Everything Is Content - Everything In Conversation: Is The Bush Back?

Episode Date: May 7, 2025

Just call us the American voting public in 2000 because this week we're asking "Bush or no Bush?" With your help we're diving into the discourse vis-à-vis shaving your pubes & asking all of the most important questions: why is 2025 being heralded as the year of the bush, are female pube-plants really on the rise, could pubes be a recession indicator, is hair down there ever unhygienic and just how exhausted are we of our bodily features being sucked into yet another trend cycle? Thank you all SO much for your opinions on this topic- they were as candid, insightful, thought-provoking and hilarious as EVER. Le bush c'est chic!If you enjoy the ep we'd loooove a share on your socials (tag us @everythingiscontentpod), a mention in the group chat or a rating and review wherever you're reading this. It helps SO much. See you on Friday for the second and final part of our AI deep dive. O, R, B x Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more information.

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this is part of the show where we normally would share some headlines and debrief you on what's been happening from across the week. But since we are recording this ahead of time, we are taking a little holiday FYI, well deserved, I hope. That sadly is not going to happen this week, but luckily we will be back next week with all the juiciest and most important stories from the pop culture world. So don't worry. So at the start of this year, Vogue magazine published an article called The Bush is Back in 2025. And this came on the heels of a viral TikTok video where a woman said she had been radicalised by seeing an Etsy ad for a bikini where the model had a full bush. She said

she saw the picture and thought, yeah, that's how it should be. That's how it should be. Thus the term full bush in a bikini was born, spreading rapidly across social media, sparking discussions about beauty standards, grooming habits, freedom, liberation, and feminism. Other new sites joined in with a guide to growing out your pubes published in days this February and in March in the Metro,

a personal account of a woman who felt so embarrassed by her sparse pubic hair that she, after trying oils and hair supplements to get it growing, then turned to laser, eventually decided to spend £5,000 on a pubic hair transplant – also referred to in the article as a pubed plant. And according to a trichologist quoted in the piece called Marie Roisbrook, this is a procedure that has been growing steadily in popularity over the last six or so years and she said that she has performed around 40 of them alongside a surgeon. Discussing one patient who flew from Qatar for the procedure following a divorce, Marie said she'd removed it for her ex-husband and was adamant she would get her pubic hair back because every time she looked at it she

was reminded of why she's lasered it off. Also wanted her daughter to appreciate her own natural hair and felt she should lead by example. It was an empowering move for her. Women's body hair has of course and depressingly long been the subject of debate and controversy and arguments about sexism, conversations about whether there's something more hygienic somehow about having less hair or no hair, if preferring a bald look is actually rooted in pedophilia, whether it can be feminist, ever get a Brazilian, just endless discourse on and on about pubes. And today it's our turn to dive in, pun not intended,

with your help to discuss if the bush is actually back, if body hair should or even can be considered a trend, and what we all make of this being framed as a real cultural shift. So you both, did you see at the beginning of this year that this kind of like turning tide and this like emergence of pubes stories in the news? I saw the Maison Margiela show, which I absolutely loved and I loved that use of those kind of like tufty pubes under the beautiful kind of see-through gowns. I didn't notice as much that there

had been like a resurgence of pubes content. That being said, on my social media feed, I do follow a lot of accounts that are kind of like body positive. So I do often see videos of women kind of sharing their ingrown hairs or the fact that they have like have got pubes in their underwear, which I've always really enjoyed. But mostly on the subject, I just want to say I feel so vindicated. Loads of my friends got laser when we were like in our early 20s. And I remember saying I don't want to do it because I don't want to commit to this. I really feel like the bush is going to come back. And also a bit like this woman, I remember thinking if I ever have a daughter, I want her to be

able to see that a woman has a full bush. Like if I was ever naked or like having a bath I would grow out a full bush. And I was really like stuck to this. Then more recently I remember thinking like a few years ago I was like damn it I should just, I should just get lazy especially the undercarriage bits that is a lot of work. I always miss. I just, it's always, I think I've done it and then I'll be looking in the mirror and I'm thinking that's probably been there for about five years that little tuft there. So I'm glad about it and well I've got so much to say on the subject but Ritera what about you? Did you see more pubes on your timelines? I haven't, but I agree with you. I basically just saw that there's been a bit of an uptick

