I never really liked the feel of shaving. Sometimes I’d try waxing, although anyone who has ever tried waxing themselves with cold wax will understand the difficulties here- I mostly just ended up stuck to various things around my room. I experimented with hair removal cream which I actually found ok, if a little scary when your leg hair starts to disintegrate, and after a while my legs started reacting badly to it. All in all, I really wasn’t a fan of hair removal techniques.
The thing is, I shouldn’t have felt I needed to be a fan of them. Nowhere is there a contractual obligation for me, as a woman, to shave my legs once a week. Yet many people get into this routine without questioning why they’re doing it. We fork out on razors promising us a smooth finish, on shaving cream to avoid getting a rash. But we don’t ask why we’re doing this, or at least we don’t ask it often enough.
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Contrary to some people’s misguided opinions, you don’t have to shave your legs to be a feminist, or to be a woman who can make her own decisions. If you’re shaving because you’ve made the conscious decision to, and you’re not doing it for anyone else, then that’s fine. But I always found it was really hard to tell who I was shaving for.
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If I was going out I’d argue I was doing it because I liked the feel of it and I should make myself feel good. However, no doubt it was also because I knew people might take notice of my legs, or take photos, and making myself feel good was, in part, knowing that my legs were ‘acceptable’. So one summer, I decided not to shave. I didn’t shave often anyway (and really I mean like never in the winter and maybe once a month each summer at most), but for this I went full on no razor. I decided if I could do this then if I felt the urge to shave my legs afterwards, I would know that it would be for myself and no one else.
All in all, I learnt a lot of things about myself. Like the fact my natural leg hair is really light, so nobody noticed I hadn’t shaved until I mentioned it. I became more confident, being able to walk into shops in my home town, where I knew the same girls I was scared of in school would be, with my legs out and standing tall. I also found out that when you don’t shave for a while, your leg hair actually becomes quite soft and cuddly.
This November, I call on you to try what I did in the summer. Let’s ditch the razors together and see what it’s like to stop shaving for a month*. After the month is up you can get rid of the hair straight away, or you can leave it for a while. But hopefully you’ll have learnt more about yourself and thought about the reasons you started to shave in the first place, knowing that when you do it again, it’s for you. This is all part of a Winter Warmer campaign and we’ll be encouraged to raise money by not shaving for a charity called Woman at the Well, who provide a safe and supportive space for vulnerable women.
Follow RHUL women’s and marginalised genders’ network on Facebook for more details.
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