Breaking Free from the Pink Box: Challenging Society’s Beauty Standards

Vulvas are in our face more now than ever. Just open your Twitter feed and you know what I mean. As a vulva owner, how do you stop comparing dark labia to the pink ones? Is the pale the gold or pink standard?

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Welcome to Swinger University. I’m Ed. And I’m Phoebe. Join us as we explore the exciting world of ethical non-monogamy, sexual health, and sex education with an intellectual and sexy twist. Why is pink a thing?

The pink vulva area, everything’s pink.

The butt is pink, butt, the anus is pink, right? All of that. Pink, pink, pink, all the way up. The whole Brazilian area. Well, that’s a standard that has come about, but I don’t know where it came from because I don’t have that particular standard in my mind when I think of vulva. Right. But it’s true that most of the porn at least years ago was depicting that as well as guys with big penises. And also magazines, so magazines and porn, we’re both depicting that. And I think it’s because of the age women were young, which is a big factor in the color of your vulva. That could be it. So these are all just turned 18, tried to make their way to Hollywood or Van Nuys or wherever it is they’re filming most of the porn now. You have nurse picked them up and all of a sudden– Off they go. In the last few years though, it is interesting to see more mature content, especially with the rise of OnlyFans and content creators, obviously. Sure.

There are different colors to the vulva. Yes. So that’s nice and refreshing to see. And as a swinger, I do notice that, but I will still say,

I don’t notice a dark vulva as often. To me, maybe I’m just not noticing.

I just think you’re not noticing.

Maybe I’m just distracted by other things in the room. Quite possibly. Maybe I ought to make a point. I haven’t found a lot of really pink, just peachy colored ones. OK, so you’re– They’ve all got a little bit of color. So you’re the person to ask then. Sure. As a swinger, how many dark vulvas have you seen? Most of them. Oh, OK, really? Varying shades of color. I mean, it varies from ethnicity. It varies with age. It varies with how much there is there, how little there is there.

Meaning labia. Volume of parts. Volume of parts. Length and width and– All the sizes that are available. Right. By sizes and shapes. If you’re a vulva owner and you have dark labia and you think that your labia and vulva area needs to be pink, because that’s all you’ve seen and you see that as the standard,

I certainly thought that my vulva and labia were completely different from the rest of the world because I never saw dark labia or vulva ever. In fact, when we were swinging, when we first started swinging 10 years ago, I don’t really remember. I really haven’t noticed. And maybe that’s just because it doesn’t matter and I’m distracted. But maybe it’s not true. So maybe it’s not true.

But when I do see the Twitter feed flowing through,

I would say 98% of the women in there do not have dark labia or vulvas. Are these all just young models?

Mostly there’s not many mature content creators out there. There are, but maybe they’re just not exposing it for free. Right. Maybe I’m not following the right people. Could be. You’re not exposing the right vulvas. I guess not. So if you are having some insecurities, part of this is related to the social media influence. It erodes your confidence. It can be mentally distressing. Having to do all this comparison. It can lead to seeking some harmful procedures, like the lightning creams that they have. They’re a temporary solution. They’re usually irritating and they’re dangerous. A lot of them have the chemical hydroquinone in it and it is known to cause cancer. You should use it very sparingly. I know a lot of dermatologists will sell it. My own dermatologist sells it, but it’s not the safest thing to be using, especially on those sensitive parts. I would be surprised that that was not very harmful because you’re not even supposed to wash your panties in laundry detergent with scent, let alone use a chemical burning lightning cream. Right. And I guess there’s chemical peels. Also for this area, I haven’t seen it. I did a little research on it. It’s very harsh. It’s irritating also and can be dangerous. Yeah. I can imagine burning your clit off. Yeah.

That doesn’t sound good.

And then, yeah, I’ve burned my hands in the garage with chemicals and I wouldn’t want to put that anywhere near my junk. Right. Right. And there is surgery, but surgeries for a different type of aesthetic. Right. That’s labioplasty, which is reducing the size of the lips. Which is a thing for a lot of people. And it’s also got a lot of risks with it. Yeah. And some recovery time. Yeah.

Although it probably does heal pretty quick because there’s a lot of blood flow to the area. But getting off track, that area, the vulva area has its own happy bacteria.

Just like inside your vagina. Right. So you have your own biome down there, which is why you don’t want to be putting any kind of perfumes. So on anything, right? Right. Wearing a lot of tight clothing. You want things to breathe. You want things to air out. So keep in mind, there are some risks. If you’re trying to. So spreading Drano. Oh, my God. Probably not a good idea. Stop it. Stop it. Why is your labia dark? That is a very good question. Why is the labia dark? Genetics is part of it.

Infections like BV or a yeast infection. I had no idea until I researched this. It can change the color of your vulva area.

Repeated friction, which I had heard about.

Irritation and trauma to that area.

So what happens is your, the cells.

There’s this keratinization that’s going on and it matures the cells towards that outermost layer of the skin. So it causes darkening. Interesting. Right. The increase of blood flow to that area also increases melanin, which you think would be good because if you’re having sex, your blood flow is increasing. Right. And there’s friction. Right. So you’re kind of just.

