to think we owe it to our DC to let our armpits go feral?

[ClockWatchingLady]

When our kids are little, shouldn't they see that women have body hair (and accept it rather than remove it)?
Once they're in their teens, they'll probably see endless full-body-waxed women online, whether we like it or not.
So while they're little and forming their basic impressions of the female body, shouldn't we stop all this bloody depilation? Whether we feel comfortable with it or not, don't we owe it to the younger generation?

Yours faithfully,
Mr Tumnus

I'd like to make clear that I was certainly not intending on starting up any aggressive posting. And if you're bored by the topic, please don't feel that anyone wants you to get involved anyway. When topics come up again and again, I would argue that it tends to be because they're important and rather complicated.

I happen to find depilation a total PITA, as do many I know, and I genuinely question the reasons we're all doing it. Personal preference is massively influenced by culture, so I don't think that explains it all (though clearly we're all free to do as we wish in the here and now). I really worry a bit about adolescents worrying about their body hair. I worry a lot about cultural perception of women (yes, I know, blah blah) too. I happen to think MN is (or could be) the perfect place to explore this - for those who want to.

IThinkOfHappyWhenIThinkOfYou - yes. I also do this because of social convention. I find it odd that it's such a relief to hear someone say this.

On the contrary, I watch threads like this because I think it is important to report posts that are nasty and offensive and because I don't like someone telling me what to do and then saying ridiculous things if I don't agree. It is little to do with hair and a lot to do with knowing that this will not end well.

I get sticky and smelly if I don't shave. I wash them obviously, but I feel like the smell lingers on the hairs more if I need to shave.

So no, I will continue to shave.

My legs? yeah, I will get round to them when they get out of control ;)

I only shave my pits when the hair is likely to poke out of something I'm wearing and I'm likely to be out in public, but my pits are hairy about 90% of the year. Same with my legs. And I have dark, coarse hair. I never shave or wax my arms and the boys like stroking that hair. I don't leave it all intact for their benefit, though.

I don't do it because of social convention - I do it because DH likes it.

He doesn't insist on it, but he likes it. He would still want to have sex with me, even if I was hairy.

I'm not that fussed about what the rest of the world likes. But I do care about what DH likes.

Well it is wine o clock where I am. Hooray! I shave my pits because I sweat, but my ladygarden is a wildly unkempt. A bit like my actual garden. Does it matter?
I do need to shave my toes though. Bilbo in Birkenstocks is not a good look for me.

I shave my toes as well. What is the point of toe hair?

I'm a bit slap dash about hair removal but if my legs or armpits are going to be on show then the hair will most definitely be coming off.

I do admire women who care not a jot as to what people think of their furry underarms but personally I'll continue to shave. I realise this is down to social conditioning, it's naive to say otherwise, but I don't think I'm harming anyone. My body, my choice.

I think I owe it to my daughters to show them that I can choose to do whatever the frick I like with my own body.

Within reason obviously. Much as I'd like to rub it all over Max from The Wanted.

Well, thank you - I'm heartily amused by all this! Theodora, who on earth is telling you what to do?!

There is logic to hairless armpits. Hairy armpits are harder to keep non smelly.

Yes, squoosh, I agree, individually. It's the collective potential "harm" (term used loosely) I'm concerned about. But basically, yes, I agree.

I don't shave my armpits, and never have.

A story. About 15 years ago, I told a group of young women about the Victorian art critic, John Ruskin, whose marriage was annulled because it wasn't consummated -- Ruskin (who'd looked at a lot of Greek and Roman statues of women) couldn't bear the reality of a woman with armpit and pubic hair.

Fifteen years ago the young women hooted with laughter -- how ridiculous that someone shouldn't be able to stand the sight of female body hair; how utterly laughable that he thought that women's bodies were hairless because that's all he'd seen.

I wonder how that story would go down now?

OK, it is AIBU.
Yes you are BU.

Better?

If people teach their kids to have respect for others in all their guises, hairy or not, I'd say that is a better way forward.

I really can't say I ever noticed anyone's armpits when I was a kid, ever.

What about make up, hair dye, bras. Shouldn't everything we do, as woman, reflect our natural state?

I do mine once a month because it doesn't look good when its long, but wouldn't do it too often as don't get many anyway.
I do think we are obsessed by being smooth. I don't like waxed or plucked men neither, they look like girls. I like my dh manly, but trimmed.

Niminy I've always felt so sorry for Ruskin's wife. Poor girl, looking forward to her wedding night, probably more than a bit nervous, and her husband screeches and runs at the sight of her hairy undercarriage.

I've never had a bald crotch though and can confirm that most men are just happy to get near a naked vagina. But yes there probably are a few modern specimens who would recoil in horror at pubic hair.

Ooh, I did, youthecat.

I remember - my mum was going swimming and some teenage girls were sniggering because she had a bit of hair escaping. It was horrible, actually.

So I think maybe what is more important isn't just how we look, but how we react to other people? Like, I am never going to grow a ladybeard, but I can still tell ignorant twits to fuck off for sniggering at someone else (I'm thinking of that lass in a US high school who had some facial hair but it was part of her religion not to remove it, and she responded with a lot of dignity to being teased).

Much better, theordora. I personally would have preferred a calm and reasoned rationale for the conclusion as well, but you can't have everything.

That's a pretty sobering thought, niminypiminy.

(Dunno why I felt the need to say that as if it were a new point, sorry! [blush) Was just thinking about the example.)

My DM has never shaved her armpits or legs or bikini line. It didn't make me want to be a hairy mama though! Therefore don't think my dd will be much influenced by my hair or lack of it.

GlaikitFizzog - I think this is a really interesting point. I don't really know. Is a boob job really much different from eye liner? Tatoos? (I don't mean in practical terms). Very difficult issues.

IsabelleRinging - yes, I might be overstating the influence of parents. It might do the opposite of what's intended! I just thought maybe appropriate early perceptual learning of what women look like might make teenagers less judgmental of body hair.