Hairy?

Charlotta I am so vicariulsy PISSED at the freaking audacity of this guy!
What the --?! Give me a freaking break man, be glad you're getting some love. Good freaking .... urgh PISSES me.

I was flipping through a Playboy a few weeks back and I thought it was wierd that ALL the women had NO pubic hair. None.
Exactly, what are we, four?
Alot of times shaving (especially excessive shaving aka nothing left anywhere) seems to me to be trying to make women like little girls.
;P

Quite frankly, I'm pissed at him for ya too.

My ex mentioned it in passing a couple times and I just told him I'd get breast implants and shave regularly the day he had testicular surgery and shaved every single hair off of him.

It didn't completely shut him up but it got the point across. It's more of a joke between us now. (I think he liked the defiance but had to push my buttons anyways.)

...wouldn't balance the scales.

Because men, for the most part, don't have the same social pressures to be hairless, so them shaving and whatnot doesn't carry the same weight.

(I say this because once or twice, I used that line too, per hair removal and lo: the guys did it. Wasn't the same thing, and it still didn't tackle the fact that I did not WANT to get rid of my hair because this guy or that wanted me to. I still could have cared less if any boyfriend or girlfriend of mine did or didn't have body hair.)

"If women put as much thought and energy into real issues, we could take over and change this world."

Of course. But who wants women meddling in world affairs? Much better to keep them under the iron fist--er, I mean, the Revelon.

~Meddle not in the affairs of Dragons, for thou art crunchy and taste good with ketchup.

I wonder how my boyfriend would feel if I shopped shaving completely.

I know my boyfriend teases me when my legs are stubbly, but it's good-natured, and he is really, really hairy. Like, everywhere, and that used to bug me but with him it just doesn't. But he's completely against pubic shaving--it makes him think of pre-pubescence. Plus I think it hurts, cuz I've done it before.

Personally, I am most comfortable shaving my legs and arms and armpits. Not the most liberated pov I guess, but I don't do it for him or anyone else. I really like the feeling of my smooth legs rubbing against each other at night when I go to bed.

But at the same time I know if I'd been raised in a different culture, I'd feel more comfortable with body hair.

Let me preface this message by saying: I'm a nineteen year old college sophomore and I do not shave my legs, arms, pubic area. I do shave my armpits - I just hate deo buildup. lol. Now that I've broken the ice a 'lil (heh) -

It makes me exceedingly angry when people - especially hairy males- criticize or chastize me for not shaving my legs. I want a shirt that says in big, emboldened letters: Don't assume that I want your opinion about my body!! Grrowwl, it makes me so angry. And sadly enough, since I've stopped shaving, it's mostly been males who have teased/criticized me for it. It seems as if men are trained from youth to expect certain things from women - 1) We're supposed to cater to their senses 2) Our bodies are supposed to be communal property that they can touch as they please 3) We're not supposed to call them on it when they stare at/cat-call us (because, after all, we're here to be eye-candy) ((Have you ever noticed how men get insulted when you call them on the staring/catcalling? How incredibly ironic is THAT? )) Women are pressured from youth into exemplifying strained, feminine beauty so that they can fulfill those roles for men. Being stared at and lusted after becomes one of the loftiest goals for many girls in their teens... and a lot of women end up feeling as if they have to shave/do this and that to be appreciated/respected/wanted. I think this is wrong. That is why I do not shave. I don't want to be drawn in and trapped by the mystique of 'femininity'. I want to support other women - not compete with them for the lust of guys. I want intellectual competition, not beauty competition. Which is why I also skip makeup. Honestly, whenever I look down at my hairy legs, I feel proud. It's a way of wearing and exemplifying my feminist beliefs without any effort whatsoever! It pains me so much to see other women like me pressured into squeezing themselves into the restrictive archetype of femininity. It just isn't fair. We're so much more than society's expectations... Women like us getting caught up in the mess of conventional 'femininity' is a total shame, I'd say. It just isn't worth it - to feel as if you have to manipulate your body in a certain way, just to measure up. In my mind, we're "good enough" already.

