A hairy issue

Every year the hair removal industry makes $1.8 billion in America alone from men and women desperate to remove hair from their faces, legs, arms, eyebrows, upper lips, bikini areas and underarms.

From the age of 13, girls and boys are taught that their natural body hair is unsightly and that they must spend hours removing it only for it to grow back again. The controversy arising from the images of dangerously emaciated models in magazines and on TV has resulted in countless beauty campaigns urging women to love their bodies regardless of what society thinks they should look like. Young women are being told to have a positive body image and to not change for anyone, but at the same time we are receiving the contradictory message that every strand of body hair must go, whatever the cost.

Hair removal, for both men and women, has been a vital part of most people’s beauty regime for thousands of years. Archaeologists have discovered flint blades used for shaving from at least 30,000 years ago, cavemen reputedly scraped hair from their faces to prevent mites and Ancient Egyptians used bees wax and strips of cloth to remove fuzz as a sign of wealth. Paintings of naked women throughout history show them to be completely hairless, proving that to be regarded beautiful, a person has never been able to be too hairy. This convention is not limited to women; men shaving their chest hair seems to be emerging, with one second year student commenting: “I shave my chest for the lols. But also for heat reasons.”

However, in a phenomenon similar to the reaction against the fashion industry’s size zero obsession, more and more women are rejecting the idea that their bodies must be flawless and completely hair-free. Instead, some are embracing what they believe makes them feminine and are refusing to remove their body hair.

Most notably, 28-year-old Emer O’Toole has appeared on This Morning and Radio 2 flaunting her natural body hair. Emer is not a disgusting, unclean hippy as society’s message about hair removal might suggest. She is an attractive, intelligent research assistant anpostgraduate student at Royal Holloway who has simply decided that it would be a waste of her time to get rid of hair which will only be back within a few days. The doctorate student says that her decision has not affected her love life, men do not find her repulsive, that she has not been rejected by her friends and she doesn’t feel less hygienic.

Similarly, comedian Shazia Mirza stood up to such criticisms of hairy women in 2007 when she chose not to shave, wax or epilate her hair as a New Year’s Resolution for BBC Three’s acclaimed Body Image. The documentary examined various issues with body image with one episode exploring why women feel the need to constantly remove their body hair. Mirza, the presenter of the episode entitled F*** Off I’m A Hairy Woman, did absolutely nothing to her body hair for six months in an attempt to challenge the commonly held belief that women’s body hair is disgusting. Welsh artist Tracy Moberly also participated in the programme, sending unshaven women down the catwalk wearing lingerie of human hair.

Journalist Emily Gibson recently wrote an article for The Guardian entitled ‘Pubic hair has a job to do – stop shaving and leave it alone.’ In her article, she attributes the past decade’s preoccupation with removing pubic hair – 60% of women aged 18-29 choose to get rid of all of theirs – to “a misguided attempt at hygiene”. Indeed, when one second year student was asked why he shaves his pubic hair, he said: “Because it feels nice and otherwise I get all sweaty.” However, Gibson dismisses common myths responsible for the “declaration of war on pubic hair”. She warns both genders of the increased risk of infections, open wounds, boils, abscesses and cellulitis, assuring readers pubic hair is in no way unhygienic.

So why are more women all over the country fighting back against what one journalist calls the “pornification” of beauty? Perhaps the decision to abandon hair removal is a feminist one. It isn’t difficult to understand why some women view the idea that women should be hair-free as incredibly sexist, as, although increasing numbers of men are choosing to shave their chests, genitals and legs, it does seem to be more socially acceptable for men to be hairy than it is for women. Jo, a second year at York, says: “It’s just not fair that I have to spend hours of my life, years probably, shaving my hair and men don’t.” We stand up to double standards in education, at work and in relationships, but when it comes to beauty and fashion, it seems generally accepted that women are expected to put a lot more effort in than men.

Some women may be making the decision for practical reasons. Hair removal is both time-consuming and costly, and many women can probably think of millions of ways to better spend their time and money. Personally, I have spent £60 and probably about three hours over the past year on eyebrow threading alone. A DIY laser hair removal machine costs around £400. Think of all the things you could do with £400! As well as being expensive, threading and waxing result in painful ingrown hairs which take weeks to grow long enough to be removed again. Mirza acknowledged the amount of effort required to remove unwanted hair when she admitted “I have done everything to remove my hair. I have waxed, shaved, used my dad’s lawn mower. It has taken so much time, so much effort, so many red blotches,” Some women refusing to shave might not be making a feminist statement at all – perhaps it is an attempt to be more frugal or to spend their time more constructively.

With the fashion and beauty industries losing their ability to dictate what is beautiful and with increasing numbers of prolific women choosing to let their gardens grown, is a future world full of hairy women a possibility? In a few years, could hair-free women be viewed just as underweight women are viewed today: as slaves to image and vanity, putting themselves through a great deal to reach an unnatural and unattainable standard of beauty?

Probably not. When asked if she would consider going out without removing her body hair, one second year student said: “I wouldn’t, I’d feel embarrassed! I like having no body hair.” In an article for the Daily Mail, novelist Nicholas Coleridge points to research which reveals that out of the 60% of women aged 18-24 who said that they would have cosmetic surgery if they could afford it, most put laser hair removal at the very top of their wish list. None of the brave women who are binning their razors have managed to convince me to follow suit and stand up against societal pressures either, and for cosmetic reasons, I still refuse surrender the never-ending battle with my body hair and I still spend way too much time and money shaving, waxing and threading.

However, even though most girls will probably shudder at the thought of leaving the house with stubbly legs, the actions of women like O’Toole and Mirza could still engender a change in society’s attitudes to body hair. Thirteen years ago, a famous image of Julia Roberts revealing hairy armpits on the red carpet was received with widespread disgust and disbelief. However, in her Radio 2 interview, O’Toole said that her friends and boyfriends have been supportive and she is not looked upon with revulsion and several listeners phoned in to express their admiration.
So while the entire world isn’t ready to give up on body hair removal just yet, the minority that have given up are not being treated in the same way they would have been in the 90s; instead, they are being supported and respected.