Agreed, it seems to be their way of proving they have testosterone and gravitas.
I get rankled when folks--primarily men folks--on FR make blanket statements about some ones' looks: i.e. Hilary's ankles; any female not a blond, blue-eyed, busty size 0 as being 'guilty'; ears that stick out; beards being commie; etc. It is their ideas that we should be paying attention to, not their external appearance.
Rush relayed an Eleanor Roosevelt (of all people) quote to his radio show audience last week.
“Great minds talk about ideas. Average minds talk about events. Poor minds talk about people.”
I think, being human, we do all the above. Hopefully, we speak less about individual characteristics, more about personal motives, while always striving to be engaged in order to understand the big picture.