in fashion, I guess, focusing more on the bush, kind of featuring the bush more. I remember Julia Fox at the Oscars had that kind of, this isn't bush, but it's kind of bush adjacent fashion where she was like almost in a see-through dress and had that kind of long Botticelli kind of hair twisting around almost kind of like ending at her vagina let's say. And I think Dazed did a piece in March saying is Bush fashion back or is Bush fashion here? In terms of IRL Bush I feel like that hasn't really entered my periphery. I'm also kind of dubious. I feel like we're so desperate for Bush to actually be back that even if there's just kind of

a trickle of discourse around it we are so ready to kind of latch onto it. So I think I'm coming in with a wary tone because I would love for it to actually be back. But I feel like if you go on any beach, any kind of semi nude environment, I'm not sure if you will see that replicated on the average woman. I hope it is, but I'm not sure we're there yet. What about you, Beth? Beth Poulson Yeah, same actually. I think I was seeing these news stories and it just felt very much like when people were going, I was a couple of summers back, like boobs are back and you go, oh, this means nothing. This is just nonsense.

It's word salad. I haven't been seeing, I mean, I'm going on holiday surely and I would love out the corner of my eye to just be like, oh, there are more bushes. Because you do notice them as a woman, you kind of go, oh my gosh, I can see that woman's pubic hair on her thighs, good for her. But I saw the headlines and I didn't really think it was tallying necessarily with reality. I think that is yet to be seen. I hope it comes as no surprise that I'm very pro-Bush. I mean, obviously we are all pro-Bush, but it just kind of passed me by as a trend. I think Bush has always been there in my periphery and in my life. I've never had laser and I've

never had conversations about laser with anyone in my really close friendship group. And I think it wasn't until I was reading around this piece that I went, oh, a lot of people actually have made quite permanent decisions about their pubic hair in their 20s and 30s that they might then come to regret. I mean, the closest I can think is that I'm quite covered in tattoos and they do sometimes think, oh, great to just take them off, just to have like a superficial ability to change like something about my body. So I kind of feel like I must sort of know what it's like that I'm not ever bothered by my tattoos, but sometimes I think, oh, it'd be quite nice for that to be different just for an evening if that makes

sense. But I've never thought so much about pubes as I have this week. It's so funny you said about tattoos because I was thinking when we're going to talk about this that I was going to say as my sort of like raison, no, not my raison d'etre, it's not the right thing. I was going to say I could never make such a permanent decision then I clicked that I have a load of tattoos. I obviously can make permanent decisions about my body. Funnily enough, I never want to get rid of them. I feel quite feisty about that. In fact, yesterday in the toilets at the restaurant, I was at this American lovely lady bit older came up to me and went, you got tattoos just like my daughter. And I was

like, oh, that's cool. She's like, I hate them. And I was like, oh, and she was like, she's a teacher. And then she's telling me about how this one parent wanted to meet their child out of her class. Anyway, I was trying to explain to her, I was like, you have this one body and this one life, like why wouldn't you decorate it? And I think a lot of tattoo hate from older women is tied into this, what we're going to get onto with pubes, which is kind of preserving your purity and that your skin should remain like unmarked and perfect. And so I really love tattoos. But with pubes, it's also difficult. I'm not that much of a hairy woman. So I do understand that laser

as well for people that have maybe a lot more hair that suffer from like PSOS or just generally a slightly more hair. It can be a really kind of life-saving, especially if you're, if your mental attitude towards yourself and your body image, laser can be an amazing option. But yeah, loads of my friends just, it kind of became a thing. Everyone just started getting laser. There was that offers on, I think it is actually not that expensive now, but I kind of made the decision to always have a bit of body hair, a bit of vagina hair, a bit of vulva hair at all times,

because I started to get freaked out about having a fully bald vulva. But that being said, sometimes I do my getting ready with me videos in my underwear. And it looks like I have a bulge, but it's just my pubes, because I haven't trimmed them. Oh. Yeah, where to start?

