beauty

We just saw what real female upper lip hair looks like on Instagram and we like it. A lot.

 

When was the last time you had a nice, intimate, up-close look at your upper lip in the mirror?

You know, those moments when you stand in direct sunlight and have a good think about the teeny tiny hairs sprouting out of the bit of skin between your lip and nose.

Going to go out on a limb here, but we’re fairly confident you’ve done this before because if what society says goes, women aren’t meant to have hair there.

With Movember around the corner, we’re set to see men all around the world grow moustaches through the month of November to raise funds and awareness for men’s health, specifically prostate cancer, testicular cancer and mental health.

It’s a very worthy cause, but what about… our moustaches? When will we be ‘allowed’ to stop waxing, bleaching, shaving, lasering and threading the offensive hairs on our upper lips?

According to hair removal brand Billie, that time is now. To celebrate, the US-based brand decided to launch their own Movember campaign, because women have moustaches, too.

You can watch Billie’s Movember campaign video below. Post continues after video.

Featuring all sorts of moustaches belonging to all sorts of women, the images are stunning. It’s also one of the first times we’ve really seen female upper lip hair portrayed on Instagram in a positive, beautiful way and we like it. A lot.

“Newsflash: women have moustaches. We’ve been trained to hide them – wax them, bleach them, shave them – but that doesn’t make them any less real,” the brand wrote alongside their brilliant video ode to upper lip hair.

“Fuzzy and faint or dark and dazzling, they’re there. So this Movember, we’re growing out our (formerly) top-secret upper lip hair and matching 100 per cent of contributions made to our Movember team, up to $50,000.”

The brand also uses its platforms to advocate for more realistic depictions of body hair, on Instagram and in life. In a time that lends itself to social media movements, this is one that makes our feeds a better place to scroll, not worse.

 

But what about if you don’t like your body hair? What if you feel better about yourself with it gone?

That’s OK, too, because what women do with their body hair is completely up to them. And judging by the different shapes and styles we received when we asked 52 women to draw their pubes, there’s no ‘one way’ to groom.

It’s worth acknowledging, though, the subliminal messages from advertising over the last decade that can inform our choices.

Body hair isn’t clean. Body hair isn’t attractive. It’s not sexy to have pubic hair. Shave your legs before he comes over. Women should be silky, smooth dolphins.

But we’re not dolphins. We have hair in different places on our bodies and it’s 100 per cent OK. (Here are some other amazing images from Billie’s advertising.)

Do what you want with your hair, but we're all for celebrating representations of female body hair that push back against what's traditionally 'acceptable', like what Billie is doing with its advertising.

And brands: give us all the moustaches and snail trails and pokey-out pubic hair and leg hair.

We'll probably buy your products.

You can support Movember by visiting au.movember.com/.

What do you think of Billie's advertising campaign? Tell us your thoughts in the comments!

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Top Comments

fightofyourlife 5 years ago

I guess my question is why a hair removal company would be promoting women keeping the body hair that their products remove? Are they introducing a line of body hair glitter/dye/shampoo or something similar? I just don't see what's in this for them.

Gu3st 5 years ago

Honest answer?

As enlightened as everyone most some of us would like to be, we're conditioned to dislike the sight of hair on certain parts of women's bodies. Many women and men looking at these images are discomfited.

Putting your hair removal brand in someone's mind at the same time as this discomfit promotes your product, while your company still looks pretty empowering.

fightofyourlife 5 years ago

I've been thinking along those lines too. I'm just surprised that not everyone who sees a campaign like this doesn't immediately think "wait...what?" Maybe I shouldn't be though. It would have been nice if the writer had looked at it with a bit more of a critical eye. The article would have been much more interesting.

HailieJade 5 years ago

Yeah, this is basically the equivalent of the black and white "before" photos/videos used in infomercials, cleverly disguised as an empowering "body positivity" campaign.


Gu3st 5 years ago

Just for the record, I don't find dolphins very sexy. Narwhals, on the other hand...

Pretty damn horny.