I think ALL vaginas are beautiful, hairless ones with small labia included, but it appears that not everyone does.

Trying to reduce shame towards bodies, religions, sexual orientations, etc. is very, very important work and I commend people who do it. However, shifting the shame from one type of labia to another does not show people that all vaginas are normal and beautiful.

The only ideal for bodies should be HEALTHY bodies, and as there’s no type of vagina that is “healthier” than any other that I’m aware of — I believe that vaginas are just vaginas. Each is beautiful and normal in its own different way.

The problem is that when a societal ideal, in this instance having hairless vaginas with smaller labia, is rejected as “wrong,” it makes the people with that variety feel outcast, yet again — perpetuating the cycle. Having smaller labia is just as normal as having bigger ones.

You might be familiar with stories about how those with body issues came to be that way. About how they thought they were perfectly normal, until one day, someone made a comment to tell them they aren’t. And so begins a spiral of self-consciousness and body image issues.

You see, I thought I was totally normal. That is, until I started reading literature written by people attempting to eliminate the ideal of the small labia who, in the process, painted those labia as unnatural. There seems to be a tendency that attempts to boost a group that is marginalized by putting down the rest of us who happened to not be a part of that group.

Anything someone is born with is “normal”: Small labia, large labia — whatever the case may be. If you want to change that, that’s your prerogative. If you need to change it for medical reasons, by all means do it. But you shouldn’t be SHAMED into changing it, or into NOT changing it.

Whatever we are born with is something to be proud of, not ashamed of.

 

This article was submitted anonymously.

 Views expressed on the Opinion page do not necessarily reflect those of the Daily Nexus or UCSB. Opinions are submitted primarily by students.

This article appeared online only at DailyNexus.com on October 11, 2013.

Print