Just thinking about your bulge Chanel, how to move on. So the only reason why I have not got laser is literally just because of the financial reasons. And the minute I can afford it, I really want to get it because I do have a lot of hair. And anyone with my melanin can understand this. We are cursed with thick, coarse hair everywhere. It's a nightmare, an absolute nightmare. And the interesting thing is seeing pubed discourse come back in is probably the only time that I've reconsidered what it would be like to completely laser your pubes off. Before then somebody brought it up to me when I'd floated the idea years

ago and just said the minute I can get laser, the minute I can get laser I'm going to get it. And they were like, do you not feel weird committing? Because what if something changes? What if landing strips? What if, you know, Bush is back? All of these kinds of trends, because they can do, they literally can do it. It could be subversive again. It's been kind of like bald pussy for way too long. We're due a big movement back. And I was just like, I don't really care. Honestly, the hassle of it is just way too much. But this kind of trickle effect of, I guess, Bush being fashionable and cool has subconsciously entered my periphery and seeped into my mind even if I think I've not

consciously consumed a lot of content around it. Because this year I was thinking it would be a lot to make a decision like that and just not be able to move back and to have lost that forever. But saying that, laser isn't forever. I learned this a few weeks ago, you have to get it topped up for somebody like me, it probably would grow back. So maybe I would be fine. We got two messages actually, on the topic of the money to kind of suggest that hairy vulvas are back. I should say, no, I think hairy vulvas is fine. Back as a sort of like recession indicators who had Lydia who said that we have no money. It's a trend based on spending less. And Francesca also said, none of us can afford the relentlessness of

being hairless. And I think there's definitely something to that. Like we're time poor, we're cash poor, waxing is too expensive, laser out of budget. And it's like, I don't want my minge to be a barometer for like the financial health of the planet. But in this case, it sort of feels like, oh my God, maybe it is. And I do wonder, I think Bush definitely has a coolness about it. I think the point is Bush is free. So you're not going to have a company, you're not going to have anyone sponsoring like a Bush product that will encourage a lot of women to keep a hold of it. And I'm thinking if there was one, if there was some kind of like Bush wax or some kind of styling cream or some something that would make Bush cool, but also like financially savvy for

a company to put a lot of money behind, Maybe that would give it a little bit more staying power. I was imagining someone like Gabrielle or who is another cool celebrity who I can imagine really low-rise jeans with some Bush peeking out? Alex Consani, Charlie XCX. Any of those girlies advertising a Bush wax, wax it into any shape, keep it long. I think the Bush could be around for the next 10 years. So I really need the entrepreneurs in the listenership to just get something cooking. Imagine if they did mini GHDs for your bush. Oh my God.

Oh no, but this is one of my issues, why I've got so many issues. Also, first of all, my first issue is, both of you do say pussy on this podcast. It's one word that I just cannot say. And then you said, minge, Beth. And I was like, this is really too far for me. I can't in good faith say the P or the

M word. What do you call it then? What are we going to call it? Flower? I'm calling it the vulva because I'm a doctor. Anyway, so the thing with me is I like a bit of topiary. I haven't really advanced full bush. One of my issues is it looks like I've GHD to my pubes. They're so straight. It's like spider legs. I don't like it. If there was a bit of a cult to it, I think I would be more pubes. They're so straight. It's like spider legs. I don't like it. If there was a bit of a call to it, I think I would be more in tune.

But the other funny thing is, when I was living with my friend Grace once, I got up the shower and she was like, "'Baby, you okay?' And I was like, "'What do you mean?' And I shaved my landing strip just on the left-hand side. It was just like to the, you know it's supposed to be in the middle.

It's quite, because razors are really wide. It's actually really hard. So I was slowly but surely trying to get it like me. And then it just sort of moved. It was just off to one side. Leaning tower of pussy, sorry to say again. Okay, let's talk about that. None of us are landscape architects. What is this work we're putting towards this too? I used to have a friend that would shave it into a heart shape and then bleach it, which

is actually really cool. That's cute. No, but babe, so how are you getting the heart shape? How? Some people are quite dexterous. Maybe you could use like hair removal cream to do hair removal cream doesn't agree with me that I feel like that's such a myth. The smell of it as well. It's just very burny. And I guess the point of the bushes or the bushes to do less and I kind of because of the pressures of capitalism, I'm like, well, we must simply find a way to make this laborious and money making as well, which is not the point.

