Bushwhacked
(Or: How We Should All Stop Worrying And Learn To Love Our Pubic Hair)
Lone voice in the wilderness time. Shay’s informative piece on shaving got me [re-]thinking about this growing epidemic of fanatical hair removal and the ceaseless, futile chase after the “perfect” body image - which appears to be that of a shop window mannequin.
I’ll cut straight to the chase. From underarm hair on women and back hair on men to now: favouring complete removal of all body and pubic hair for both women and men. This is a growing culture of revulsion at body hair and further anxiety regarding body image, about what is “acceptable” and desirable and what isn’t.
I remember an ex-girlfriend of mine trying to shave her pubic triangle into an ever smaller, neater, rigid and geometrically correct shape. Each time she would check in the mirror after shaving a tiny bit from one side and this, however, she would see it still wasn’t quite equilateral and would shave some more. Soon enough she ended up with an absurd little triangle of hair free floating in the middle of her lower stomach. Much mirth did this give me, but I wondered, and asked her, why she even bothered. After all, I was perfectly happy with the size and shape of her natural-grown bush. She told me it was sexier to have the smallest amount of hair down there as possible. Well, this was news to me, but pubic topiary is all the rage so let’s all join in shall we?
But, for women especially, it isn’t stopping at compulsively shaping and sculpting bushes into ever more narrower shapes. Now, even the not-particularly-sexy “sexy” landing-strip has been discarded in favour of the completely hairless, doll-parts look. Men aren’t too far behind now, either. Gay subcultures are typical trailblazers when it comes to male grooming and style. And emerging from it’s origins in gay porn, the Back, Sac & Crack waxing procedure is now a popular and readily available service for any/every man who wants to “look good”, even if that means a somewhat undignified and eye-watering few minutes on their hands and knees in a beauty salon having wax strips ripped off their balls.
All this anti-hair madness is chasing after porn star fashion. But while a shaved pussy affords us a clear view of what a woman’s cunt looks like when it’s being penetrated, it’s effect when it has seeped into the mainstream seems to be one where pubic hair is seen to be distasteful and is to be got rid of as much as possible. Not to mention a decidedly unpleasant cultural side-effect of where a prepubescent look is idealised in adults: shaved/hairless chest for men; smooth, hairless mons for women (that plucked-chicken skin look, as well as visable labia, is also out).
Natural body oils and pheromones be damned: everything must be plucked, shaved and over-washed and doused in chemicals. Perhaps people actively want dry skin, pubic stubble and asthma, who knows?
It’s all part of a self, and bodily, disgust which just keeps on growing and growing. It’s tendrils reach everywhere, everyone.
All those allegedly enlightened women who have short words to say about anyone who wrinkles their nose at anything gynaecological or female “extra padding”, and who don’t waste a single second of their waking day loudly proclaiming how “open minded” they are compared to everyone else, are still the same people who go “ew ew ew, he’s got a hairy bum!!”
But men might still be worse. The world is teeming with fools, of course, and the internet is the perfect place for them to wallow in their own crapulent ignorance. Recently one site posted up topless pictures of all the Best Actress Oscar nominees; cue plentiful guffawing and outrage at the apparent shortcomings of all the actresses breasts. Amid all this one commented on a still of Rachel Wiesz from the film Stealing Beauty where she is sunbathing nude with just a piece of material draped over a hip to cover her modesty, but not enough to conceal evidence of pubic hair. “Eurgh! Who is that woman with the nasty, hairy bush?” he shouted, clearly a connoisseur of the non-hairy variety of bush.
But even if you’re completely waxed free of every hair on your body, don’t think you’re safe from fretting about your ugly, ugly form. Vaginal surgery can now take away any “unsightly” bits of skin to give you that “Playboy” look (or, rather, the look of a prepubescent girl but, shh, don’t say it). And isn’t it about time all men were circumcised? Yeah, let’s just keep propagating these half-cocked myths about “cleanliness” and even aesthetics. Despite the fact that cut penises look like sausages that have burst open one end under a hot grill, circumcision butchers away the “male clitoris”, the frenulum, leaving sensitivity vastly reduced. But so what? This is what is “acceptable” now, cuz, duh, it’s what porn stars all look like, duh. And, ew, uncut cocks? Ew ew ew, they’re all dirty!
