Hare Krishnas have their art and dance the treat and are far from commenting on the rakes of society. But it's nothing compared to the snapshot of Christianity and the artworks of the period giving rise and reason to the hair that exists where the seat of your pants makes its daily bread for the turtles checking out the pool.
A pivotal Christian tenet is the existence of Adam and Eve. The couple from Eden, evicted after eating an apple from the Tree of Knowledge and setting up the scene for the crucifixion of Jesus Christ.
In the many paintings and illustrations of the couple, their genitals are covered in fig leaves or branches off screen reaching its tentacles of nature's hand. A societal fixation on modesty and a vestigial shaming from the sight of their bare skin. Their bodies otherwise naked save for the foliage on their privates and the hair on their heads. They didn't even have armpit hair.
Ancient Roman artworks prior to their slow burn to Christianity depict men and women in full frontal drape but soon, with emergent churches and changing social mores, were too covering up.
Theories abound on the crop dusting bushels. Reasons why we even have pubic hair include:
- Spreading pheromones - The hair helps trap the chemistry between apocrine glands and the bacteria from oils by the sebaceous glands. May or may not even scent in the first place.
- Gate keeper against dust and other foreign objects entering the vagina. Though for men it's more to catch the pasta sauce.
- Chafe buffer - When two carpet samples go toe to finger, the pubic hair will leaves skin burns for the furious five. Pubic hair adds fluff and air often found in a well-executed soufflé.
Did the fig leaf come before or after the Eden event? Mix the theology with science and you get a bit of both. Mix it some more and you get crabs.
To back up his case [of pubic lice making an evolutionary come back due to coarsening of pubic hair, Robin Weiss, a virologist at University College London,] visited zoos to peer at the groins of our closest relatives. He noticed that in other great apes, hair in the pubic region was if anything much finer and shorter than elsewhere on the body - the opposite of the human situation. It supported his argument that human pubic hair is different and probably unique, both in its evolution and in its physical appearance and purpose.
The proliferation of the fig leaf in art and the rash rampant sprouting of pubic hair compared to our primate ancestors (who have thinner hair in their genital regions compared to the rest of their hirsute body) suggests the illustration of life and the agitation of the greens leads to the under wares.
Having fig leafs cover up the privates leads to sprouting from the clash and agitation of human skin versus nature's backhand. Where the leaf rubs, hair doth grow. It's superfetatious to reasoning that one thing breeds in stereo with another.
Given the need to reduce the chances of walking around with smears leaking down their legs or the sensation of packing in dingleberries, one would normally wipe after voiding their bowels.
With the leaf easy in reach, as clearly seen in the many falling leaves capturing the scene (artists of the day being the camera obscura for the still life masses), it's the next thing beyond the three sea shells to make for toilet paper before the advent of tabloid journalism.
And that is the reason we have butt crack hair.
Written on Monday, 5 September 2011