I think for most people, it's like I'm free. It's like an exhale of like, I actually don't have to intervene down there. It's not a problem to be solved. Even with like a trim, it's very labor unintensive, whereas all of what I'm suggesting now, which also is like, if it's fashionable, if you enjoy it, it's like getting a haircut, do what you love. But I guess the point is, if Bush is back,

maybe it's a good sign that we are just saying, we're okay as we are, we don't need to do all of this. We had a message from Grace that said, I feel like it's only back for conventionally attractive, slim, still pretty hairless women, which I think is true. And I also have to say, when I think of a bush, I still think of like, like your bikini lines done, and it's this perfect, lovely kind of like triangle, big fluffy bushy bush. But a real bush, if we're talking about real pubes, that can be an extension, like you said, Beth, like down the thigh. Like the pubes can be spreading their way around the body. And I think that's what we're uncomfortable with. I think we're always happy to talk about certain

parts of body hair, but like no one's talking about the nipple hairs. I mean, me and my friends are every time we go for lunch because we're counting them and they are growing a number every week. The random neck hair you get, like I think that there's ways of framing this, but it's like actually women are hairy in all sorts of places and we're just all kind of in denial about that and it is a lot of work to stay in denial. Can I read Kay's message very quickly? I think on the back of that she said, wake me up when we're allowed to have hairy butt cracks. That's another place where it grows. That's episode part two of this. Katie Ruth said, it's just another reminder that there's

constant discourse around a woman's appearance. It changes constantly as do many areas of women's Ruth said, some of which are permanent and then they inevitably change again, typically to the opposite of what's just been seen as in. And then we're making even more drastic changes to reverse or remove what we've done. It's never ending and I feel more livid this is not happening for men and never has done. The only slight similar cases are being seen in dadbods as being hot. We also had a message from Roxanna that said, I'd love for the bush to be less stigmatised, mainly for the sake of last-minute swim and beach trips, but the idea of it being a trend bothers me, similar to what Katie Ruth said.

And she said that people should still feel comfortable rocking the sparse bald look and shouldn't have to modify their bodies or feel shame and regret over past choices to feel comfortable in their own literal skin, especially when those earlier choices were often made in pursuit of fitting in in the first place. I'm just so tired of certain bodies, features, preferences, being in and out, goalposts constantly moving, sometimes widening and narrowing, but always, always, always being exclusionary. And there's always a smugness when the wind changes in someone's favor like me at the top of the episode who is vindicated on my non-laser. I'm definitely guilty of this, but when you didn't participate in a trend and then it becomes

inverted, there's always a chorus of people, oh my God, at me saying, wow, I'm so glad I never did X, I said, but boy, oh boy, do those guys look foolish now. I think it's funny because it's true, but I think I agree about the trends thing, but I have to say, I do always feel, I feel, I hate that our bodies are trends, I hate that like parts of ourselves are trends, but I do feel happy when a trend goes towards something that might encourage a bit of body acceptance or body neutrality more than I do when a trend is like hair and chic, much more exclusionary, might lead towards unhealthy habits. Growing out of Bush, I don't think it's going to hopefully give anyone any like bad lifestyle changes. If anything, it might just give them a bit more time in the morning.

No, that's a nice way of framing it. This's not, this is not the worst fad for there to be out there. This is probably one of the nicer ones that we could hopefully experience, especially within the last 10 years. So yeah, the damage doesn't seem to be too bad as long as it doesn't A, swing really rapidly and B, it actually is seen IRL and not just on catwalks because that's the thing I feel. It feels to me as if it is, as you said previously, hot, slim, white bodies doing this and I don't really feel like I've seen, I mean, I'm yet to go on a beach, I'm yet to go on a nudist beach so maybe I'm just shooting my load too quickly here but I just want to see it IRL, I want to see it across

everybody, I want to see hot people, I want to see mid people, everybody just doing this. Oh, it's so difficult not to make a joke about shooting your load on the news speech, but I didn't because I'm mature. I really do agree with all of that. And I think it's so easy, I think, because we're all acted on by patriarchal forces, whether we're that aware of them or not. And so it's really difficult actually to know what your preference is, for example. For years I would go, look, I love a support body hair, but I really love being smooth. And it's like, maybe I do, maybe I did. Really difficult to know what I really wanted because there was so much noise. There was so much, there was just this energy that was constantly informing everything clouded my judgment.

