“New Year, New Me” has been said/ heard by every one of us at least once since going back to school. And because I know you all already took marvelous resolutions on your work and your everyday organization, I will suggest one new engagement towards yourself for this year to come. For this environment issue, I decided that we could all rewind to how Mother Nature made us. Far from gender, far from society and from stereotypes, I want you to embrace your inner self, effective now.
In order to do so, you need to distance yourself from societal biases. I point at all those (not so) implicit rules exhorting you to match a defined image. Namely, girls having to be hairless on every single part of the body while boys, conversely, have to wear a beard to be considered virile. Constantly trying to reach those ideals only keeps us away from our natural state of being. But additionally, we are widening gender expectations. The hygienist society which we evolve in made us believe that hair is dirty…but only for women, as it would make grey hair sexy just for men. Magazines, advertisement and pornography showcasing women with hairless armpits or photoshopped bikini lines are so omnipresent we interiorized those concepts. We are now living in a sterilized world where women are reduced to smooth creatures supposed to embody their delicacy and tenderness.
However, reality is the mere opposite. Hair does exist to protect us from cold, infections, in brief, they prevent us from exterior aggressions and keep our bodies healthy. When we preach perfect (non-)pilosity, we convey the controversial message that keeping one’s hair is dirty. This is society driving us to deny our original nature and it should make us consider why we follow its standards. Instead, we need to empower ourselves by preaching the beauty of our natural and imperfect bodies, with or without hair, scars, stains… Caring about nature is also caring about our nature and love every bit of us. I want us to feel sexy thanks to who we are deep down, original and unique and not because we reached to get an Instagram-model-body.
So yes, I want this month, and the ones to come to be those of a progressive body positivity, in phase with who we are, as to reconnect not only on a physical level but also on a psychological one. Winnie Harlow with her vitiligo skin, Arvida Byström and Sophia Hadjipanteli for their pilosity pride or even Sophie Fontanel and her grey hair, to name but a few, will all encourage you to do down this path of a natural body and soul, so make sure to check them out!
Savannah Quero-Isola, The Thames Dolphin