It’s inevitable. Crude, right? It’s inevitable. Literally. Literally, yeah. So all the, those ladies that really liked horseback riding when they were growing up because of all of the extra stimulation may have actually increased the onset of the coloration in their labia. Or if you’re a cyclist and there’s a lot of irritation going on there, right? You take the cycling class at your gym or you are an actual cyclist and you’re cycling back and forth to work like we were doing for. Right. Every day for years. Yeah, which is great. I so miss that. The other thing that will affect that skin is shaving.

Which makes sense. It’s irritating the skin. It’s like a razor burn. So here we are all shaving. If you’re not waxing, you’re shaving. If you haven’t got it lasered and you’re actually creating

this keratinization of the skin. Right. Which is making your labia dark.

Makes sense. You’re better off waxing.

You might be okay with the laser, but if you don’t want to spend for that waxing is better. Assuming you’re actually concerned about the color.

Right.

Right.

Age has something to do with it. We touched on that a little bit. Which kind of makes sense, especially if you’re doing all of these processes and procedures and bicycle riding over the years as you age, you’ve done it more and more and more. So. And you’ve gotten more use down there. Hopefully you’ve had. Hopefully you’ve had some usage of the equipment. Yeah. A lot more sex and hormones affect it. So as your estrogen increases, that will make it darker. The progesterone will actually decrease the color. Oh, interesting. So for those ladies who are perimenopause or in menopause, if you happen to be on progesterone, if your doctor prescribed that for you, then that might help decrease that. But I have no idea how long it takes for that to happen. Or to what degree. Right. Exactly. And pregnancy can fluctuate your hormones, obviously, as we all know. Yes. And that can also cause the darkening. Yeah. Pregnancy does darkening on a whole bunch of different things. So your nipples will darken, your labia darken. The areolas as well. Yeah. And I think your nipples get bigger too. They can. Because I have really small ones compared to everybody else my age in the orgy room. Part of that is just random. But yes, I don’t know. I would say 90% of the women have gumball nipples and I do not. I have a number two. It does happen. And I thought mine were big. Mine are tiny. Tiny. Compared.

Which is fabulous because I get to play with gumball nipples. There you go.

All right. How to fix it. If you are really concerned and you do want to do something about it. I can’t deal with it. I want to try something.

There is no guarantee, but you can change your daily habits. Avoid using harsh soaps. Wear the loose clothing that I talked about earlier. So sun dresses with no panties. Exactly. Okay. Perfect. Exactly. Perfect.

Natural remedies were talked about, but eating certain kinds of foods, which I think is BS. And then applying aloe and coconut oil. Oh, that’s a really bad idea. I also think that’s BS. I call BS on that big time and that’ll mess you up. So don’t please don’t do that. Yeah. Yeah. The coconut oil will absolutely mess with your pH and all the natural bacteria. Bacteria down there. Yep. Your natural biome. Now the laser, the Pico laser I did read is pretty effective according to the little bit of research that I did on that. You should do your own for sure. It does target the melanin and we’ll break it down. Interesting. I will say I have gotten multiple laser treatments on for hair in that area. And it is, oh my God, really, really painful. Really, really painful. It is not pleasant. It’s a hot kind of burning sensation. Oh gosh. Yeah. It stings and it’s like sharp. It’s really shocking.

It’s very, because that sounds fantastic. Right.

I almost think the waxing would be better. I’ve only had it waxed down just the, there was some part, I think just the top, the mound, I had that waxed once. That was pretty painful, but since it was so long ago, I’m not sure I can compare the two. They might be similar.

If you know, or you’ve had both procedures, be sure to let us know. Right.

You know, the last thing is just maybe try loving your body and accepting it the way it is, right? And all of it’s beautiful. You mean we don’t have to live up to the artificial, stereotypical, social media projected image of ourselves. We could actually just be happy in our own bodies.

That’s shocking. Yep. And embrace our uniqueness. And I will tell you from the non-Vulva owner, but vulva appreciator position, I don’t care what it looks like. Well, I know. They’re all amazing and wonderful. And if I have the privilege of being able to see one, I’m happy. I don’t care what it looks like.

I’m happy.

It’s amazing. It’s wonderful. But it is amazing how deep that programming goes because I’m decades old now, and I have seen really nothing but tiny little tight packages, all neat. Now, I will say they’re not as neat and tiny now, and a lot of books have come out, and you’re seeing a lot of differences now, right? Yes. And that’s lovely, but I still have not seen many color differences. Maybe we’ll get some pictures in an email. Can people send us these pictures in an email? Absolutely. Swingeruniversity.com. That’d be lovely. It would actually be nice to post those in Patreon for people to see the differences.

So if you’re a vulva owner and you’re proud of your not stereotypical vulva, and you want to share it, let us know. In all of its glory, whatever the color, whatever the shape, that would be fabulous.

Because we’re all different. And perfect. And complete. And if you choose, oh and tasty.

If you choose to make changes to your body, do your research, since not all the solutions are safe, cost effective, or long lasting.

And with that, go give your labia some love. Yeah, hugs and kisses.

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