And so I think we can't make enemies of each other. We can't say, God, you're such a fool for doing that and I was the wise one. Because it's constantly shifting. We're constantly all doing things that is influenced by that. And I think that's why Roxanne's message did sit with me because it was just very balanced. It was very fair. It's kind of saying like, we're all being acted on by those forces and there's no winning by being smug. There's only winning by kind of being like, let's all be as awake to them as possible. If we do make a permanent decision, there's no winning by being smug. There's only winning by kind of being like, let's all be as awake to them as possible. If you do make a permanent decision, there's no shame in that. And there's no, the tide will swing back again. Like, and only you are saying like, sometimes that temptation is still there. Maybe that will be something

you do. Maybe it'll be something you never do. Maybe there'll be regret. Maybe there won't be. But it's like, life is very long. And these things, like we're all kind of on the same side. And I think if I see a pubem thrilled, if I don't see a pubic, I'm not like, oh, that's a stupid bitch over there. Do you know what I mean? I agree. Also, there was a trend, maybe like, I'm trying to think when it was, 2000 and it was probably around 2016. Actually, that would make sense with the current, like with the climate. When everyone was going out on armpit hair, I still think armpit hair on a woman is one of the coolest things ever. I think it looks really sexy. I genuinely

used to say I don't do it because I prefer being smoother. If I'm being totally honest, the reason I don't have armpit hair is because I just know that men don't find it attractive. And unfortunately, a lot of the time it's men that I'm wanting to find me attractive. So that's annoying, but also shaving my armpits takes about 0.2 seconds and I've got a really good razor. So that doesn't really matter. But then like I was also thinking my leg hair, I very actually rarely shade that, but I've got quite fair hairs. So again, it's like there's so much, there's so many pressures coming from different ways in terms of like, how much can you get away with, there's so much racialized prejudice against hair as well. Like certain people are viewed

in much more negative ways for having body hair than others. And also then when we're thinking about like the gendered thing, I also love being fully shaved and sliding around my bed like a dolphin. That feels so nice because it's just like, it's all slippery and like rubbing your legs together is really nice. The growing out bit is always the worst bit when you're a bit prickly. But the thing I really want to get onto that we haven't got onto yet, we had a message from Hannah said, I'm all here for it, it being the bush. Since having a little girl last year, the idea of shaving to in essence look like a child, ugh, the bush c'est chic. And that's where I've got to. I like to keep, even if it's just a tuft, sometimes it does come all off because as I've said, I can be

a bit haphazard with the razor and then it's just too late. I can't just leave three strands so I do whip them off. But for the most part, I do like to be like, I'm a woman, here's my eight pubes, just FYI. What about you guys? Or are you full Hollywood honeys? No, I go for a landing strip too. I only ever get it all off if I just go to a waxer and just, yeah, I don't know if it feels outside of my control just to say, oh, can I have this please and just like communicate that out of laziness. But no, I've gone for the landing strip. And maybe this conversation will make me, no, I just, I don't know, I don't think I can do bush. I think it's the reason you said the racialized elements. I think maybe something about, you know, the idea that darker skin people, especially because my hair is so coarse and thick, something about it feels like it's this additional shamefulness of being like unruly. I don't know,

I guess also cultural shame around body hair is really, really intense in my community, the Indian community from the Indian community. From the youngest age, you know, we are encouraged to get our eyebrows threaded and wax our mustache off and all the kind of facial hair. So that really extends to our entire body. It is really shameful. So I think there's all of this kind of stuff and I don't know if I can unpick that. I don't know if I can let it go. It's too much for me guys. What about you Beth? So I mean, I am a single woman living in the middle of nowhere. The average age is about 79. So she's so natural at the moment. I'm

just letting it do what it's going to do. I am going on holiday soon. So I'm like, well, I'll tidy. I quite like to tidy within a bikini. You know, it's not particularly long. I'll tidy around the edges because those thighs do get, you know, I've got dark hair. Like I dye my hair blonde, but my hair is the colour of my eyebrows and my roots, which is a very dark brown. So it's like when I don't shave my legs, which I don't often, I go outside, I know it's noticeable. It does take a degree of bravery. I don't think it's the kind of bravery that I deserve a medal for, but it's definitely that. It's definitely something I'm working with. The discomfort, I think, feels instructive. On the pubes though, do you know what I used to do? I bought like

a little waxing pot and I tried to wax my own bikini line. And it wasn't that it was so painful, although that middle bit, that triangle of terror, awful, but it just took it like, it was quite intense. So I would do a bit and then I packed the kit away and then I'd do a bit the next day. And it took me about five days to do the entire thing. I thought I'm never doing that again. And the growing back, it was like, it was staggered across the five days as well. And I just thought, this is labor. This is beauty labor. It's physically painful. I think it was a really interesting, I'm going to call it a test, a kind of, yeah, it was like a kind of laboratory test. I tried it out. I just thought I'm not

