Women in France are using the hashtag #LesPrincessesOntDesPoils, which means #PrincessesHaveHair, to challenge the stigma surrounding the appearance of body hair.
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Blame porn, blame advertising, blame Barbie, the sad reality is this “beauty standard” is still kicking around in 2016.
“French women don’t shave their armpits” has always been a diss used by men who have never actually met a French woman, and probably haven’t come close to any other sort of female since leaving school.
Adele Labo, a 16-year-old from Lille, started the social media hashtag to try and fight stigma around female body hair after she was ridiculed at school for not shaving.
Ms Labo told The Guardian that she chose to start sharing pictures of her body hair after she was teased at school for not shaving. In an interview with Le Huffington Post, she said that the remarks hurt her feelings at the time, but that she is now, with the support of her family, happy with the way her body looks. “I think society stigmatises women, there is massive social pressure over body hair”, she told The Guardian.
Céline Montaudy wrote “So exhausted of the stigma around women and their NATURAL body hair” whilst another woman simply captioned her photo with “my body my choice”.
Body hair removal dates as far back as ancient Greece and Egypt, but really took off in the 20th century when Gillette sold the first razor for women in 1915, declaring body hair “unsightly”. Some people choose to wax it or shave it or otherwise get remove it, which is totally fine, while others choose to go the natural route and leave it on the body for all to see.
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Here are some of the images that women have sent in.
