TWITTER TROLLS’
Siam Goorwich pens an ode to ditching the razor and letting the fur fly free
AS I RUN my hand over the soft, downy hairs, I feel a sense of contentment. But I’m not talking about my kitten or my Shrimps faux-fur coat. I’m talking about my lusciously hairy legs.
Hairy legs are back on the agenda, thanks to a boundary-pushing adidas campaign image featuring Swedish artist/model/ photographer/internet cool girl Arvida Byström, in which she dares to bare her pelt-like pins. As you’d expect, the image has met with mixed reactions – from virtual thumbs up to actual rape threats.
‘Being such an abled, white, cis body with its only nonconforming feature being a lil leg hair… I can’t even begin to imagine what it’s like to not possess these privileges and try to exist in the world,’ said Arvida.
As a body hair advocate myself, I found the image heartening. My own love affair with forbidden body hair began as I approached the big 3-0. In my teens and early twenties, I shaved, waxed and plucked with the best of them. But as my twenties came to an end, something shifted. Not only did I begin to resent the pain – both physical and financial – but growing my body hair started to make me feel empowered and strangely sensual.
Stripping my body of hair used to make me feel sleek and sexy, but over the past few years I’ve learned to feel just as desirable when my body is in its natural state. I’ve also discovered there’s something deeply comforting about growing a thick thatch, especially in winter.
Unlike Arvida, I haven’t yet been brave enough to get my hairy legs out in public, but it’s increasingly feeling like an itch I want to scratch. #Freethebodyhair has a pretty nice ring to it, no?
KEEP YOUR HAIR ON