The patriarchal society we live in finds natural body hair on women to be grotesque. The norm in this society is for women to remove their body hair in order for their bodies to resemble, at least in this aspect, those of prepubescent children.
If you actually look at the history of body hair removal, it’s almost always been associated with cleanliness and purity and from there social status.
The modern variation started with darwinism and the assertion that body hair was more primitive and undeveloped. Hairlessness was then cast as more evolved. Spectrum of ape to human has a clear hair gradient, so obviously less hair means less ape-ish, and hence more desirable.
In the past few hundred years the evolution aspect has been giving way to the purity and cleanliness aspect again.
The sexism is in who our society finds purity and cleanliness more important for. Trying to tie that double standard back to pedophillia just makes people more prone to dismiss the entire thing.
The driving factor can be seen more in how people talk about beards, but also womens. People say clean shaven men look clean, professional, and so on. We all know what images come to mind if I say to picture a neckbeards room.
People aren’t infantalizing men by appreciating a removal of a prominent secondary sexual characteristic.
For women, you said it yourself:
finds natural body hair on women to be grotesque
You didn’t say “old”, or any of the myriad fucked up terms some people have for women older than 25, you said “grotesque”. Society finds it gross or unclean.
The sexism is right on the label. You don’t have to go digging for it.
Society has significantly higher standards for hair removal for women than men, likely related to how society has higher standards of “purity” for women than men. Men have an “out” where the masculinity of male hair can also be positive, but there’s no corresponding feminine hair boost.
Can you point out where I’m tying any of this to pedophillia please.
At no point have I even suggested pedophillia.
I have not mentioned sexual attractiveness to men being the focus of hair removal, nor even implied it.
I have been talking about patriarchal society valuing neoteny in women. Youth and beauty. Society. Values.
Somehow you all read what this and instead interpreted it as “‘patriarchy’- that means men in angry dumb feminist speak, ‘society’ - this also means men, ‘values’ -this means what men are attracted to, ‘pre-pubescent’ - reeeee this dumb bitch is saying we’re all pedos, get her!”
It’s fucking embarrassing how poor your reading comprehension is.
Ah, excuse me for thinking that your comment about removing body and genital hair to more closely resemble a child had anything to do with an implied sexualization of children. It’s only what every other person thought, and also a common claim.
You might go and actually read my comment, as opposed to throwing a fit because you dislike one sentence where I use a word you don’t want me to use. I spend most of it talking about how society values purity and cleanliness, which hair removal is associated with.
I was actually trying to engage in a positive tone in good faith, unlike you it seems who I’m not pretty sure is just going for the argument and has no interest in anything other than getting to yell.
It’s fucking embarrassing how poor your reading comprehension is.
Ah, what sweet irony, considering you obviously didn’t understand what I was saying.
I wasn’t even talking about pubic hair ffs. You all saw ‘body hair’ mentioned in relation to women and assumed I was talking about pubic hair.
Why did you make that aasumption I wonder? Is it because seeing leg and armpit hair on women is so extremely rare that you forgot it existed? I wonder why that is? What, I wonder, does society value most in women? Hmmm. I wonder why that is?
You’re clearly not interested in actually talking if your takeaway from either of my messages was to get upset about the exact extent of body hair removal I assumed you were referring to.
Yes bro, I shave my manbush because I want to be mistaken for a preteen boy, not because it’s unpleasant, unhygienic, and I hate cleaning up pubes from the bathroom floor, or any other practical consideration.
Unless you identify as a woman and/or are a fem presenting nb or ajacent, what was written wasn’t intended to be inclusive of you.
You can shave your manbush for whatever manreasons you manlike. But I get the feeling though that you probably very much mandislike seeing women with hairy legs.
How often do you see women walking around with their fully natural hairy legs on display?
I get the feeling we might be talking at cross purposes here, just to clarify, could you please briefly explain what you believe the terms ‘patriarchal society’ and ’ social norms’ to mean?
You’re asserting that society demands that women remove their body hair to look like kids.
You won’t take an argument that there’s a billion reasons for that action, and reduced half the human population to one will that only you happen to be able to fully know.
Youth and beauty are the two most valued traits in women by our current society and the older a girl gets, the hairier she becomes. Hairy legs on women are considered disgusting and will cause public reactions.
Personal and aesthetic reasons for fem presenting folk removing or modifying body hair are completely valid, but these choices are often still being made to fit in to social norms.
If I, or pretty much any other fem presenting person, go out wearing shorts, we will shave our legs. We don’t shave our legs to look like children, we shave them to not be harrassed in public, because society expects us to be hairless like young girls.
