don't worry, I'm a professional ([info]fallen_arazil) wrote,
@ 2008-03-14 18:26:00
Previous Entry  Add to memories!  Tell a Friend  Next Entry
Current mood: cross
Entry tags:feminism

bikini season
So summer is on the way, and my sixty-something year old mother has been making noises that it's all well and good to have hairy legs in winter, but now that shorts season is coming, my legs look gross and I should shave them.

There's a part of me that really does think my hairy legs are gross, but that's exactly the reason I can't shave them, because that feeling is just proof to me of how deeply I've internalized this arbitrary double standard of aesthetics, where women are smooth, pre-pubescent-ly hairless, with long eyelashes and red lips, wearing skirts and high heels. I mean, the idea that good grooming demands I shave my entire legs purely because I happen to have internal reproductive organs is ridiculous, right?

Right?

~Djinn


(10 comments) - (Post a new comment)


[info]bironic
2008-03-15 12:17 am UTC (link)
I struggle with that every year, and inevitably I cave whenever I have to go out in public in shorts or a skirt. Sigh.

(Reply to this)


[info]psychedk
2008-03-15 12:37 am UTC (link)
*pokes head out* I... think the only thing that matters is how you feel about your hairy legs, instead of measuring them against what you ought to think or what some ideology dictates. If you feel bad that you want to shave your legs, then you're just as much a slave as if you shave because you think society demands it. Do what you what to do and don't give a damn about the rest. Even feminists are allowed to have different tastes, right? :)

(Reply to this) (Thread)

[info]fallen_arazil
2008-03-15 12:52 am UTC (link)
Ah, I expressed myself badly. I don't really think my hairy legs are 'gross', but I am acutely aware that other people will look at me and think that, and it's that knowledge that makes me uncomfortable, and creates in me the desire to conform in order to avoid negative attention. While I know that no one whose opinion I actually value will care either way, somehow that idea that strangers will look at my legs and think badly of me because I don't shave them ... bothers me, and that realization bothers me even more.

(Reply to this) (Parent)(Thread)

[info]psychedk
2008-03-15 01:23 am UTC (link)
Ooh, it's an interesting paradox. I have to first say I'm not a feminist at all, so these kind of issues always leave me puzzled. But I do have many friends who are, and in so many other ways I don't fit into conventional boxes, nor do I wish to. So I can sympathize. I've spend a lot of time finding out what felt true to me, in many regards, and some will be close to conclusions drawn by the large majority, some will be very far from them.

I don't think of it as conforming. After all, there are actually people who like natural hair, and again other people who don't care either way. I don't shave my legs in the winter either, because my husband don't care enough to ask me to do it, and I'm generally lazy, but I like that others don't look at my legs and think "geez". Call it conforming, call it vanity. It's probably more a question of suffering from normal fear of what people might think of you (and only a handful of people can really be free of that); it's all semantics to me, because in the end I'll do whatever makes me comfortable. If that happens to please a large portion of people, then so be it...

Edited at 2008-03-15 01:25 am UTC

(Reply to this) (Parent)

[info]rivers_bend
2008-03-15 01:13 am UTC (link)
I just spent the afternoon getting waxed from my ankles to my hips. Cos the fact that my legs are hairy grosses me out. I have deeply seated issues with body hair, based, I'm sure, on too many airbrushed pictures in Seventeen Magazine when I was young, unpopular and impressionable. Weirdly, leg hair on other women doesn't bother me. It's the beauty double standard. I have totally bizzare and unrealistic expectations about myself that I don't have at all for anyone else.

(Reply to this)


[info]usomitai
2008-03-15 09:38 am UTC (link)
HAIRY LEGS (AND ARMPITS) FTW.

I went unshaved for ~six years and I loved it. Only reason I went back to shaving is because I moved countries and where I am now, it's *too* radical a movement to be understood (it wasn't "you must be a feminist," but rather, "you must be a freak"). And I stand out enough as it is. :|

So I say if you have the courage, go for it! \o/

(Reply to this)


[info]recrudescence
2008-03-15 05:46 pm UTC (link)
Shave one, leave the other alone, and do a compare-and-contrast exercise this spring!

Seriously, it's all up to you. My leg hair is blond, so I can get away with being a little lax in its upkeep, which is excellent, but it really comes down to what makes you comfortable.

(Reply to this)


[info]topaz_eyes
2008-03-15 06:48 pm UTC (link)
Shaving legs is just another attempt by the razor conglomerate to increase their sales, don'tcha know?

And yet, I will be shaving mine too.

Can't win.

(Reply to this)


[info]empressaurelius
2008-03-16 09:18 pm UTC (link)
Yeaaaaah, the idea of shaving the legs is so stupid when you think about. I refuse to do it during the winter. I got teased about not shaving my legs in middle school, though, so I will always do it during the spring/summer. Maybe not as often as I "should", but.

(Reply to this)


[info]karaokegal
2008-03-17 06:36 pm UTC (link)
If you can gut it out and go out there hairy and be cool with it, then you're a better (ahem) man than I am Gunga Din. Me...I'll either shave or wax my pits and legs before we go to Maui, although probably not the bikini line. I don't really wear bathing suits anymore. I go into the ocean, hot-tub, pool in shorts and a jog bra.

(Reply to this)

(10 comments) - (Post a new comment)

Create an Account
Forgot your login or password?
Login w/ OpenID
English • Español • Deutsch • Русский…