going to be someone that can rip my pubes out root tip for the entire thing. I do now, after disclosing far too much about my pubic hair, want to say I really find the messages about it being infantilizing and prepubescent. The first time I ever heard this, it's the kind of thing, it was quite radicalizing and I just thought, oh my God. And I think it's not that everyone who prefers less hair has this internalized fetishization of their own prepubescent body or if someone likes it on someone else, it's not that they are a pedophile. But I do think those are true to the fact that a lot of men do unashamedly prize young bodies youth to the extreme. We see the trend in porn a lot and it is once you think about

it, you can't unthink about it. That the only time this really occurs naturally is in children, is before puberty. Puberty is the growing of hair on a body to remove that, to give the appearance that it's the only, you know, my body only ever did that until I was like 11 years old. I think those things, it's very hard. And I imagine as that messenger got, I think it was Hannah who said that, when you have a daughter, I imagine that does change you. And we also got a message from Simone who said, you know, as she's gotten older, she finds the full shave to be infantilizing. And I think that might be it. I think I'm going to struggle to think about bald vulvas the same way. I think maybe there is something to that, even if it's not as black and white.

In like art or even like models, when you see them with a bush, it just looks so much more sensual and kind of beautiful when you see it. I think the difficulty is literally just in a bikini. If I could have like a perfect bush, as I said, that was like just slightly neat, I would really enjoy that. But it does also the bulge. I was thinking about this when it was on trend. Did they just bulge out in their bikinis? I think so. I wanted to touch on waxing as well because one of the things that I'm so fortunate about is I never really got waxed as much to my mother's horror. And I want to ask you about your mom's relationships. My mom would be like, do not shave your legs. Do not shave

your vulva. Just wait and one day I'll take you to go and get wax. And that day never arrives so I just shaved my legs on a school trip and she was really upset with me. I don't know why because I think she was like, you need to wax because it's so much better. But anyway, my skin is really good with shaving. So I actually find body hair removal a very easy thing to do because I don't spend any money on it apart from buying a razor head and I don't get ingrown hairs or shaving rash. So I'm really lucky in that regard because I know that some people kind of have to wax. I have tried to wax my own. The fear of doing that underneath there and it does really hurt.

I did used to run a salon out of my uni halls where I waxed every girl on my floors, vulva, pre-night out. I was so good at it. They'd come into my room, we'd get the little pink strips and super drugs. It's much easier to do it on someone else. But I think that that is like that beauty tax as well and the time and the labor and even the growing it out is interesting. But did your moms ever have that thing about shaving? And I think, I don't know if my mom,

me shaving my legs was just upsetting to my mom because it made her feel like I was stopping being a little girl. Because when you're a little girl, the hairs on your legs are really sweet. They're just sort of like soft and downy. And in a way, I just wish I'd left them as they were and never touch them. My mom does not have arm hair or leg hair really. And I don't think she'd mind me saying that. So I never grew up thinking anything about leg hair until I went to school and people were like trying to cut it off with those little shit scissors.

And then of course I did the rite of passage of stealing. I think it was my granddad's razor and like shaved my legs, blood bath. Had to pretend I'd fallen over. My grandma was like, I know this isn't what's happened love. And so it was very much this like private shameful thing. And even this conversation, I'm like, God, we all did grow up with a very different relationship

to that. And it's based on literally like the thickness of the follicle, whether we're blonde, whether we're like redheads, dark hair, like it's all, I don't know, it's just a really, it's like a really long history of this, a personal history of this. I'm like, actually, I barely think about this. It's automatic. I shaved my legs, got on with my life. I'm like, this began when I was about eight years old. That's mad. Can I just say quickly, mine was also only at school. I remember we were doing sport and this boy said to me, your legs are so hairy. I literally came home from school,

I think it was like 11. I was like, mom, I need to shave my legs. She was like, you're not. I'll take you for wax. Then three years went by and she didn't. That's when I took it matters into my own hands. I had the near exact same experience as you, Beth, where I, yeah, it literally was because of people at school. And I think, I think I probably just naturally had more hair than the girls that I was friends with. So it would just be kind of like well-intentioned questions but also private shame and just kind of going home and feeling so disgusting and so gross about it and just harboring onto that until yeah, stealing

a razor from my dad's cabinet or whatever, literally like slicing open my knee and then just like bloodbath literally like he said and then my mum just realizing she's got to try and teach me because I'm just going to do whatever I'm going to do regardless. It's heartbreaking. It actually is and I'm kind of like, I actually think it is very important that this is not like, I don't want the legacy of like, I don't want people to grow up having those same experiences. It's like, the only thing I really think I've got to show for it is that like, that scar on the back of the shin, I think every, every woman has from either being a child or, you know, it's just such a dangerous place. And

