What do you get when you tell a feminist/Sexuality student to write a fairy tale?
Once upon a time there was a vast prairie in which tiny protections of vellus hair could frolic and play. In this pudendum habitat, each strand was purposeful, and unified in its duty to provide warmth and sensitivity to the skin beneath it. The hair moved together as would flocks of births swooping down into traffic and consuming trees in songs of joyful gossip; they belonged together and their similarities were evident behaviorally as well as physically. Occasionally, a huge fatty hand would explore their texture. Other times, the hand became two and, lathered with bubbles, would cater to the general cleanliness. But such episodes of disruptions did not deter the community and those hands were not frightening, as you might imagine- almost as if they were all one with each other. They all lived in perfect harmony.
But one day, the mood on the grassy field seemed different. All of the hairs stood on end and something had changed. The fragrance in the air was different. The seeming unification was no more. The hairs whispered excitedly amongst themselves when suddenly and without warning a grand tower rose from among them, with violent sound and ground-shaking force. A shush fell over the crowd as they gazed up at this beanstalk of black. The very first pubic hair, perfectly rough and perfectly straight. Way up at the top, they heard its voice “ummmm… hello? Hi. It’s me, it’s Patrick. Can anyone hear me?”. The murmurs got louder, incredulous comments from each direction. Finally, a brave independent takes over communication. “Patrick? Is that really you? What has happened to you? You are gigantic… your skin is coarse and… and you look like you haven’t seen the sun in ages…”. Patrick answers “I don’t know- I think I’m losing my balance… you all look so small down there…” But his voice was interrupted by a deafening scream. The hand came down and pulled at Patrick. “Mooooooooom! I have a hair! A big black one!” the voice speaks. It’s a familiar voice, the holder of the harmony, and she seems distraught. The crowd stares with terror at the obtuse protrusion. “Oh it’s perfectly natural, baby. It’s just pubic hair. Soon you will have tons of them” a different megaphoned voice comments. The community can no longer hold their silence, they grow into panicked yelps and screams. Soon “you” will have tons of them?! Tons of towering hairs, hairs that grown in disparate patterns and obstruct the view- obstruct the very NATURE of their balance?
Soon a rumble takes over again- another hair has sprouted. The hairs scream with panic, locked in place they reach as far away from the eruptions as possible. “Oh my god! It’s happened to me! Noooooooo” screams the newly emerged. “Diana? Is that you?” called out a voice down below. The panic was now widespread. Their chaos was only made dull by the continued back-and-forth of the omnipotent voices discussing the appropriate course of action. It seemed as though there was an option to get rid of the new growth completely. The vellus mobbed into the mentality of abolishing the outsiders. Diana and Patrick reached towards each other, trying to find camaraderie, trying to find warmth. In their contortions, they became longer and longer, more curved and coiled. A familiar tremor game way to a third. Then a fourth. While the crowd’s voices had turned into chants of abolishment, the new graduates continued to turn into each other, finding the warmth and harmony they had so suddenly lost. Within hours, the curly mounds of hair lay intermingled, and the rhythmic calls for removal had become distant and minute. The majority was now metamorphosed. Even the maker of the body has covered the light and returned to normalcy.
Soon, the entire valley was unrecognizable. The new landscape was disorganized, disruptive. This new type of chaos had given way to a new dynamic of harmony- one where the collective textures of each brought unbridled, unlimited passion- the type of passion that outsiders seek to quiet down and that depends on itself for its very survival. From that day onward, pubic hairs twist and kink to weave closer together, and little girls must chose every day if their symbolic disarray will stay welcome on her skin.