Friday, March 21, 2014

The Mutant Anti-Mammal


Gotta love Vice. I love articles like this even (and sometimes especially) when they contradict my own preferences.


It is true that hair removal (for anyone) is neither natural nor logical. But you know what else? There's nothing wrong with that, as long as everyone can be clear about it. It's okay that I'm not so down with being a mammal all the time, and maybe don't want other mammals, because mutants are hot. I appreciate that this author refers to hair removal as producing a mutant state, because technically that's kind of correct. That's a beautiful perspective. And if you find being called a mutant or attracted to mutants objectionable, perhaps you should seek the hairy life. It's all about framing.

I may "fetishize" hairless men in the same way that this author "fetishizes" hairy women. (Air-quoting because I'm always skeptical of the use of this word when simply describing a sexual attraction to how a person lives in their body.) I say that it's the same because it highlights unconventional choice. It takes courage to be a hairy woman, whereas it takes quite literally nothing–like actually a gaping, disturbing absence of anything–to be a hairy man. In this case I'm talking body hair, because men's facial hair grooming is sometimes a whole other thing. Even though I'm not into it, I can appreciate it at times.

I respect my hairy lady friends greatly for this reason. And people who do not find it attractive need to dish out the respect, too. Because when you take the time to think about it, it's pretty disturbing that we want to look out into the world see a parade of people who suit our individual taste. Being on a blind date is one thing, but when it's just people in the world? What is that? Don't answer that, actually. Just stop doing it.

Wax, razors, lasers, I've done all of it. That's right, LASERS AROUND MY VAGINA. That's INSANE, right? It totally is. And I'm so pleased with it. Not only with the result, but with the actual insanity of it, that the future is here and that's how I'm experiencing it. Like tattoos or hair dye, it is a body modification. It just happens to be a matter of subtraction rather than addition.

I think that accepting the insanity of hair removal is beneficial to everyone, whether you revel in it or reject it. Even though it is my preferred aesthetic, I suspect that many individual women will benefit from rejecting it. So many may only do it because after a lifetime of magazine brainwashing and unthinking boyfriends, they may not know how not to. I have in moments of crisis wondered if I too am merely a victim of cultural brainwashing, but I know that my choices are my own. I know this because if I had a male body, I would make all of the same ones (and I'd be so hot, ohman). It is a labor intensive timesuck and walletdrain. That's why it's so important to be sure that you are really the one who wants it.

Ladies, gents, etc., do not take your choices for granted, whatever they are. There is no right, and the only wrong is thinking that there is.


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