Did you know there is a war going on? It’s fought every day, in every bathroom across America and the world. THE WAR ON HAIR.
Removing our body hair is something that’s so culturally and socially ingrained, we barely think about it anymore. We just do it- we shave, wax, or burn it off our bodies without much thought. Armpit hair, arm hair, leg hair, pubic hair has been declared enemy #1 to the female of the species.
But WHYYYYYYY? Whhhhyyyyy did I spend almost a grand getting my armpit and bikini line zapped? Who decided this was “normal” when it is distinctly unnatural? Why aren’t women allowed to have body hair?
If you ask people they will say, “to be more attractive”. But no one even stops to think why is it unattractive. Who decided? I’ve got an answer for you today, the villain of the piece that we can all write hate mail to at the end of this podcast.
Why Do We Have Body Hair?
While many theories exist on why we have body hair, no one really knows. Like how no one knows why we have so much less body hair than our closest relative, the chimpanzee. All kinds of made up sounding theories about that one in my research. But on our body hair, some theories are:
It helps keep you warm
It extends our sense of touch (like tiny antenna all over our body)
Protects us from the sun
And my favorite one: pubic hair can trap sexual pheromones to make your business even attractive. That’s right, society just couldn’t handle how hot all women’s bushes were so they made us lop that shit off!!
I’m going to go into the history of removing unwanted hair but I want to make a little disclaimer. When we talk about removing hair, I’m talking about the hair we all have after puberty. This is different from the hair we get as we get older. I completely understand why women all throughout time have been trying to get rid of the distinctly dude-like hair that pops up as we get older. I will never not pluck my facial hair and no one will tell me differently. Mustaches and beards, even tiny wispy hairs, aren’t a good look. Everyone everywhere and in every time wants to be young and beautiful. No one wants to be the old lady with a mustache and boob hair.
Body Hair Throughout History
There has been products around since recorded history that helped women get rid of unwanted hair. Ancient Egyptians were a fan of the sphinx look and they used clam shells as tweezers and invented sugaring-aka hot sugar and lemon juice that rips hair out by the root and other depilatory solutions.
Ancient Greeks sculpted women without any pubic or body hair, even though we all know Greeks are hair as fuck. The men didn’t have any chest hair either- UNREALISTIC BEAUTY STANDARDS! They're nothing new.
Then Medieval women went the other way. If they shaved their lady parts, it was usually because of pubic lice. So in 1450 the first merkin in human history was recorded. Do you know what a merkin is?? I didn’t. A merkin is a wig for your nether regions. Having no pubic hair was a sign you had lice or an STD so they covered that shit up.
The Evil Mastermind Behind Women's Hair Removal
Flash forward to the early 1900s. Enter the villain of this tale: King Camp Gillette. Yep, that GIllete. We’ll all write our hate mail together after the episode. Ol’ KC was a smart business man who invented the disposable razor. And he knew that if he doubled his customer base, he’d double his sales. So fella got to work and in 1915 he released the “Milady Decollete Razor”.
This was the first razor designed and marketed specifically for women. It was advertised so that it sounded like it was another modern woman’s accessory. New dress? You need that razor, too, if you're going to be showing your arms. Magazines marketed the two together- the latest sheer sleeved fashions right opposite the razor ads.
KC was smart, as we’ve established, and he was careful in how these adverts were written. They used carefully chosen words like, “used by women of refinement”, remove "objectionable" hair, get rid of an "an embarrassing personal problem" and smooth underarms were a "feature of good dressing and good grooming". If you aren’t doing it, you aren’t a woman of refinement, good dressing, and good grooming. So good on you KC, you sold your razors and doomed the rest of us.
Less Coverage Means Less Places for Body Hair to Hide
But even though hemlines were rising in the 20s, leg hair still reigned supreme. Because of those handy dandy stockings! Why bother shaving if you're just going to cover them up with another expensive, “luxury” product.
But here come the drums of war. WW2 to be specific- 1941 to 1945 for the US, i got that wrong in a previous podcast and kicked myself. Silk and
nylon was hugely rationed for the war. Paratroopers needed tha for parachutes and uniforms. Manufacturers made some liquid stocking on the market but women quickly realized it was messy and stupid, so they started shaving to get the smooth look. You win at last, Gillete. He had tried to get women shaving their legs but it just wasn’t catching on until the war.
And then the bikini came out in 1946 and pubic hair and fat girls everywhere rued the day. Now you need to trim THAT hair back. Sarah Hildebrandt writes in her book The EmBodyment of American Culture, “the more clothes women were ‘allowed’ (or expected) to remove, the more hair they were also expected to remove.”
Bathing suit styles kept changing and so how we groomed our downstairs changed with it. Full coverage bottoms of the 60s and 70s (hello there 70s bush, we see you, we love you) gave away to the high cuts of the 80s and 90s, and finally to the strings of the early 2000s. Good luck hiding anything in that, so it’s all got to go. Stupid Sex in the City popularized the Brazillian and made it the new “normal”.
Body Hair From Today and Beyond
But right now, things are getting a little fuzzier, in more ways than one. People still go nuts over women’s body hair on Instagram but some celebs and Instagram models are embracing it. Rachel’s idol, Bella Thorne, went armpits out in a photo shoot and other mino
r celebs like Scout Willis, Miley Cirus, Dakota Johnson, have all flashed their armpit hair. We’ll really have seen progress when one of the see through dresses has bush poking out.
What do you think the future holds for body hair? Do you think we'll begin to embrace it again, or will women (and men) continue down a hairless path.
Let us know what you think!
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