Fucking hell.
How did we get here? What has made us like this, where we are striving for the look of children? More to the point why do we so readily accept this infantilisation of our culture and collective body image?
We now snigger at shots of naked women in the 1970s with their wild’n’wooly bushes, but will future generations be aghast at how we traded soft, pheremone rich, pubic hair for tight, bristly micro-bushes and then kindergarten sex chic? Or will they have found ways to go even further with it, via god-knows-what plastic surgery and enhancements blahblahblah.
As The Smiths once sang “on the day that your mentality / catches up with your biology”, then we can talk.
Lone voice in the wilderness time. Shay’s informative piece on shaving got me [re-]thinking about this growing epidemic of fanatical hair removal and the ceaseless, futile chase after the “perfect” body image - which appears to be that of a shop window mannequin.
I’ll cut straight to the chase. From underarm hair on women and back hair on men to now: favouring complete removal of all body and pubic hair for both women and men. This is a growing culture of revulsion at body hair and further anxiety regarding body image, about what is “acceptable” and desirable and what isn’t.
I remember an ex-girlfriend of mine trying to shave her pubic triangle into an ever smaller, neater, rigid and geometrically correct shape. Each time she would check in the mirror after shaving a tiny bit from one side and this, however, she would see it still wasn’t quite equilateral and would shave some more. Soon enough she ended up with an absurd little triangle of hair free floating in the middle of her lower stomach. Much mirth did this give me, but I wondered, and asked her, why she even bothered. After all, I was perfectly happy with the size and shape of her natural-grown bush. She told me it was sexier to have the smallest amount of hair down there as possible. Well, this was news to me, but pubic topiary is all the rage so let’s all join in shall we?
But, for women especially, it isn’t stopping at compulsively shaping and sculpting bushes into ever more narrower shapes. Now, even the not-particularly-sexy “sexy” landing-strip has been discarded in favour of the completely hairless, doll-parts look. Men aren’t too far behind now, either. Gay subcultures are typical trailblazers when it comes to male grooming and style. And emerging from it’s origins in gay porn, the Back, Sac & Crack waxing procedure is now a popular and readily available service for any/every man who wants to “look good”, even if that means a somewhat undignified and eye-watering few minutes on their hands and knees in a beauty salon having wax strips ripped off their balls.
All this anti-hair madness is chasing after porn star fashion. But while a shaved pussy affords us a clear view of what a woman’s cunt looks like when it’s being penetrated, it’s effect when it has seeped into the mainstream seems to be one where pubic hair is seen to be distasteful and is to be got rid of as much as possible. Not to mention a decidedly unpleasant cultural side-effect of where a prepubescent look is idealised in adults: shaved/hairless chest for men; smooth, hairless mons for women (that plucked-chicken skin look, as well as visable labia, is also out).
Natural body oils and pheromones be damned: everything must be plucked, shaved and over-washed and doused in chemicals. Perhaps people actively want dry skin, pubic stubble and asthma, who knows?
It’s all part of a self, and bodily, disgust which just keeps on growing and growing. It’s tendrils reach everywhere, everyone.
All those allegedly enlightened women who have short words to say about anyone who wrinkles their nose at anything gynaecological or female “extra padding”, and who don’t waste a single second of their waking day loudly proclaiming how “open minded” they are compared to everyone else, are still the same people who go “ew ew ew, he’s got a hairy bum!!”
But men might still be worse. The world is teeming with fools, of course, and the internet is the perfect place for them to wallow in their own crapulent ignorance. Recently one site posted up topless pictures of all the Best Actress Oscar nominees; cue plentiful guffawing and outrage at the apparent shortcomings of all the actresses breasts. Amid all this one commented on a still of Rachel Wiesz from the film Stealing Beauty where she is sunbathing nude with just a piece of material draped over a hip to cover her modesty, but not enough to conceal evidence of pubic hair. “Eurgh! Who is that woman with the nasty, hairy bush?” he shouted, clearly a connoisseur of the non-hairy variety of bush.