you think, I just would like this to end with us. I think that's probably quite naive. It was always that corner of my ankle. I never cut myself now, but the corner of my ankle, my knee, that bit on the shin, and it was such a painful cut as well because it's so fine. But it's so funny, I'm so used to removing my body hair now. As I said, I don't find it that laborious. It doesn't take me much time. I'm not really that fussed about it. If I forget to shave my armpits and go to the gym, I don't care. If my legs are hairy, I don't care. I'm not that often in a bikini. I guess I do post on my underwear on Instagram, but I did have pubes at one time. No one noticed. I just put the price filter on. Anyway, but when we talk about it with young girls,

that does make me sad because why aren't they allowed to play sports in their shorts and not feel self-conscious in the same way that boys do? And I wonder if that's a really big conversation that we need to be having. Why are we encouraging from such young age that you have to kind of like mutilate and self-flagellate for such natural things? I almost feel like that isn't a conversation that we've got to. We're so often talking about women. Maybe we've got to stop having the conversation around what we're doing and actually be like, it's too late for us. We're going to be shaving or not shaving, doing whatever. It needs to start with these little children. And especially, it often did come from boys teasing us. So many of my understandings of my body,

whether it was like that insecurity around when you first start going, your breasts, or like my body hair, it was always coming from boys teasing me, that then made me like wanna make changes. And so it's like, maybe we need to start there. It's too late for us, but the little girls, imagine the freedom they would have,

of just being able to play sport and do whatever, and not be stressed about this, from like like you said age eight, age 11. Counterpoint, I feel like they learn from us so it really, it really the responsibility has to be with us sadly, even though it is too late for us we need to learn now today right the second as we're listening to this podcast everybody because I think shame is so widespread, children are so pure. They only learn shame from the world around them and the world around them is led by adults, which is us. So it is our job. Well, that was one of my reasons why I wanted to be able to grow Bush was because if I ever had a

daughter, I was like, I want her to see me in full Bush glory. But I do think I wish there was something around that. It also just doesn't seem right that children are handling blades. I know. I agree with you. It is heartbreaking. So I think we're nearing the end of this. I did want to quickly say I find it really interesting in our DMs, and no judgement on this, but we got, I mean, the only men that got in touch were very pro pubes. We did get a few messages from women who just can't get on board with it, who just find it and they were like, whatever floats your boat, but no, could never be me, I just really don't get it. And I think that I'm glad that's not

me, but I do, I totally get it. But I did find it really interesting that we got the men who I think were also, again, very well-meaning, but it was very funny getting messages from a man being like, I love pubes. As long as they're in a nice triangle shape, I love pubes. As long as they're sort of a landing strip. And I was like, you're almost there. Yeah, I found the messages from women who were just kind of open about the fact like, look, I just can't get on board with that. Because I think that's quite a big thing at the moment is just we have to say the right thing, we've got to get it right. But sometimes you go, no, this has affected me and I just I don't like this. And I think that is very valid. And I'm

glad that people did get in touch to say that. And to the men as well, just keep thinking on it and just, you know, just expand your idea of what pubes can look like until you can see a big bush and be just blessed. Because I mean, that is a blessed day, isn't it? I just want to add one more thing on the negative. Someone said, I think it's really important because personal hygiene. And I just want to say having body hair is not unhygienic whatsoever. In fact, that was one of the biggest marketing campaigns when they invented the female razor. Gillette realized there was a massive marketing push to be had if they had female consumers of razors. And one of the things they said was, it's more hygienic. And so a lot of our kind of tangled understanding

of our own bodily functions and body hair and stuff is actually all down to marketing and advertising. So I just want to say that there is nothing unhygienic about being hairy. We actually have hairs for a reason. I don't know why we have pubic has maybe to keep our vulvas warm. Not sure, but it's there and it's not on her genic. Thank you so much for listening and for all of your opinions and takes on this topic. We love being in conversation with you all. Remember to give us a follow on Instagram and TikTok at everything is content pod. We'd also love if you'd leave us a review wherever you listen if you haven't already. It really, really, really helps us to keep this podcast going. So please, please do. We'll be back here on Friday for part two of our AI deep dive double bell. Bye!

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