So, these are only a FEW of the tweets that were aimed towards me, for openly being a female with armpit hair. There are millions more that I may or may not post. But for now, let’s go ahead and review this here folks.
Does a dozen teenagers who have been brainwashed by our patriarchal, misogynistic society telling me that I’m a disgusting hairy ape hurt my feelings? Absolutely not. I’m obviously very proud to display my body and my personal choices that go against our cruel standards for women.
But what does make me sad, is that this is what we are teaching our youth. These are the real, raw beliefs of young people today in regards to women, and what they can and cannot do with their bodies.
They truly believe in their minds that it is ‘unacceptable’ and ‘disgusting’ for a woman to make the choice to not shave. What’s even more sad to me is that the people agreeing with this boy were ALL FEMALE. Is this kind of bias, this kind of internalized hatred for womens bodies & choices really what we want to continue to teach them? This is probably the first time they have seen a woman who doesn’t take a razor and shave off what naturally grows on her body, and they’re legitimately angry to the point where they can personally attack someone they don’t even know about their body. They are angry to the point where it’s almost as if they feel personally insulted that a girl does not shave. Let’s stop and think: why would they feel this angry about a personal choice that is so very insignificant? That has no effect on our health, hygiene or well being?
Think back to this the next time you hear yourself or someone else saying 'women are equal' or ‘women aren’t discriminated against.’Because this is what we are teaching our young women. We are teaching them that your body is not okay, it is not okay to go against what society defines as ‘beautiful.’ It is not okay to be open about who you are, what you choose to do with your body that makes you most comfortable. It is not okay to make a choice that goes against the rules that society has set for us. That you are ‘psycho,’ an ape, disgusting, & that your choices that fit your comfort are not okay. This is the world we have created for women.
Personally, I think you’re rocking it. *respect knuckles*
ok so i still vividly remember the first time i ever saw a woman with unshaven pits. i was 14, she was probably in her early 20s. she was also the first out lesbian i’d ever met. she had awesome hair and always wore this wire necklace with two interlocking venus symbols on it. as hilarious as it is to admit, at the time i didn’t really understand why i felt so drawn to this woman. about 2 years later i was like “ahhhhhhhhh now i get it”… i met her girlfriend a few times and disliked her for reasons i later realised were entirely motivated by jealousy. which was crappy of me, because her girlfriend was actually lovely.
anyway, it was summertime, i went into the bookshop where she worked, she was on the phone, and wearing a sleeveless floral dress. she had her arms up in front a small electric fan, receiver cradled between her cheek and her shoulder. she was flushed and shiny from the heat. she looked amazing. so with her arms up over head it’s like BANG full frontal unshaved armpits. all this sandy brown hair, in little damp curls.
and the exact words i thought were: “i didn’t know we were allowed to not shave.” my mind was blown. it had never even occurred to me that i didn’t have to shave. the moment i had even a hint of action in the armpit region i had been at it with a razor, because that is what you are ~supposed~ to do. plus i’d been shaving my legs a few years at that point, mostly because i was under the impression that it was as non-negotiable as wearing clothes or eating food.
knowing how awkward and dorky i was as a teenager (hehe, “was”) i’m sure i probably just stood there staring like a freak. i was totally inspired. i stopped shaving my legs and pits, and apart from a handful of occasions which have involved coercion by other people (yes mum, it was totally worth the huge multi-day fight we had when i was 16 about how i was embarrassing you with the state of my armpits :-/) i’ve remained my delightful hairy self for the last 16 years. i’ve copped a fairly large amount of shit for it, particularly in high school, but in this respect i’ve always felt like hairy pits are a good filter for the narrow minded and the rude.
so finally, to the point: photos like the one at the top of the post make me so happy, because i think of how powerful it was for me to see an image like this when i was a teenager. maybe girls these days are less likely to get to 14 without seeing a woman with ~gasp~ body hair, i don’t know (i really hope so!). i feel like that moment in my life was the starting point for so many other awakenings. the beautiful woman from the bookshop wasn’t trying to do anything other than stay cool during a crappy australian summer, but yeah, she kind of changed my world. she’ll never know what a big deal it was, but i’ll never forget. we don’t have to do what they tell us. we can make our own minds up,
I’m really glad I grew up a second-gen hippie with a mother who encouraged me to not shavebody hair or wear makeup or dye my hair.
All of those things are things I’ve done and do on occasion, but it makes a big difference when you’re doing them because you’re trying on styles; you feel like it sometimes; you’re playing with costume and drag; you prefer a particular feel; you want to look different than you did last week. Or what the fuck ever. But yeah, I had to decide to *rebel* a little to shave my legs, and so I inherently think of it as a kind of frivolous affectation when done for appearance reasons because of that. (It also helped that I was on a swim team as a preteen: shared a locker room with female-assigned people of all ages undressing openly, and the more serious post-pubertal swimmers shaved for functional reasons but that included the dudes.)
I’m genderqueer and on testosterone. I shave my pits because I prefer the way it feels. I’m trying to look like a guy, so currently, shaving my armpits is counter to the “approved social behavior”. But I do it anyway because they’re my armpits and I like them that way. Bodily sovereignty FTW!
(One of these days I’m gonna get hold of a narrow trimmer or something and shave patterns into my legs. Tried this with a standard razor before but couldn’t make the shape stay.)
I was lucky enough to find a husband that likes my silky-smooth leg hair, but I do still get self-conscious about displaying it in public. I do shave from time to time, whenever I get the urge; coincidentally, this usually tends to correspond to my more masculine swings as a genderfluid individual. It’s like my brain is wired for genderfuckery—I strap on a packer, and the leg hair suddenly needs to go.
But this is such an invisible issue overall—like the above poster, it took me quite a while to realize it was even possible not to shave. That’s why I’m adding my two cents here. More people need to realize it’s even an option, so they can decide for themselves what they want to do. Whatever you decide, more power to you: it’s your body, and you get to decide what to do with it.