Can I ask what society you’re referring to here? I stopped shaving my legs at about 25, while in a conservative office in the northeastern US, then moved to Germany. They’re both relatively progressive areas, and I can imagine things might be different in other places, but I haven’t had any problems or confrontations because of my leg hair. I’ve had the occasional remark, sometimes from a man completely out of pocket (mostly telling me they don’t want to fuck me, which is… exactly the situation I want, I guess), but they’re mostly from women, wishing they could do the same. I never know what to say to the latter, except that it’s not as bad as I expected it to be. My armpit hair, on the other hand, has provoked some horrific bile, mostly from men and occasionally from women.
I don’t really care, because I’m not doing it for approval, but it’s fucked up that people feel entitled to comment on something that absolutely doesn’t concern them and is literally just the path of least resistance for a mammal such as myself.
That’s very clearly not the reason though, as those same beauty standards emphasize post-pubescent secondary sexual characteristics a lot too (big boobs, hips, butts, full lips).
The common thread seems to be just a way to hyper-differentiate from masculinity. In this patriarchal binary beauty standard, the most non-masculine woman is the same as the most feminine (assuming they also have those secondary sexual characteristics, otherwise you dip into androgeny). Basically, if you already have feminine qualities, then less man=more woman. It’s why tall or more muscular women are seen as less feminine, not because they aren’t childlike FFS.
Men have more body hair, therefore manlier men are hairier, and by extension the more feminine women have the least body hair.
Patriarchal society values youth and beauty in women above all else, and the older a girl gets, the hairier she becomes.
Individual aesthetic reasons for hair removal on female bodies are valid, but these choices are still being made within the society we live in and are often still made in order to conform to it.
I’m not so quick to immediately jump on the “omg it’s pedophilia!” bandwagon. It’s lazy and needlessly inflammatory. If everything is pedophilia than nothing is pedophilia. That’s a charge we should reserve for very rare occasions.
Certainly not when the null hypothesis works just fine. Male and female beauty standards are cultural, but they’re not completely arbitrary. They’re mostly just exaggerated versions of actual physical sex differences. Women on average have fuller lips than men. So we wear lipstick to accentuate this. Men tend to go bald more often, so women’s beauty standards contrasts this by tending towards long and highly styled hair. Men traditionally go for short haircuts or no hair at all, again accentuating male secondary sex characteristics. Women on average tend to have less body hair then men. So women’s beauty standards tend to encourage its complete removal.
Beauty standards are subjective, but they’re not just pulled arbitrarily from a hat. No one ever sat down one day, spun a big wheel and said, “ok, by spin of the wheel, women have to shave their bodies but get to have long hair!” Beauty standards are largely just exaggerations of actual biological sex differences.
I didn’t mention pedophillia. The only people bringing up pedo shit are the ones who haven’t understood what I wrote and are angry because they saw the word ‘patriarchy’.
The norm in this society is for women to remove their body hair in order for their bodies to resemble, at least in this aspect, those of prepubescent children.
YOU LITERALLY DID! And now you’re trying to weasel your way out of it by saying, “well, I didn’t explicitly use the word pedophilia, I just implied men are attracted to the features of pre-pubescent children.” There is a word for an adult that is sexually attracted to pre-pubescent children. That word is pedophile. You are literally arguing that female beauty standards are pedophilic.
No, you’re just making a lot of assumptions about people without actually knowing anything about the stuff you seem to think you’re an expert on. “patriarchal society” doesn’t want women to look prepubescent, people just have preferences for about 1 million different reasons, that don’t necesarily have anything to do with pre pubescence. By blaming patriarchal society, you’re insinuating that men are the problem, and that men in general want to fuck children. So I will say again, fuck off, and add, get a grip.
I never said any of this. Literally nothing I wrote implied any of the stuff you are saying here.
All the angry men bringing up this man hating and pedo shit are the people who got triggered when they saw the word patriarchy and forgot how to fucking read.
When you see a word you don’t understand, that word isn’t trying to make you feel stupid or implying that you’re a pedo and a bad person. Go look that word up and learn what it actually means, I can promise you it doesn’t mean what you think it does.
The patriarchal society we live in finds natural body hair on women to be grotesque. The norm in this society is for women to remove their body hair in order for their bodies to resemble, at least in this aspect, those of prepubescent children.
If you actually look at the history of body hair removal, it’s almost always been associated with cleanliness and purity and from there social status.