But even if you’re completely waxed free of every hair on your body, don’t think you’re safe from fretting about your ugly, ugly form. Vaginal surgery can now take away any “unsightly” bits of skin to give you that “Playboy” look (or, rather, the look of a prepubescent girl but, shh, don’t say it). And isn’t it about time all men were circumcised? Yeah, let’s just keep propagating these half-cocked myths about “cleanliness” and even aesthetics. Despite the fact that cut penises look like sausages that have burst open one end under a hot grill, circumcision butchers away the “male clitoris”, the frenulum, leaving sensitivity vastly reduced. But so what? This is what is “acceptable” now, cuz, duh, it’s what porn stars all look like, duh. And, ew, uncut cocks? Ew ew ew, they’re all dirty!
Fucking hell.
How did we get here? What has made us like this, where we are striving for the look of children? More to the point why do we so readily accept this infantilisation of our culture and collective body image?
We now snigger at shots of naked women in the 1970s with their wild’n’wooly bushes, but will future generations be aghast at how we traded soft, pheremone rich, pubic hair for tight, bristly micro-bushes and then kindergarten sex chic? Or will they have found ways to go even further with it, via god-knows-what plastic surgery and enhancements blahblahblah.
As The Smiths once sang “on the day that your mentality / catches up with your biology”, then we can talk.
posted by Dielo at 3:41 pm
5 Comments:
I so agree with you and it's time for a post like this!! Thank you.
Dielo,
What other creature on earth -- blessed with good health, a fair countenance, freedom from hunger. cold and persecution -- would devote inordinate amounts of time to pluck the hairs from its body?
Thank you, Dielo. This was an excellent post.
Unfortunately, human folly has not been limited to the 21st century. The ancient Greek and Romans considered the hairless body to be a sign of status and civility. Ladies of Medieval times plucked their hairlines if they thought their foreheads not sufficiently large.
Ironic that we claim to love our animal nature, but we detest any hirsute reminder of the beast within us.
My sister has been taking a medication that has rmoved all her body hair (leaving the hair on her scalp mercifully in place). I said many people would pay big money for that condition. She said, it was not to be wished for. First of all, it is cold. Even for women, the soft downy hairs on the arms do retain a lot of warmth. Secondly, she said it is as though you have lost one of you senses. No longer do you feel the whisper of a breeze on your bare arms or legs. The hair follicles are also messengers sending the brain reports on the weather, as well as serving as a standing army that protects the skin. So pulling out our hair is truly "senseless."
From one who enjoys flesh and fur, my sincere thanks.
Kochanie
What a thought provoking and interesting post. I started shaving because I preferred the way it felt when I was shaved. My husband refuses to, he tells me most men don't. What about the issue of getting hair in your teeth during oral sex? I think you have a lot of good things to say about how fucked up the culture has become though. over all I enjoyed the post.
Hmm, I generated more heat then light with this, I think. I must just point out, however, that I, of course, don't give a tinker's cuss what the individual chooses to do with their own body - hard cheese for me if I did. But I rather made the schoolboy error of attacking one thing in order to defend another and thus came across as somthing of a fervent anti-shaver. My point wasn't supposed to be shaved vs pubes, more, I suppose a general point regarding body facism and the way the wind is blowing vis a vis a growing uptightness regarding body hair. Or summink.
Thanks for the comments anyway, commenters.
Neverenough :- Cheers. And, yeah, I just thought a bit of rear-guard action was needed is all.
Kochanie :- I forgot about the Romans and Greeks. Yeah, they were distancing themselves from the barbarian/still wild world and so forth. Your kind words are appreciated as always. My love to your sis btw, that all sounds very :(
Ice Princess :- That's cool. As for hair problems during oral sex: how's that old phrase go, "push it to the side of the plate and keep on eating"? ;)
This was a very interesting post. In fact I thought it was so well written and thought provoking that I featured it in my Desireable Reads Blog.
Thanks for the good read.
hugs
Des
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