Editor’s Note: With the impending graduation of our initial Teen Talk columnist Maria Proulx of Ledyard, the Times has been searching for a new voice of the younger generation. This is our new Teen Talk columnist’s first piece. Cecile is an East Lyme High School student and an editor of The Viking Saga, ELHS’s school newspaper.

Envision Marilyn Monroe in her pink dress in “Gentlemen Prefer Blondes” — but with armpit hair. Try Cindy Crawford in her Pepsi ad with her iconic denim shorts — but with leg hairs. Picture Kendall Jenner walking the Victoria’s Secret runway — but with pubic hair.

Try to picture any It Girl or sex symbol without her smooth, hairless skin. Body hair is never something that has fit into the beauty standard in America. At least for women.

Body hair removal comes with its own myriad of issues, including razor burns, bleeding, skin irritation and not to mention pain. But why shouldn’t it hurt? Pain is our body’s way of protecting ourselves. Body hair, as stigmatized, is there for a reason.

It is not dirty or gross. Whether for temperature regulation or protection purposes, it was given to the human body for a purpose. The idea that it is unhygienic is both sexist and untrue. The same thing deemed normal for some is unhygienic for others. The only difference? Their gender.

A lot of times choosing to shave for men is a fashion choice while for women it is a political choice. Hair is neither dirty nor unhygienic. Actually the process of shaving can cause bacterial infections, ingrown hairs and other issues. It would be more hygienic to not shave.

In Korea, pubic hair was a sign of fertility and something to be desired, so much so that in the mid-2010s Korean women were getting pubic hair transplants. The issue is not one that lies with the hair itself but with society’s connotations of it.

The original intent to start start marketing razors to women is something that seems to be the root of everything evil: money. In true American fashion, razor companies saw potential to profit off the female razor industry and started to market them to the female audience. In these advertisements, they used taglines meant to embarrass women. And it worked.

From the very start, large companies have successfully profited from alluding to the idea that female body hair is something to be ashamed about.

As someone who was a competitive swimmer year round, I found myself at 10 years old noticing new body hairs and feeling an immense pressure to get rid of it. All the female figures in my life did. I felt the need to fulfill the only image for beauty I was ever fed.

Freedom of choice isn’t always something granted to women. Girls shouldn’t be ridiculed for standards that are forced onto them.

The cycle of shame really never stopped for me, and what I have realized is a lot of it was internal. The realization that I had forgotten to shave would come with immense embarrassment. Mortified, I would try to cover up any sort of region that had hair.

I remember choosing to wear leggings in the humid, hot summer air rather than show my hairy legs.

The extent I would go to because I would be scared of what people would think was far, and I wasn’t the only one. As my female friends and I reflect back on our experiences with hitting puberty, the shame of not shaving was one not specific to just me.

Some of my friends recall their parents drilling the idea of shaving as a part of strict hygiene and being told by others that “boys won’t like you” if they had body hair.

So why is the desired look for women to be one that resembles children? It isn’t always a question of beauty but of femininity. Oftentimes the fear of letting body hairs grow stems from the fear of appearing masculine.

Why should my femininity be defined by the hair on my legs? Society for too long has curated guidelines for what is feminine and what isn’t. As more strides are made in dismantling heteronormative standards, we have to understand the problematic nature of things as seemingly small as body hair.

Hair removal shouldn’t have to be a political choice, it should just be a matter of personal preference.

Women are real, not objects meant to live up to your expectations of them. It shouldn’t be a girl’s burden to live up to the unnatural fantasy of what femininity is to others. It’s time we celebrate the multiple faces of female beauty, including the ones with a mustache.

Cecile Horst of Niantic is a sophomore at East Lyme High School. Contact her at cecile.horst@outlook.com.