The modern variation started with darwinism and the assertion that body hair was more primitive and undeveloped. Hairlessness was then cast as more evolved. Spectrum of ape to human has a clear hair gradient, so obviously less hair means less ape-ish, and hence more desirable.
In the past few hundred years the evolution aspect has been giving way to the purity and cleanliness aspect again.
The sexism is in who our society finds purity and cleanliness more important for. Trying to tie that double standard back to pedophillia just makes people more prone to dismiss the entire thing.
The driving factor can be seen more in how people talk about beards, but also womens. People say clean shaven men look clean, professional, and so on. We all know what images come to mind if I say to picture a neckbeards room.
People aren’t infantalizing men by appreciating a removal of a prominent secondary sexual characteristic.
For women, you said it yourself:
You didn’t say “old”, or any of the myriad fucked up terms some people have for women older than 25, you said “grotesque”. Society finds it gross or unclean.
The sexism is right on the label. You don’t have to go digging for it.
Society has significantly higher standards for hair removal for women than men, likely related to how society has higher standards of “purity” for women than men. Men have an “out” where the masculinity of male hair can also be positive, but there’s no corresponding feminine hair boost.
Can you point out where I’m tying any of this to pedophillia please.
At no point have I even suggested pedophillia.
I have not mentioned sexual attractiveness to men being the focus of hair removal, nor even implied it.
I have been talking about patriarchal society valuing neoteny in women. Youth and beauty. Society. Values.
Somehow you all read what this and instead interpreted it as “‘patriarchy’- that means men in angry dumb feminist speak, ‘society’ - this also means men, ‘values’ -this means what men are attracted to, ‘pre-pubescent’ - reeeee this dumb bitch is saying we’re all pedos, get her!”
It’s fucking embarrassing how poor your reading comprehension is.
Ah, excuse me for thinking that your comment about removing body and genital hair to more closely resemble a child had anything to do with an implied sexualization of children. It’s only what every other person thought, and also a common claim.
You might go and actually read my comment, as opposed to throwing a fit because you dislike one sentence where I use a word you don’t want me to use. I spend most of it talking about how society values purity and cleanliness, which hair removal is associated with.
I was actually trying to engage in a positive tone in good faith, unlike you it seems who I’m not pretty sure is just going for the argument and has no interest in anything other than getting to yell.
Ah, what sweet irony, considering you obviously didn’t understand what I was saying.
I wasn’t even talking about pubic hair ffs. You all saw ‘body hair’ mentioned in relation to women and assumed I was talking about pubic hair.
Why did you make that aasumption I wonder? Is it because seeing leg and armpit hair on women is so extremely rare that you forgot it existed? I wonder why that is? What, I wonder, does society value most in women? Hmmm. I wonder why that is?
Maybe because this all started with underwear?
You’re clearly not interested in actually talking if your takeaway from either of my messages was to get upset about the exact extent of body hair removal I assumed you were referring to.
Yes bro, I shave my manbush because I want to be mistaken for a preteen boy, not because it’s unpleasant, unhygienic, and I hate cleaning up pubes from the bathroom floor, or any other practical consideration.
like that it gets itchy/uncomfortable AF when you work out? nah, that can’t be it.
Unless you identify as a woman and/or are a fem presenting nb or ajacent, what was written wasn’t intended to be inclusive of you.
You can shave your manbush for whatever manreasons you manlike. But I get the feeling though that you probably very much mandislike seeing women with hairy legs.
And women can’t?
How often do you see women walking around with their fully natural hairy legs on display?
I get the feeling we might be talking at cross purposes here, just to clarify, could you please briefly explain what you believe the terms ‘patriarchal society’ and ’ social norms’ to mean?
You’re asserting that society demands that women remove their body hair to look like kids.
You won’t take an argument that there’s a billion reasons for that action, and reduced half the human population to one will that only you happen to be able to fully know.
I don’t think I care to humour your request.
Youth and beauty are the two most valued traits in women by our current society and the older a girl gets, the hairier she becomes. Hairy legs on women are considered disgusting and will cause public reactions.
Personal and aesthetic reasons for fem presenting folk removing or modifying body hair are completely valid, but these choices are often still being made to fit in to social norms.
If I, or pretty much any other fem presenting person, go out wearing shorts, we will shave our legs. We don’t shave our legs to look like children, we shave them to not be harrassed in public, because society expects us to be hairless like young girls.
Can you understand what I’m saying here?
