Hey besties. I'm writing this annoyed as I've written this like a week back but it got deleted by accident and I'm still a bit pissed. Anyways we're discussing society shoving shaving down womens' throats and a bitch is sick of it. I also changed the category "Articles" to "Written Thoughts" and that's because this is more of me sharing my thoughts on a specific topic rather than me reporting about one. As always have a great day, let's dive in.
~ Podcast episode for this post ~
So like shaving is the act of removing hair from your body if you already didn't know. We all have hair, BOTH men and women, so I don't see why women are pressured into getting rid of it. If women or females aren't supposed to have hair then why do we naturally have it?
People in general shave for different reasons, some just like how it looks, it makes some feel good about themself, some do it because they feel as if they have to and so on. For me, I really just shave my legs, because I like how it looks and my armpits because I think it's a bit more hygienic. Since the hair traps the sweat and stuff.
People more than less associate shaving with being feminine and having hair as more masculine and I have a major issue with those stereotypes. < If you can even call it that.> I'm sure you've seen TikToks of people shaming women for keeping their body hair and that's just unnecessary.< Even if you don't have or know what is TikTok, you've seen that happen before whether it's in real life or on the internet.> Hair Is NATURAL, whether it's on your head, face, arms, armpits, legs, knuckles, genitals or toes.
WHAT DID WOMEN DO BEFORE SHAVING WAS A THING?
Women didn't exactly care about their body hair until the concept of shaving and going hairless is better than having hair came about. When women went out back then, they would wear stalkings, therefore hiding their legs.
What happened was that people created a problem that wasn't there then offered a solution, as a marketing strategy. And that is exactly what shaving did. They made women insecure about themselves or brainwashed them into thinking having hair anywhere except their head was not "in style" or was ugly or was a problem then they preyed on that vulnerability that they created and sold shaving to them. Which helped form the toxicity with feminity in today's society.
" According to Hope, a shift began in 1915 when advertisers in Harper's Bazar started to target underarm hair (usually for various depilatory creams). A new trend in sleeveless dresses, often inspired by Greek and Roman clothing, exposed women's previously covered arms. That, of course, led the depilatory industry to conclude that underarm hair was undesirable."
"The appeals were largely based on fashion, but they also told women what they should do to look fashionable (remove their underarm hair). Safety razors also got into the mix. As Gillette claimed in a typical 1917 ad: "Milady Decolette is the dainty little Gillette used by the well-groomed woman to keep the underarm white and smooth."
To some degree, the shift to increased shaving was made possible by technology, such as the 1901 invention of a safety razor with disposable blades and the 1919 packaging of instant shaving cream. But that technology also needed to expand its market." - from Vox
Society is fucked up but it's so because people are. Peer pressure is most certainly real and valid. Bullying is common among children especially teens. Now as early as 12, you are ridiculed for having hair on your body. I mean I've been called hairy before but I am naturally very hairy. Some of my peers would make comments about it, like:
"You have man arms."
"You have man legs."
"Gorilla."
"You're so hairy."
And it goes on. Hair is a part of puberty which means a child is growing up. Children, for the most part, are hairless and I'm sure you've heard the line "Baby smooth". Have you've ever realised that some of the traits that people consider to be "feminine" are characteristics of a child. For example" small or petite, hairless, innocent which more ties in with virginity and "pureness", skinny or not much body fat. It is very much possible this is a part of a much bigger issue: paedophilia or men wanting women that is dependable on them.
"Hair is unclean and dirty." This makes no sense since men would be unclean, dirty, nasty and so on. People would be weirded out if a man shaved his armpits but would also be weirded out if a woman did not shave her armpits and this somewhat of a double standard needs to stop. This is one of the gender norms that I think is complete bullshit.
I'm not saying women should stop shaving and all of that but for society to stop considering women shaving mandatory. Anyone should be able to shave if they want to. We should shave because we want to and not because we were bullied or pressured into doing it. Stop bullying, making fun of, bad-mouthing women who you see with body hair. Stop staring at that woman in the drees that you can see her armpit hair, stop giving them disgusted faces and so on.
Shaving is a vigorous, time consuming and expensive process. Waxing, buying razors every month, shaving creams, hair removal creams can be and is expensive. All the bending and different positions that you have to do to get rid of the hair in different sections is very much uncomfortable. Then you have to deal with razor bumps, in-grown hairs and all that jazz. Even though shaving is a pain in the ass women still do it. Society had kind of made it out to be some kind of right of passage and if you don't do it you're gonna feel and be treated like an outcast.
Articles and Videos I recommend looking at:
^https://www.bustle.com/articles/196747-the-sneaky-manipulative-history-of-why-women-started-shaving
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