To Shave or Not to Shave: That is the Question
Day Seven: Wild Women Writing Challenge
Today, in my Wild Women Writing Challenge, we’re prompted to write about how mainstream culture has taught women to shame ourselves, via Disney princesses, Barbie or some other fictional character. I decided to write about hairy legs and pits!
Women’s razors have only been in existence since the turn of the 20th century. Gillette decided that he could double profits by marketing products to women! But first, they had to make women feel like they needed razors. The images of women with bare armpits and legs in post-Victorian, “risque” clothing was all women needed to get brainwashed into believing that their body hair was passé. You can read more about The Sneaky, Manipulative History Of Why Women Started Shaving here.
In 7th grade, I remember being in the locker room and the girls started talking about how they’d all shaved their legs. I froze up. Apparently, I was the only one who hadn’t. In fact, until that moment, I didn’t even realize it was a thing that we needed to do, or even think about. I was so embarrassed! The other girls realized that I hadn’t shaved, and I tried to hide them. I tried to make myself feel tiny, and it worked.
To make matters worse, one of my “best friends” came over to my house one day after school and asked if I had a razor she could borrow to get some hairs she had missed! I freaked out, thinking “OMG I hope she doesn’t think I’m a loser!” But, I kept a calm face and told her “yeah”, and went to my moms room to find one, pretending like it was mine all along.
After that day, I started obsessing over Gillette commercials and how smooth the models’ legs were. I flipped through Teen magazines and realized that they all had silky smooth, perfect legs. I needed to get my legs to look like that! I spent hours trying to decide which razors to get, tried all types of hair removal products with my friends and all shaving creams in different scents. I kept removing the hair, but still thought my legs were so ugly! Being a super athletic and adventurous girl, I always had bruises, scrapes and scars. I had “warrior legs” as I’d like to call them.
Gillette commercials worked! Not only that, but girls constantly commented on their 3-day old stubble, claiming that they desperately needed to shave! This consistent self-shaming got deep inside my head. I obsessively removed my leg and armpit hair for years, thinking it was ugly or manly if I let it grow out a little bit. I would never go more than 1–2 months without shaving my legs (much longer than most girls).
In my mid-late 20's, I began to unlearn societal constructs and became more and more comfortable with my body. I started becoming the “tomboy” I was as a kid. The fake nails came off, the panty hose were thrown away, I put makeup on less and less and I donated all of the heels. I would let my leg hair grow out for a few months, here and there. But, never my armpit hair! I was conditioned to believe that armpit hair on a woman was gross!
Fast forward to 2014- I’m living with 4 other flat mates in Rome, Italy. One of my roommates claimed she let her armpit hair grow out the previous summer. I exclaimed that it was gross, not really understanding what she meant by the fact that it was “liberating”.
It was the following year when I was completely humbled. I had an awakening. And I finally stripped away all of the layers of consumerist bullshit that had become a part of me. I went wild and ran into the woods where I sat in silence and was told everything I needed to know.
I stopped manipulating my body- I stopped brushing my hair and allowed it to take on a journey of it’s own- it grew into wild, natural dread locks. I stopped shaving completely, and my armpit hair grew FULLY out for the first time since 7th grade! It was the strangest feeling to feel a bundle of hair growing under my arms. But my house mate was right- it was liberating!
I never felt more free than when I was 100% comfortable with my body and my hair. I was not concerned with peoples’ perception of me, and completely stripped of societal norms. Since then, I still shave once in a while, but I’ll do it for me rather than what some chick in the locker room says. Well, maybe it does still make me feel more feminine when I do it. That’s just the brainwashing still ingrained in me! But, Gillette can kiss my hairy pits!
And ladies! Let’s stop the self shaming. You do NOT need to shave your natural body hair in order to feel like a goddess!!! YOU ARE A GODDESS in your raw, natural form!