My boyfriend is extremely hairy. He is the only person I have ever seen who has a eye brow that continues around the eye socket, the only person I have seen who has hair growing ON their nose and ON their ears...worse of all he is going bald..pretty soon he will have hair everywhere but his head. I don't know how shaving got linked to being feminine. I have known men to shave their faces, heads, necks, backs, chests, legs and pubic area. How often do we see men on TV or as models who have a foot long beards? Or how often do we see male underwear models with chest and back hair? As women at least we can hide our pubic, leg or armpit hair. Men can't hide their faces. Also men have to live by the double standard that not having enough body hair is "unmanly" while having too much is "unattractive".

I think the difference between men and women is that while men may choose whether or not to shave, their gender identity or societal role isn't questioned or judged the way women's are when they exercise the same choice.
The way I see it, men who don't have a lot of body hair can usually attribute it to things like race or profession (ie. models tend to wax their chests and backs). It is never assumed that a guy won't have leg or chest or armpit hair, whereas for women, having it tends to be seen as gross, or at the very least, subject to judgment.

Cristy, I've had the opposite experience: it's usually women who comment about my body hair. They're not always critical -- often they want to know how I can not shave. Sometimes they'll even tell me they wish they could do it too.

It makes me very sad to hear things like that (and things like what you're saying Charlotta). Of course those women can choose not to shave but they probably won't have any support for their choice.

I stopped shaving largely because I find my body more attractive when it's hairy. Now though, even if I did want to shave I'd think twice because I sincerely hope my actions make it easier for another woman to put down her razor, assuming she doesn't want to be holding it that is.

Although I go to great lengths to assure every GF I've had that I have no problem with, and even enjoy, their body hair (always in response to their comments, I never bring the matter up myself), and they themselves usually seem to want to let it go and not worry about it, at some point they always become anxious about it and insist on shaving. Maybe this is because I am lying to myself and them and I am sending unconscious signals, or maybe it is because they have just had the social message imprinted so deeply that they can't ignore it. Either way, it makes me sad.

First there's the obvious (and already stated) association between lack of pubic hair and prepubescence. Not sure if that's necessarily a pedophilia thing; it may also have to do with perceived purity or innocence (and/or cleanliness) for its own sake.

Then there's the whole "women must compete for men" aspect (those who do the most work will become the most attractive).

But most interestingly, how about this: hair serves to heighten sensation (I noticed this when I shaved my head and stopped caring whether it was raining). So women who shave their body hair are, essentially, limiting their sensitivity to (light) touch -- and desexualizing themselves.

Of course, most men don't know the definition of "light touch" so it may not matter. But I still find the idea interesting.

As a liberated woman raised by a die-hard feminist, I have to say: I LIKE shaving my legs. I do it for me, because I like the feeling of bare skin against my sheets. I also consider that I am going to make certain requests of my sexual partner, and that in return he gets to make certain requests of me. I very rarely would view being asked to curtail body hair as an oppression of my inner self (I like to think that my inner self has more important things to worry about), and feel like compromise in a sexual situation is part of equality. For those who gasp at the idea of bargaining in a sexual situation (many of us have been raised to see it as weakness and failure), think about it this way: the only way to truly be on equal terms, which I am pretty sure is what we are going for here, is to both give and take.

So, I am willing to sacrifice a little body hair in exchange for him including the vibrator in sex play, and why not? If it enhances his pleasure and doesn't detract from mine, why shouldn't that be a desired outcome?

This is partly a response to Saraubh, who mentioned encouraging girlfriends to embrace their body hair and seeing them shave anyway. It sounds like they were uncomfortable with it, and you're right, perhaps it was because it was socially ingrained, but perhaps it was also because it made them feel happier and more at ease, and why should we encourage anxiety and uncomfortableness when we could be accepting of all body choices (to a respectably hygienic extent), reproductive, beauty-related, and modification-wise? Isn't that what feminist liberation really means?
However, the guy you spoke about sounds like a jerk. If you were just fooling around it's quite rude and more than a bit awkward to be like "okay hon, time to interrupt everything we have going because I am too uncomfortable around body hair."