Suppressing permissions reset

[Mark]

When doing a "make buildkernel" and "make installkernel" on FreeBSD
4.11-RELEASE (on a Vmware box), I noticed the Makefile in /usr/src/etc,
for one, tries to reset permissions on files taken from a series of *.dist
files. I find such initiative a bit too forward for my taste. Is there a
way I can suppress said behavior? Like a Makefile parameter or something.
And would zero-ing out the *.dist files do the trick?

Thanks,

- Mark