Once you get to a certain age, you’ll eventually realize that the only constant in life is change.
While the saying sounds cheesy, it doesn’t change the fact that it’s true. This saying applies to everything in our lives, from our bodies, the way we think, and the way society sees beauty.
History has been a chronicle of revolutions and counter-revolutions all meant to break the status quo in order to progress to something (hopefully) better than what people had during that time.
One particular development in the 21st century is that we’ve seen trends that have actually tried to bring us back to the old way of doing or seeing things. This is certainly true in the beauty standards of women.
Society, in general, has been conditioned to believe that shaving is an indispensable part of a woman’s beauty regime. But it may surprise you to know that at the beginning of the 20th century, shaving women’s armpits and legs wasn’t even the norm. However, relentless advertising was about to change all of that.
When sleeveless dresses came into fashion, advertisers started promoting the idea that women should shave their armpit hair. Leg hair soon followed.
By the time the 1950’s rolled in, what was initially seen as a fad eventually transformed into a social standard that has lasted for decades. But recently, some women have started questioning the validity of this beauty standard and have even gone so far as to stop shaving body hair entirely.
They even show their unshaved body hair on social media to inform everyone that body hair is a natural part of women’s bodies and something that should be celebrated.
In line with this, a woman named Laura Jackson decided to introduce “Januhairy” in 2018. This campaign encourages women to stop shaving their body hair for a month and experience what it was like before advertisers totally changed our standards of beauty.
A lot of women have responded and have even shared their unshaved pictures!
Replaced!