The Vagina as Commodity: What Does the Pubic Depilation Phenomenon Mean?

Posted on Comments

“This particular cosmetic trend — I’ve dubbed it the Deforestation of the Pubic Delta — is really a byproduct of the pornification of culture. In the same way, trends like breast augmentation, body piercing and tattoos for women have been mainstreamed by the pervasive porn aesthetic.
“When you turn sex into a commodity, the marketing mentality takes over.”
— Robert Stacy McCain, Feb. 22, 2010

In recent years, anecdotal testimony has suggested that “sexually active” young American women are more or less expected to shave or wax their pubic regions to a condition of utter hairlessness.

Exactly when this trend began, and when it gathered such momentum that the unshaven woman is considered a bizarre novelty, I’m not sure. But further confirmation arrived this morning on Twitter when, responding to a “who to follow” recommendation, I stumbled into this conversation involving several young people:

Everyone who has written about this phenomenon agrees that the hairless vulva trend began in the world of pornography, and there are many observers who see this as a matter of women trying to live up to erotic expectations created by the porn industry.

As such, you might expect feminists to denounce this trend, but the ethos of “pro-sex feminism” seems to require that they endorse every manifestation of hedonistic promiscuity as “empowerment.” So the spectacle of women rendering their crotches as hairless as a fourth-grader’s in order to satisfy the porn-influenced expectations of their boyfriends — no, feminists don’t want to criticize that trend.

We must view this trend in the context of a shift in which traditional norms have crumbled in a comparatively short time frame.

The venerable ideal of pre-marital chastity, for example, has given way to the expectation that everyone will participate in the Hook-Up Culture. A person who is not sexually active by the time they’re old enough to get a driver’s license is considered abnormal, and no one seems to imagine it possible that a virgin could graduate college. If everybody is screwing around promiscuously, it becomes impossible even to discuss promiscuity as a phenomenon, because it’s simply what everybody does. Screwing around becomes a normative expectation.

Attendant to this expectation is the understanding that sex is now a matter of competitive performance: In an environment where everyone is presumed to have had multiple previous partners, lovers are striving to out-do their partner’s previous lovers in a sort of erotic sweepstakes pageant, with the goal of impressing one’s partner as exceptionally skilled at various sexual routines.

Only in such an environment can there be a ubiquitous fashion in genital grooming, and one wonders why young women — who otherwise are taught to emulate feminist ideals by resisting male demands — go along with this trend so compliantly.

Increasingly, it seems, women are encouraged to view their sexuality as a commodity in the consumer marketplace, and this attitude has become so common that no one even stops to consider just how weirdly unnatural and unhealthy this attitude is.

 

 

Category: Sex

88 comments

  7. I’m amazed that no one is protesting the obvious and disastrous ecological consequences of this practice. Maybe we can get that CA judge who shut off the Central Valley’s water to save the delta smelt to issue a ruling to SAVE THE CRABS!

  10. Just to weigh in, I do a lot of nude photography and I’m noticing a trend back toward pubic hair amongst a lot of models. For adult performers I think the look of shaved vag is in some ways a matter of aesthetics but also one of practicality for scenes involving oral sex, pop shots, etc.

  12. I wonder how much of this is influenced by pedophiles who like the little girl look. I wonder how many pedophiles are in the fashion industry. They like the little girl look with flat chests also.

  14. That’s what I find so funny. Shaving your armpits? Patriarchy! Shaving your legs? Submissive! Shaving your naughty bits? Empowering!

  15. Actually a lot of the fashion industry is made up of gay males so that’s why you see so many flat chested young women as their aesthetic ideal is often that of the twink: a hairless, thin, androgynous male in his late teens to early 20’s.

  16. Actually Ive been seeing full bush and armpit hair amongst a lot of twenty something women. I do hate the armpit hair though. It’s a real turn-off. Thankfully a lot of them haven’t moved on to leg hair yet but it’s out there.

  17. You do realize that, had this post been written 100 years ago, you would be talking about the new trend of women shaving their legs and underarms, right?

  22. I do not generally do “R” rated Rule 5s, but I would propose someone explore the transition from hirsute to hairless.

    Me, I am covered with hair (a double coat to be exact). So, I am definitely old school.

  23. Don’t forget Miley Cyrus.

    I mean, I’d rather forget her, but I suppose this is something that Stacy should add to list.

    IYKWIMAITTYD.

  24. I saw the headline, read “PubLic Depilation” above that provocative photo (for whatever reason), and wondered just what latest fad associated with the decline of Western Civilization that our esteemed host was researching this time.

    With Stacy, you just never know. Heck, with the world you never know. But I’m glad it was just a case of temporary dyslexia.

  26. They are feeding you a bunch of nonsense. I lived in the tropics for over a decade, and the ONLY women who did that were professional models who had to model skimpy bikinis. A few friends tried it once just for kicks and the agony of the experience convinced them that it is a demonic plot.

  28. You’re way overthinking this, Stacy. Women are removing their pubic hair because oral sex has become such a routine part of sexual relations. Nobody wants to get hair in their mouths when they’re eating “pie.”

  32. Our esteemed host got it right with just one sentence, “Attendant to this expectation is the understanding that sex is now a matter of competitive performance.” Women are absolutely their own worst enemies when it comes to men. Why on God’s earth would women actually choose to wear stiletto heels, or let their boyfriends make girlfriend porn or buy skirts so short and tight that they can’t move, other than the competitive pressures they feel?

    A clue: if every woman out there stopped shaving, stopped shaving everything, we men would still like them. As that great American philosopher, Sam Kinneson, once put it, we have just two choices: we can either love women, or (fellate) a big (penis).

  34. Women who shave their pubic hair have only gone half the road of the aesthetic if they haven’t also had an anal bleaching to complete the look….

  36. Y’know, I’m just going to take your word for that. As much as journalistic curiosity might urge me to Google “anal bleaching,” I’ll resist that urge.

Comments are closed.