My favorite glove alternative is bare skin. Though I agree there are reasons to have gloves readily available.
For instance; I recently had a beekeeper friend bring over two colonies of his that had become unmanageably defensive, for me to rehabilitate. The night he brought them over, we definitely needed gloves and a veil. But, by the next morning, they had already calmed down enough for me to work them without gloves or veil.
For more than a decade, once I had first relocated, to where I am now, I kept bees that originated from cutouts. I multiplied the colonies I had, then, by frequent walk-away splits. Those bees, back then, were quite likely, AHBs. They were quite defensive, and I felt the need to use a veil, and gloves, whenever I worked them. This decade was the only time I kept bees that had me regularly using this much, protective gear. I then decided that I needed to change the genetics of the bees I was keeping. I imported a few queens from reliable sources of productive and gentle bees. I learned to raise queens, and requeened all my colonies with daughter queens of those queens. And I continued switching out queens, until all the colonies are gentle and productive. Now, for more than another decade, I can easily work my own bees, with no more protective gear than shoes, shorts, and T-shirt.
