Feminist Friday: Hairy vs. Hairless

Anti Pervert Hairy Leggings

It all started two months ago with those stupid freaking hairy "anti-pervert" leggings. You know the ones I'm talking about. The ones that permeated my Facebook news stream with comments of "haha" and "eww." The ones that were billed to keep unwanted male attention at bay. Those stupid freaking leggings drove me to a feminist rage that put me on threat level explosive. I hate them. Even more so I hated that no one else around me seemed to understand that they weren't funny and they weren't gross but were the epitome of patriarchal bullshit and  perpetuated the beauty myth while not so subtly victim blaming.

So if you don't want "perverts" perving on you then you should have hairy legs. So obviously hairless legs are the only attractive thing to have; if you have hairy legs you're gross and even the perviest perv will leave you be. I've talked about hairlessness and what society tells us is beautiful before so I'm not going to rage on too long here--on the grand scale of how fucked up these leggings are it's the lesser of all the evils.

Women "have" to wear these leggings to stop perverts. Why can't the perverts stop themselves? Even suggesting that they will stop unwanted attention suggests that any unwanted attention is the fault of the woman being harassed and not the harasser--victim blaming and not even vaguely subtle about it. I'll also take it so far as to say they perpetuate the belief that rape is about sex when rape has nothing to do with sex and is about power. If you're a pretty, hairless girl you could get perved on so you need to protect yourself by making yourself ugly and hairy so no man would ever want to harass or perv on you. Obviously unattractive women are never raped or harassed, duh. 

I promise they're really hairy.

Those freaking hairy leggings pissed me off so much I decided to say fuck it and I would grow my own pair of leggings and challenge my own thoughts about hairy legs and say fuck you to the man. One little problem though--I can't shake that feeling that other people are judging me and my hairy legs and I really don't like it.

In general I've been okay about it. I've gone to swimming pools, worn dresses without tights to work, but I've also been somewhat hyper-conscious of what I think is other people staring at my legs. I'll be fine and not think about it but then cross my legs in a meeting and think that everyone is looking at my legs and how hairy they are. It doesn't help that hair in general grosses me out and I don't know if that is just a personal hang-up or societal norms rearing their ugly head but I can't embrace and love my hairy legs like I would in some utopian feminist fantasy. Maybe two months isn't long enough to break my subconscious subservience to societal norms but I'm not anywhere near 100% secure about having hairy legs.

I find myself apologizing for them, too. To the girl who waxes my eyebrows to friends when I'm out for drinks--they all say the same thing about how blonde I am and they hand't even noticed. They couldn't have not shaved for two months but I still can't reconcile it. I want to be happy, hairy and care-free but for whatever reason I'm fairly sure I'm at the end of my hairy journey. Although I have to say writing this and "coming out" with my hairy legs has made me feel a bit better about it all.  Still though feeling the wind blow between your leg hairs isn't a particularly pleasant experience.

It's increasingly difficult to reconcile my feminist beliefs with my own personal beauty beliefs but I hope I can fall back on my most favourite feminist belief--choice. I chose to have hairy legs and at some point I'm going to choose to have hairless legs again. Sure my choices are partially informed by what society tells me I should do but if I buck the norm and still don't like it surely making an informed choice is worth something? 



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Feminist Friday XVI: The Beauty Myth

The Beauty Myth. Oy. I've sat here and thought and thought and thought. I know that the media influences our concept of beauty. I know that the media portrays an extremely warped version of what they call beauty. There is an ever growing pressure on women and young girls to be beautiful and I wholeheartedly think that this is intrinsically wrong and, to some extent, downright evil. No one should be made to feel that their physical appearance is directly linked to their value as a person.


Yet here I sit, a proud and ardent feminist, who wants to be pretty. Yes I want people to think that I am intelligent, but I also want people to think I'm pretty. How the hell do I rationalize that with what I've just previously stated? I can totally rationalize that I like make-up and long blue-black eyelashes, that's easy. Yes, it is society that dictates that long, lush lashes are best, but in choosing to make my transparent blonde lashes lovely and dark I'm not really usurping my feminist beliefs. Yes, I'm buying into the beauty machine that costs us all hundreds a  year, but I'm not giving up any real power.


If I had to choose between being intelligent or being physically beautiful, I'd choose intelligence every time. That doesn't mean that I don't want to feel physically beautiful, too. I could go off on a tangent about what real beauty is, but I've already done that in my Born to Be Beautiful post so you can read that again if you like. I know you are as beautiful as you feel but that doesn't stop me from wanting to feel attractive, too. 


I know that feminists can be physically beautiful. Gloria Steinem is one of the most physically beautiful (and just straight up beautiful) people I have ever seen in real life: she is stunning. She's also an intellectual and political icon and powerhouse. She had the most amazing nails (yes, I noticed so what?), so are you going to say that since she had well manicured nails that she's not a real feminist for buying into the beauty machine? Obviously not.


I think I'm rambling here now but my point is that you can want to be pretty, but still not condone the so called beauty myth. I can use make-up but still disapprove of over photo-shopped and airbrushed images in magazines. I sometimes have trouble reconciling the fact that I WANT to look pretty with the fact that the media PRESSURES women to look pretty. I think what all feminists want is a more realistic portrayal of beauty in the media; a beauty that is all colours, shapes, sizes, ethnicities, sexualities and ages. It's okay to want to look good, but we shouldn't feel pressured to look good. At least I hope so....

Feminist Friday XVI:

The Beauty Myth

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