Hair Today
26 March 2007
It is not only we girls who are obsessed with what to do with our unwanted, unruly hairs.
Whether to trim, pluck, shave, wax, or laser etc. etc., this is the new millennium enquiry amongst both sexes.
Can’t say that I’m any less preoccupied with said enquiry than the average girl.
However, after reading How To Shave The Modern Male, I feel fortunate that managing my feral body hair is not fraught in ways that apparently it is for the average hairy bloke.
This no doubt is due to the fact that once fashion dictated shorter hemlines, briefer swimming togs, vis-à-vis “skin is in,” for better or worse, girls were socialized into managing their stray hairs.
In other words, girly boomers, gen Jones, gen X, Y, at el, grew up knowing too much too soon about the joys of depilation.
In contrast, male body-hair removal is a recent phenomenon - thanks to the metrosexual revolution.
Oh, and then fill the glossies and visual media with images of young male models sporting metrosexual smooth bods and what happens?
Girlfriends/lovers/wives infatuated with the nubile Adonis-look, nudge they’re hairy mates either in the direction of the bathroom and the razor, or a licensed esthetician.
Never too far from body hair trends, clever Philips identified male body-hair removal as the next big commercial opportunity: shaveeverywhere.com
If you’ve clicked on the “shave everywhere” link and watched the Philips Body Groom ad and you’re still not laughing, there is something seriously wrong with you!
I laughed, and then just as quickly remembered not laughing but screaming when as a hairy-legged teen and newbie to shaving, I tore out a chunk of skin from my shin with Beaty’s blunt razor.
In the years since losing my shin skin, hair removal has come a long way - think laser. In that sense the Philips Body Groom, high tech or not, is still a razor and still oh-so-sharp for use up in “God’s country.”
The good news: There’s a word for blokes averse to the dangers of shaving their parts and pieces, and for the girlfriends et al, who like their bloke’s bod’s nick-free and downy soft.
Hirsutulous (hur-SOO-chuh-luhs): It’s from Latin and means rough and hairy (and incredibly feral).
March 26th, 2007 at 6:54 pm