For women particularly, there is an unspoken pressure to get rid of all body hair in order to be seen as conventionally attractive and adhere to current beauty standards. But why was this normalised, and has it always been this way? Is body hair something that has always been seen as shameful, or — in a world encouraging bodily transformations and cosmetic procedures — is this just another temporary trend?
While hair removal practices existed around the world throughout history, body hair was by no means considered undesirable until the early 50s. When razor companies realised that they could double their profits by selling razors to women too, they needed some kind of excuse to entice women to buy them. This is when leg and underarm hair first became shameful for women to publicly display, and body hair became something embarrassing and unattractive for women to have. Men, on the other hand, were celebrated for having body hair as a sign of masculinity and testosterone. In a matter of months, women were being held to a whole new beauty standard that they felt pressured by unrealistic advertising to live up to.
This was taken into a whole level as the 20th century continued. In 1978, many parts of the South refused to display the cover of Patti Smith’s album Easter because of the depiction of female body hair. In 1999, Julia Roberts was shamed for showing underarm hair at the Notting Hill premiere. Even celebrities were being shamed and criticised for something as natural as body hair.
Around the 2000s, women were also told to shave pubic hair, pressuring them to become completely hairless and feel shame about a natural condition that men were allowed and encouraged to have. The double standard between men and women with body hair, both in the 20th century and beyond, is incredibly illogical and only derives self-hatred from young women or girls reaching adolescence who are told that their bodies are ugly and undesirable.
Women’s body hair has never been an issue; consumerist companies who get a kick out of shaming women in order to earn more money are the ones truly at fault.
More recently, however, women have been trying to break the taboo around body hair. Underarm hair and leg hair have become more normalised through the feminist movement in an attempt to make female body hair less stigmatised. While many celebrities — and women at large — are still critiqued for publicly showing body hair, it is slowly beginning to become more acceptable. The hope is that one day, women will be able to display their body hair as unabashedly as men, who are encouraged to, and celebrated for doing so. Women’s body hair has never been an issue; consumerist companies who get a kick out of shaming women in order to earn more money are the ones truly at fault. Instead of fueling the worldwide debate about body hair, it’s about time they owned up to their actions.