Does any woman really look forward to bathing suit season? Or for that matter, any occasion – the annual office formal ball, Halloween or that ABC party theme your roommates insist on constantly reprising, when we must put ourselves on display for the world whether we want to or not?
Maybe it’s not so much about putting ourselves, and by extension our physical forms out there for all to see, maybe it’s the impending prospect of preparation and the pain that usually accompanies said primping.
Waxing. Plucking. Exfoliating. Poking. Pricking. Judging. Shaving. Why do women put themselves through such drastic routines to conform to current standards of beauty? Can’t we be beautiful and have hair on our armpits? According to mass media in North America the answer to that question is a resounding NO! While artists, actresses and other prominent members of Western civilization have made stabs at being progressive by not partaking in these ritual personal sacrifices to the goddess of beauty not much has been done on the ground level.
Via Harper’s Bazaar
We still rip our hair from its roots with burning hot wax, we still maintain that eyebrows must be plucked regularly to avoid resembling one of the kids in that Cadbury commercial and of course, this regime would not be complete without the self-doubt all of these modifications prompt. By changing ourselves constantly and tampering with our natural looks we are questioning our own innate beauty – we are pushing for change when we should be celebrating ourselves.
Alan Cumming, a well-known Scottish actor recognized for his roles on television, in film and at the theatre has thrice acted in the controversial musical Cabaret. Set in Berlin, the story unravels around the setting of a nightclub and it was noted in the film version that starred Liza Minnelli, that her armpits were shaved though the other dancing girls’ were not. This distinction made it clear who was the star.
Cumming’s relationship with the show has been through Broadway and once, in an interview he discussed the topic of having women and men with more hair than usual on their bodies appearing in the piece. What he told National Public Radio was interesting and enlightening, “I think this obsession we have in our culture with shaving — taking away body hair on men and women — I think it’s really dangerous, it’s like wanting to infantilize yourself and wanting to make something sexy that is not adult, it’s more prepubescent, and I think that’s really weird and dangerous, don’t you?”
What he says is true to an extent, we already know that with programs like Photoshop our perception of beauty is skewed but is it really that dangerous? Are we really placing ourselves at risk by reducing our entire worth down to the absence or presence of one stray hair on our chin or above our eyebrow?
The answer is yes. Yes, we make ourselves undergo pain to ameliorate our physicality while we allow the idea of pain and beauty to intermingle. That’s the dangerous cocktail – once mixed it can become almost impossible to untangle a negative motivation from a positive one. We must understand that beauty is not pain; they do not operate in a pair.
There came beauty without pain, and pain never has to masquerade as beauty – so, who cares if your eyebrows are bushier or your legs have stubble – it’s your body, it’s yours to do with as you please and that’s all there is to it.
by Sam Lehman
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