Can I ask what society you’re referring to here? I stopped shaving my legs at about 25, while in a conservative office in the northeastern US, then moved to Germany. They’re both relatively progressive areas, and I can imagine things might be different in other places, but I haven’t had any problems or confrontations because of my leg hair. I’ve had the occasional remark, sometimes from a man completely out of pocket (mostly telling me they don’t want to fuck me, which is… exactly the situation I want, I guess), but they’re mostly from women, wishing they could do the same. I never know what to say to the latter, except that it’s not as bad as I expected it to be. My armpit hair, on the other hand, has provoked some horrific bile, mostly from men and occasionally from women.
I don’t really care, because I’m not doing it for approval, but it’s fucked up that people feel entitled to comment on something that absolutely doesn’t concern them and is literally just the path of least resistance for a mammal such as myself.
Yes, this is what I am talking about. Body hair on women is treated as grotesque and causes public harrassment. Thank you for providing examples.
That’s very clearly not the reason though, as those same beauty standards emphasize post-pubescent secondary sexual characteristics a lot too (big boobs, hips, butts, full lips).
The common thread seems to be just a way to hyper-differentiate from masculinity. In this patriarchal binary beauty standard, the most non-masculine woman is the same as the most feminine (assuming they also have those secondary sexual characteristics, otherwise you dip into androgeny). Basically, if you already have feminine qualities, then less man=more woman. It’s why tall or more muscular women are seen as less feminine, not because they aren’t childlike FFS.
Men have more body hair, therefore manlier men are hairier, and by extension the more feminine women have the least body hair.
Patriarchal society values youth and beauty in women above all else, and the older a girl gets, the hairier she becomes.
Individual aesthetic reasons for hair removal on female bodies are valid, but these choices are still being made within the society we live in and are often still made in order to conform to it.
I’m not so quick to immediately jump on the “omg it’s pedophilia!” bandwagon. It’s lazy and needlessly inflammatory. If everything is pedophilia than nothing is pedophilia. That’s a charge we should reserve for very rare occasions.
Certainly not when the null hypothesis works just fine. Male and female beauty standards are cultural, but they’re not completely arbitrary. They’re mostly just exaggerated versions of actual physical sex differences. Women on average have fuller lips than men. So we wear lipstick to accentuate this. Men tend to go bald more often, so women’s beauty standards contrasts this by tending towards long and highly styled hair. Men traditionally go for short haircuts or no hair at all, again accentuating male secondary sex characteristics. Women on average tend to have less body hair then men. So women’s beauty standards tend to encourage its complete removal.
Beauty standards are subjective, but they’re not just pulled arbitrarily from a hat. No one ever sat down one day, spun a big wheel and said, “ok, by spin of the wheel, women have to shave their bodies but get to have long hair!” Beauty standards are largely just exaggerations of actual biological sex differences.
I didn’t mention pedophillia. The only people bringing up pedo shit are the ones who haven’t understood what I wrote and are angry because they saw the word ‘patriarchy’.
YOU LITERALLY DID! And now you’re trying to weasel your way out of it by saying, “well, I didn’t explicitly use the word pedophilia, I just implied men are attracted to the features of pre-pubescent children.” There is a word for an adult that is sexually attracted to pre-pubescent children. That word is pedophile. You are literally arguing that female beauty standards are pedophilic.
Where did I do that? Could you show me please? Specifically the bit about this being to cater to mens attractions please.
It’s ok to look words up you don’t understand.
I just don’t like hair in my mouth, fuck off.
And you are valid in your preference. So are women who chose to remove their body hair for whatever reasons. Nothing I wrote has stated otherwise.
Your gut reaction here says a lot more about you than it does me.
No, you’re just making a lot of assumptions about people without actually knowing anything about the stuff you seem to think you’re an expert on. “patriarchal society” doesn’t want women to look prepubescent, people just have preferences for about 1 million different reasons, that don’t necesarily have anything to do with pre pubescence. By blaming patriarchal society, you’re insinuating that men are the problem, and that men in general want to fuck children. So I will say again, fuck off, and add, get a grip.
I never said any of this. Literally nothing I wrote implied any of the stuff you are saying here.
All the angry men bringing up this man hating and pedo shit are the people who got triggered when they saw the word patriarchy and forgot how to fucking read.
When you see a word you don’t understand, that word isn’t trying to make you feel stupid or implying that you’re a pedo and a bad person. Go look that word up and learn what it actually means, I can promise you it doesn’t mean what you think it does.
I mean the world do be patriarchal. Don’t deny that. But the prepubescence thing is batshit crazy indeed