sure

and peacock tails evolved to absorb a peck to the rear and lions evolved manes to absorb bites to the neck

get real. you know other primates have beards too, right? hair on the face of mammals evolved long before primates emerged 85 MILLION years ago. facial hair is a primitive feature not and advanced one

mouse lemurs have facial hair and it's hard to imagine lemur prize-fighting stance to deliver fist blows to the jaw

a thick beard evolved through the same process as any other - random mutation (in this case facial hair on males) and natural selection (females mating more with one type of male than other over generations)

for other examples see "homo sapiens penis size relative to other primates and mammals"

by the time we get to homo sapiens in Vitruvian man form, homo erectus females had already been selectively breading most bodily hair away (probably because of lice and skin parasites) and longer head and facial hair (probably because washing and grooming with oils and mud makes it manageable and parasite free while pleasurable to touch when they do the funky monkey)

this in turn makes males with good-lookin' facial hair more desirable by females which made their social pecking order standing higher which made females want higher order standing offspring so they would prefer mating with higher order standing males; rinse, repeat and round and round we go, all the way up to and including this guy

so homo sapiens are just part of the same, hominid thousand-generation evolutionary branch continuing trend of female preferences of random mutation males and pop science is stupid