Never Shave Your Legs Again File
Suzannah Weiss' first person account of leg shaving. (Photo: Suzannah Weiss)
My first exposure to the female coming-of-age ritual of leg shaving occurred during slumber-away army camp at historic period eleven. In an almost ceremonial fashion, my motel-mates would bring buckets, shaving foam, and razors out onto the deck for "shaving parties" on weekend afternoons. I and some other late bloomers sat quietly on the benches, observing a rite we were also embarrassed to inquire our mothers near and too well-behaved to partake in without their permission.
That summertime, I developed an obsession with leg-hair removal and the ladylike status I'd supposedly reach in one case I adopted the do. My friend and I would sit on the beach piling sand on our legs and removing information technology with shells, prepping for the real thing. But every time I resolved to ask my mom about information technology, I would mollusk upwards, scared of being deemed likewise immature for mystically polish legs.
Back then, it was a given that I would shave my legs 1 day; the question was just when. I took that for granted, as if hairless legs were a biological characteristic of the developed female that I would unveil past removing the unsightly pilus clouding my true nature. The problem was, shaving my legs never felt natural. I don't remember quite when I started, merely I was around 13 and probably used razors I found in my bathroom without consulting my mom. There was a menstruum of smoothness and a pleasant cold feeling when I kickoff pulled my sheets over my legs, but there was a longer menstruation afterward where my legs felt prickly to the touch. And there was also the occasional cut and razor burn down, non to mention the extra time added to my already long showers.
I put upward with the physical discomfort of shaving all the fashion until college because I couldn't tolerate the potential social discomfort of having legs that stood out. But as I became more than aware of the excessive standards our society imposes upon women's appearances, I grew angry that something every bit beneficial as torso hair had caused me so much concern. The ideal of smooth legs was most pleasing men, non pleasing myself (though some women have told me they shave to please themselves, and they should be able to make that choice without judgment besides). Later all, men were never considered gross or unclean for having much more than body pilus than I did.
I stopped shaving once and for all around my inferior year of college, and surprisingly, nobody has (at to the lowest degree openly) objected. I boyfriend fifty-fifty told me he liked my natural legs because they showed I thought for myself rather than blindly post-obit conventions. When I mentioned I sometimes felt self-conscious about my legs, another boyfriend said information technology would exist ridiculous for him to take issue with legs that were far less hairy than his.
I have, however, decided not to date men because they answered in the affirmative to the OKCupid question, "Do you think women have an obligation to keep their legs shaved?" One great barometer of how much a man respects women is whether he believes they accept an obligation to look aesthetically pleasing to him. When I asked one guy to explicate why he answered yes to that question, he responded, "It's unappealing and uncomfortable if I'thou sleeping with them." I'thou nevertheless scratching my head over that last reason. If information technology'south uncomfortable to castor upwards against someone with body hair, why doesn't he shave?
Leg hair isn't uncomfortable to touch (if anything, it'southward but uncomfortable in the prickly between-shaves stage), or else we would hear more than people lament most men'due south body hair; it doesn't hold the potential to increase torso odor similar armpit hair; and, in my experience and that of all the women who lived before leg-shaving became a mainstream custom in the 20th century, it's not inherently unattractive. Shaving one's legs is a subjective decision that should be made by the bearer of the legs.
Needless to say, shaving wasn't the mystical archway into the cult of womanhood that I hoped for. Instead, not shaving made me feel more mature — because I rejected an illogical but powerful double standard in favor of what made more sense to me.
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Source: https://www.yahoo.com/lifestyle/why-i-will-never-shave-my-legs-again-124747111178.html
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