Those “special privileges” aren’t a “privilege,” but a duty to one’s faith.
If I were to say I had a “duty” to my own atheist sense of beard honor or whatever, that’d fly out the window. Religion is a preference, a choice. The duty is only to the persons own sense of pride and morality.
We have similar problems with nurses of certain religions in my country, refusing to do their job (for instance related to abortion) and endangering patients citing religion.
Thankfully the regulations have been upheld and these people have been told “If you refuse to do your job, you’re fired.” in these cases, but there is a religious lobby rapidly growing in influence in my country, and have already secured exceptions from stuff like hygiene rules in healthcare.
A “beard exception” matters little in truth, but allow one such exception and suddenly they’re everywhere (I’d argue let people have their beards ffs!). However, this kind of pandering is insane, dangerous and my patience for it is very limited. Religion is their choice, but that is no excuse to impose their will on the rest of society.
What’s so obvious about it? The initial example here is facetious and absurd, but what’s to say that I don’t take my “beard honour” just as seriously as someone else does their religion?
Because I’ve certainly met people who take their religion very lightly, yet absolutely will use it as an excuse for special treatment at every opportunity.
A less absurd example might be somebody with the delusion (a.k.a strongly held personal belief) that their value as a man depends entirely on their beard, that they might as well kill themselves if they were unable to have one. Or someone with a facial scar tied to incredible emotional trauma that they use their beard to cover up.
The simple fact is that special treatment of religious adherents is discriminatory, not against them, but against everyone else. The root of the problem is that laws that were intended to prevent special maltreatment of religious adherents have instead become leveraged as a basis to grant privileges. When they don’t get the job after refusing to follow hygiene protocol, shake hands with certain demographic groups or perform job duties, they sue their employer for discrimination. They demand the job, and demand that the job description be changed to fit their personal preferences.
I agree, it should be as simple as “can you do the job or not”. If being clean shaven is part of the job description (which I certainly could find good reasons for, such as gas masks or hygiene) and you refuse to be clean shaven, then you’re out.