this is funny...I will be in charge of the pro-hair backlash.
Savage Love
by Dan Savage
November 5 - 11, 2003
I need help understanding a trend. As a physician, I see lots of naked bodies. For several years I've noticed that, generally speaking, many straight patients (men and women) in their twenties have trimmed and/or coiffed pubic hair. A lot of the men tell me that their girlfriends prefer it that way; some have said, "It makes me feel cooler and cleaner." Occasionally I have to treat folliculitis (an infection/inflammation at the base of the hair follicles) caused by overaggressive shaving. Recently I noticed many of my 14- to 16-year-old male patients have completely trimmed off their pubic hair. What gives? When I was that age, I anxiously awaited a full set. â??Pursuing Understanding by Inquiring Columnist
Women have long felt it necessary to shave their legs, pits, forearms, wrists, backs, shins, and ankles, PUBIC. Then about 10 years ago stylish women began having their pubic hairs ripped out at the roots. Surely you've heard of the Brazilian bikini wax, Doc. The pubeless look was popularized by several cultural trends: the mainstreaming of pornography, teeny bathing suits, and awful, unflattering low-rise jeans. Naturally bushy women went from trimming to li'l Hitler mustaches to complete deforestation in under a decade.
Meanwhile, male homosexuals were taking over American cultural life. That gay men now dominate our culture is not some paranoid Christian conservative's fantasy, PUBIC, but a fact of life. Queer Eye for the Straight Guy confirmed something everyone already knew: Outside of rap and hip-hop culture, stylish gay menâ??not all gay men, mind you, just the stylish onesâ??are the real tastemakers. And gay men weren't content setting tastes in jackets and hair products and cowhide-accent chairs. Hardly. We were, however subtly, setting sexual tastes as well. Out went the virile man (So long, Burt Reynolds!) and in came the vulnerable boy (Hello, Ashton Kutcher!). Soon the kind of guys most gay men want to fuck became the kind of guys most straight women want to fuck, the male beauty ideal every bit as hairless as its female counterpart.
The funny thing is that once you start stigmatizing some body hair it's only a matter of time before all body hair is deemed unattractive. Women started having their pubes yanked out because body hair on women had long been seen as unattractive and unfeminine; as they started wearing outfits that basically exposed everything but their vulvas, off came more and more body hair. Men began shaving off their chest hair in response to a gay-dictated beauty ideal in which body hair was just as unattractive on males as it was on females. And you're seeing the results of this cultural shift every time one of your 16-year-old male patients drops his drawers.
I'm not endorsing any of this. While I'm a longtime supporter of the reigning beauty idealâ??I like 'em lean and hairlessâ??there are people out there who feel differently. Indeed, a pro-hair backlash is already under way.
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I am a 15-year-old male with a questionâ??what is proper etiquette regarding pubic hairs? I will soon be having my first sexual experience and was wondering whether or not the majority of women prefer the area hairless. â??Condoms and Manners
The proper etiquette, CAM, can be summed up in three words: Keep it clean. However much pubic hair you've got, no one wants to press his or her nose into a stinky, matted mass. If your fingers stink after you scratch your balls or you've got Butterfinger crumbs in your pubes or, God forbid, butt rasta is drifting up from your ass crack, then it's time to take a shower, CAM.
While some women will prefer you to trim or arrive hairless, others will prefer that you arrive with all the hair God saw fit to grow down there. If you're indifferent on the pubic-hair issue, if your partner's wishes are more important than your own, I would urge you to make the young woman in your life an offer: Tell her that how much or how little pubic hair you have is entirely up to her. If she likes it trimmed or hairless, she can trim or shave off your pubes herself.
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I had a mishap this morning. While trimming my pubes I accidentally trimmed off a chunk of clit. My concern is regarding the healing process. Is it going to heal normally? What are my risks of infection? Do you think that the scar tissue will affect the feeling? I'm concerned about this affecting my sex life. Any recommendations would be greatly appreciated. â??Chunk Lost in Trim
You trimmed off a chunk of your clit? A chunk? Jesus Christ, CLIT, what are you using to trim your pubes? A riding lawnmower?
And, like, excuse me, but your first impulse after carving off a chunk of your clit was to send me a letter? If my clit was lighter by a chunk and bleeding like crazy, CLIT, my first impulse wouldn't be to dash to the computer to send an e-mail to some fag who writes a sex advice column. I WOULD GO SEE MY FUCKING GYNECOLOGIST! You may be at risk of infection; you may lose some sensation; it may affect your sex lifeâ??but only a doctor can examine what's left of your clit, look for signs of deadly clit-eating bacteria, and offer you the medical interventions you may require.
