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In the next 35 years, feminism needs to reclaim lost ground. Many issues that once "had no name" but were important to what happened in our real lives were explored in the 1970s. While some of these were never lost or have moved to the forefront-lesbian and gay rights, race and racism in women's movements, global feminisms-others were buried in the "sex wars." Prior to the sex wars, for example, feminists had dared question the expectation that we be "hairless wonders" (except for our heads).

The "slut feminism" embraced by some women in the 1980s and 90s made it difficult to question the rules about "sexy" appearance propagated by media moguls (rich men) and enforced by the less privileged men who may be our husbands, fathers, boyfriends, or sons. "Slut feminism" suggested that as long as we had our orgasms, it didn't much matter how we got them. If being "sexy" the way the media moguls said was sexy helped us get off, then we shouldn't question what "sexy" was, or those who insisted on its restrictive standards. And one of the most iron-clad rules of being sexy was, and is, shaving.

Let's not be silenced any longer. Most women have bristling legs, arms and armpits. The idea that we must pluck, shave, wax or otherwise remove body hair to achieve the smoothness of a baby's bottom is impractical and destructive. As Mimi Spencer writes in The Age, an Australian publication, "What woman doesn't abhor the eggy smell of depilatory cream, the searing pain of a blunt razor dragged up her shinbone, or the embarrassment of opening the door to the postman with crème bleach still clinging to her upper lip?"1 As long as we accept this social norm without question, the development of ever more torturous methods of hair removal will continue. Consider the Brazilian bikini wax, "which was surely developed in Hades, but (get this) has actually received good press from the world's ditzy beauty editors. Not only is it a humbling and hideous experience, during which you proffer your undercarriage to an unknown shop girl, it also hurts like the babyjesus."