3 Comments
Our weekly dispatch from the nation's foremost mustache expert.

Genghis Khan once purportedly said to an enemy, "Compromise is for the weak." Indeed, the man who made the Fu Manchu a staple of mustache fashion was prescient, and his kindred spirits in the modern day Mustached American community see compromise everywhere. Weak-kneed, clean-shaven mortals assume relations among those with beards, goatees and mustaches are copacetic. In reality, what is perceived as a broad union of acceptance is far more complicated.

Since 1965, the American Mustache Institute has drawn a line in the sand between ourselves and our bearded and goateed cousins. Many hard-liners even consider the beard and goatee to represent what we call the "spousal compromise."

What is spousal compromise, you may ask? In short, it involves growing out (diluting) our lip covering in order to satisfy whimsical females whose follies have typically driven the decision-making capacities of men.

Dr. Froman reveals his own encounter with the specter of spousal compromise, after the jump.

At the AMI, we hold to the hell-bent belief that the mustache represents power, good looks and an unwillingness to stray from our beliefs. So to be completely frank: Beards and goatees have always provided a somewhat worthless halfway meeting point between the utter weakness of the clean-shaven and the immense splendor and dominance of the robust mustached male.

I often think back to my third wife, Svetlana. After meeting on an educational tour of a Hungarian roller rink and meat-packing facility, we went through nine months of courtship and then a six-month engagement. Then, on our honeymoon in Beirut, she requested something that changed our course indelibly.

"My dear," she said with a wry expression that revealed her former Soviet tendencies. "You know that I've always loved your mustache, but I fear the total awesomeness of it might be too much for me. I know how much you care about my well being, and I simply can't handle all of that pleasure. Would you perhaps mind transitioning it into a beard and/or goatee?"

I thought about it for roughly eight seconds, and then chose to introduce her to the handy bottle of sodium pentothal I routinely carry in my pocket. After she woke up two days later, she was greeted by a tidy annulment.

Clearly she did not realize that compromise is not part of the Mustached American lifestyle -- making the grandeur of Genghis Khan's vision all the more prescient. Truly, compromise is for the weak, and as long at the American Mustache Institute is driving our community's agenda, none shall be tolerated.

For Dr. Abraham J. Froman's mustache perspective, check in every Wednesday on Asylum.