Fascism & Female Pubic Hair Removal: Hygiene

The American twentieth century featured a gradual erosion of female bodily hair.  It began with the legs and continued to the armpits, until by the end of the century women felt the pressure to remove all or at least most of their pubic hair.

The immediate link between female hair removal and consumerism is obvious: more shaving means increased sales of razors, creams, and lotions. Today, female hair removal is a multi-billion-dollar industry that encompasses everything from standard household razors and creams to professional waxes and laser-hair-removal.

In order to convince women to spend their precious free-time and hard-earned cash on pubic hair removal, Consumer Society attacked on several related fronts: hygiene, self-confidence, peer pressure, and the perceived preference of males.

First, there is the completely inaccurate and misguided notion that a hairy pubic region is somehow unhygienic.  Males constantly repeat this mantra, to each other, to the women in their lives, and all over the internet.  Women also speak of feeling "cleaner" when they have a shaved pubic region.  This illusion of cleanliness is of course due to the fact that for over a decade now women have been fed the message that their pubic hair is "unclean," whether from their female peers, from men, from mass media, or from pornography.

A central tenant of Fascism is its focus on cleanliness and cleansing.  The unclean ethnic "Other" must be cleansed from the pure national race so that it can flourish.

In our Misogynist Consumer-Fascism, the unclean Other is woman, with her menstrual flow, her vaginal discharge, her vaginal odor, and her "unsightly" pubic hair.  The disorder of her Otherness poses a threat to the controlled order of the phallus.  For our male-dominated, phallocentric society, the vulva is a foreign body, composed of complicated folds, nooks, and crannies that lack the familiarity of the simple and dominant penis.  The vagina itself is a terrifyingly empty cavity that supposedly emits vile and noxious substances. Many American men seem to hold a notion that the female genitalia is inherently "unclean" and in need of constant maintenance lest it resort to its foul and repulsive natural state.

(Hence the sheer brilliance of South Park's "Poor and Stupid" episode [Season 14, Episode 8], where Cartman becomes a NASCAR driver for Vagisil, and there is much talk about making stinky vaginas "minty fresh."  Thankfully, Patty ultimately gets revenge on her husband for the shame he repeatedly makes her feel over her vaginal odors.)

Female pubic hair is just one element of the female genital region that apparently disgusts American men.  However, female pubic hair is something men can easily control by removing it, thereby exposing the vulva to the male scientific gaze.  As long as they can see the vulva, without any hair in the way, the vulva no longer seems so mysterious and frightening.  Instead, in real-life the bare female vulva is as familiar and unthreatening as the shaved pussies American men have been staring at and masturbating to all their lives, in their controlled world of pornography.  (Or as the hairless vulva of a pre-pubescent child.)

Although his obsession with female genital hygiene stems from both sexes, it is the product of an exclusively male-dominated Fascism.  It is therefore no coincidence that men are largely oblivious to their own uncleanliness. 

As anyone familiar with humanity can attest, the male body is obviously far dirtier than the female body.  To put it another way: men smell like shit.  The wealth of hair around a man's anus ensures that he will not be able to cleanse himself properly after defecation unless he washes immediately afterwards.  The perineum and the scrotum will also absorb some of the fecal smell, particularly if the man sweats during the day.  Even a man with a shaved pubic region will smell awful after a day of sweating.  And uncircumsized penises have a particularly unpleasant smell all their own.  Yet we do not see commercials telling men how they can "keep their anus fresh" or stop their balls from sweating or make their foreskin more hygienic.

Similarly, unlike women, men always expel a thick, sticky, glutinous substance when they achieve orgasm.  Yet a man who patently refuses to perform oral sex on a woman (even a woman without pubic hair) will nonetheless expect to ejaculate in her mouth and even have her swallow his semen, despite its nauseating consistency and unsavory flavor.

This phallocentric attitude is perfectly captured in this clip from Andrew Dice Clay circa 1987.

After talking extensively about how important it is for women to perform oral sex on men (beginning at around the four-minute mark), Dice offers his reflections on the female genitalia: "You ever see a vagina up close? It's frightening. It's like a haunted house down there. It's covered with shrubbery and weeds. You gotta cut through with a machete."  Of course, that was back in 1987, before most American women removed their pubic hair.  Dice would be much less frightened by today's hairless vulvae, thanks in large part to the fact that so many American men have embraced the misogynist attitude of Dice's on-state persona.

Women are constantly bombarded with these false notions that their genitalia are unhygienic, whether it be from the mass media, from their male peers, or from social institutions.  This Daily Beast Article on Yale Sex Week relates the story of a middle-school sex-ed class, where "the boys and girls were separated: Boys were taught about wet dreams, and how they’re OK; Girls taught about periods, and how to stay clean. The message to boys was 'you’re sexual beings, don’t worry about it.' To girls, 'you’re dirty, don’t forget to douche.'"

The perceived necessity of female pubic hair removal is just the latest effort by Misogynist Consumer-Fascism to establish the female body as unhygienic so that women will purchase products to alter their natural bodies.  The pubic razor and the professional wax have now become standard consumer products, joining the douche and the feminine wash among the unnecessary items women purchase to keep their womanhood under control and mold it to masculine sensibilities.

(For the record, of all the women I have performed cunnilingus on, I have never once encountered a single one whose genitalia smelled unpleasant.  And the overwhelming majority of these women had full, natural bushes.  And this includes quite a few encounters when the woman was coming straight from a long, sweaty workout at the gym.)

People of course have the freedom to groom their pubic regions in whatever manner they choose.  However, it is important to question WHY you want to remove your pubic hair, whether it be by trimming, shaving, waxing, or laser-hair-removal.  Why is it that a woman will say she feels "cleaner" without pubic hair?  Is it even possible that, in America (and the world) today, a woman will desire to remove her pubic hair entirely of her own accord, without any influence from the New Fascism? Consumerism always sells slavery under the illusion of choice and freedom.

Unfortunately, regardless of her own personal reasons for doing so, each time a woman removes her pubic hair, she is conforming to the wishes of those who whine that "pubic hair is gross," who leave comments like "shave your pussy bitch!" all over the internet, and who urge women to "keep it clean."

Remember, the obsession with cleanliness and cleansing the Other is a central tenant of Fascism.  What distinguishes this New Fascism is that it concentrates its efforts on the very essence of a woman's womanhood:  her genitalia.  Cleansing through pubic hair removal is just the latest in a long line of campaigns that attack the defining physical characteristics of the female genitalia, whether it be menstruation, vaginal discharge, vaginal odors, or the pubic hair that began to sprout when a woman made those first steps from childhood to puberty on the path to becoming an adult.  By virtually requiring women to remove their pubic hair, today's Fascism seeks to ensnare women in a perpetual, child-like state of submission to adolescent male desires and to the forces of Consumerism.

Control the dangerous Other by sheering off her womanhood.  Keep her clean so you can use her with minimal disgust.  Then dispose of her when you're through.