“The film is set in the 50s, I couldn’t have just had a landing strip! I had to grow the hair down there. But because of years of waxing, as all of us girls know, it doesn’t come back quite the way it used to. They even made me a merkin – a wig – because they were so concerned that I might not be able to grow enough.”Dear.
God.
There are times when I am apalled at the horror that is mankind. War, murder, rape, genocide, syrupy coffee drinks, Uggs. And there are moments when I am stopped, mute, overwhelmed by the exuberant beauty that is the world and everything in it; birdsong, the unthinking caress, thunderstorms, a sleeping cat, blueberry cheesecake.
But...merkins?I cannot honestly decide what to think.
I know what I think: These "landing strips" and Brazilian waxes are utterly absurd! Women have hair! Mind, there are some women who could do with a bit of trimming, but to create a strip, as though it were a tarmac-styled topiary, is just nuts!
ReplyDeleteWho thinks this is pretty? Many years ago male friend shared that perplexed by the shaved look some purveyors of pornography prefer -- why? We decided the male consumers were threatened by real women, preferring the hairless juvenile who would be more ... submissive.
Basically I hew to the idea that natural is best. Alas, women are brainwashed that they must make themselves somehow better; I say, just BE better.
Cute title :)
ReplyDeleteMy suspicion, Lisa, is that part of this is laddish fears of the reality of femaleness. A woman with a glorious thatch of pubic hair probably has other untamed personal traits; a will of her own, messy colds, a tendency to slap you stupid if you call her "the little woman"...
ReplyDeleteA Barbie-slick woman has been tamed and trimmed, depilated and tamed. She won't make scenes, won't force you to listen to her, won't be...well, she'll be like a woman in a porn film; a life-support system for a vagina.
As I said; I don't get it. If you don't want to be intimate, emotionally, intellectually, and physically with a real woman, dude, be considerate and consider masturbation. It's kinder on everyone. I'm really getting sick of the way the public image of "woman" has become a porny sort of impossibly skinny, forever-sixteen nymphette. Sick, and sad.
Oh, I'm totally with you. Barbie still rules the day (and night), for all Oprah's efforts to the contrary. We may have "Latina" and black women entering the red carpet, but the closer they approximate the Barbie image, the better (Eva Longoria, Halle Berry, etc.)
ReplyDeleteWe as women, some of us, may feel better about ourselves, but most boy-men would still prefer we shut up, shut down and "open up". It is complex, of course, because women have not learned to be authentic, and so the games continue . . .