‘I don’t care if men find me attractive’: The complex politics of leg hair

Wait 5 sec.

When Joanie O’Mara, 28, stopped shaving her legs, it made her feel “really self-conscious.” She had learned to embrace body hair in other areas because it felt more deliberate – “more punk and feminist” – but leg hair remained contentious in her mind. Unlike armpit hair and pubic hair, it felt neither defiant nor erotic. “Legs are just legs,” she says, “so it’s perceived as unkempt.”Earlier this month,