Flying Hair Club

According to the BBC, Islamist MPs in Pakistan are protesting the forced early retirement of an air force officer who refused to trim his long beard, saying that he was victimised by secularist forces, and by implication claiming that religious life is under threat. The explanation by the air force, that long beards cause oxygen masks to malfunction, was simply brushed aside amid the furor.

Perhaps they should think a bit more about what that means. It means that if his beard is too long, and he is flying at high altitude, his facial hair might compromise the seal of the mask around his face and cause the oxygen supply to leak. When the mask malfunctions, he will die and the plane will crash. It is ridiculous to claim that 'secularists' are actively persecuting the religious who wish to maintain their beards. On the contrary: they are actively aiding their cause by keeping them grounded so that they will not die. If every long-bearded pilot was allowed to fly then soon there would not be any long-bearded pilots left, and then the aforementioned MPs might cry foul and ask why the air force had no long-bearded pilots -- were they being actively excluded and discriminated against? The answer, in that case, is simply the invisible hand of natural selection acting upon a trait (beards) that is disadvantageous in the aerial environment. The Pakistani air force is merely saving them from themselves.