How ‘Full Bush in a Bikini’ Became a Feminist Rallying Cry
Channing Smith
Ladies, have you heard it? That chant in the distance, growing ever louder and more forceful. “Full bush in a bikini, full bush in a bikini, full bush in a bikini!”
This rallying cry—which originated on TikTok—has morphed from viral video to movement, from Etsy review to revolution. But what does it mean, exactly, and where did it come from? I got you, in this edition of TL;DR.
Give me the TL;DR.
Women on the internet are celebrating the beauty of the bush after a TikTok cheering on an Etsy review featuring “full bush in a bikini” went viral.
Wait, I need more. What’s the background here?
Earlier this month a TikToker named Sujindah posted a TikTok in which they repeat the phrase “full bush in a bikini” multiple times, with growing enthusiasm.
They explain that they were browsing bathing suits on Etsy when they stumbled upon a review where a woman shared a photo of herself in the bikini au natural.
“I got radicalized by that Etsy review, for real,” they said in the video. “Like, yeah, that’s how it should be.”
In an interview with Vogue, Sujindah explained that they’d never been a huge beachgoer until recently, and something about seeing the photo changed their perspective.
“I’ve always been an advocate for showing up the way you feel, and I was just in awe that someone showed up that way in their bikini,” they said. “Very c-nt. It reminds me that we often do not see it as much as we really should.”
What does the internet think?
It’s sometimes the most simple videos on the internet that go viral. Sujindah’s TikTok has since been viewed more than 15 million times and has kind of shook the internet with its wild celebration of pubic hair.
Not only are thousands of women commenting on the video that 2025 is the year of the bush, several others are making videos celebrating it. The message of “full bush in a bikini” has spread far and wide, from TikTok to Instagram and Reddit, where it is being celebrated by women and people with vaginas everywhere.
They are citing several reasons for putting down the razor: shaving or waxing is itchy, it can be uncomfortable, it can lead to honestly-terrifying-in-their-pure-size-and-volume ingrown hairs and cysts. But many women are citing another reason: the idea that removing your pubic hair is casting off the male gaze and is inherently feminist.
“I love how far we’ve come as a society, especially the younger generation of girls,” wrote one person on Reddit.
Although women (and men) have been removing their body hair forever, going fully bare became a trend in the ’80s and ’90s, into the 2000s. With very few exceptions, most women in porn are also completely bare, a phenomenon that Vice reported in 2017 led to a sort of taboo against it for generations of couples.
“No one has authoritatively established a causal connection,” porn scholar Joseph Slade (yep, that’s a thing) told the magazine at the time. However, he said he had found that “surveys of students in my media and sexuality classes indicated that women felt pressured by boyfriends who were themselves conditioned by porn.”
So for these women who only shaved or waxed or lasered their public hair because they felt it was expected by their male partners (or were told directly it was their preference), the act of choosing not to is an act of rebellion. By not conforming to this social norm they adhered to for so long and celebrating the bush, they are taking a feminist stand.
Of course, many women commented that they decided to shave or wax because they prefer it, with some even saying they’d tried going full bush and found it uncomfortable. Those women are being celebrated too, because it’s not about the hair. It’s about doing what you want with your body, not conforming to patriarchal ideals.
So why should I care?
Look ladies, it hasn’t been a great month. An accused sexual assaulter is in the White House, another is the Secretary of Defense. Misogyny is…cool now? And is running rampant in nearly every facet of culture.
Does celebrating the bush and choosing to do what you want with your own pubic hair change any of this? No. But it can make us feel a little bit more powerful in these shitty times, and that has to count for something.
What should I take away from this?
Do whatever to your pubes. Just do it because it’s what you want.
Originally Appeared on Glamour
