLF called for a bearded man to be appointed to the Cabinet. According to Independent diarist Eagle Eye, sources from the Labour Party, then in opposition, promised that if they were elected, the cabinet would include the first bearded minister since Baron Passfield in 1929. Upon Labour's victory in the general election a year later, the bearded Robin Cook was duly appointed Foreign Secretary. Since then, however, the BLF has regarded New Labour as obsessed with a clean-shaven image, with some notable exceptions (including David Blunkett and Charles Clarke).

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