“If you got it – flaunt it.”

No one knows who said the above quote, but whoever did most definitely had a glorious mound of chest hair.

I have chest hair – superb, manly, chest hair. And I’m not talking about that sparse, patchy, bull-s**t type of chest hair. My stuff is well groomed, plentiful, and sexy as a mo-fo. And I want to show it off to the world. Does that make me a bad person?

There once was a glorious time called the late 70’s/early 80’s when chest hair ruled the world. To have it meant you were a real man. You were important. You were respected. Anyone who was anybody had a prominent hairy chest. Burt Reynolds, Tom Selleck, The Bee Gees – all of them showed off the goods. Now it is seen as a fashion faux pas and it’s just not fair.

Here’s the deal: I get hot really easily and I like to keep two buttons unbuttoned on my shirts instead of the standard one. I can’t do one. It makes me too warm and it feels like I am choking. I feel comfortable and cool with the two buttons, unbuttoned look. And I am constantly getting grief for it. Friends and family continually bag on me. But if I didn’t have chest hair, if I rocked the Ken doll look, I wouldn’t get any grief at all (I also wouldn’t be a man.) So what gives? Why the bias against chest hair?

Hell, if facial hair is so hip right now then why can’t chest hair be just as hip? Hair is hair.  Why leave one out just because it is in a different location? Let’s celebrate both. Come on hipsters, put down your craft beer, comb your beards, and get behind the chest hair!

Listen, I’m not talking about back hair. If you are unlucky enough to look like a Wookie, well, first of all, my sympathies. That must suck. Now quit reading this article and go get rid of it – immediately. I’m talking about chest hair. There is no need to get rid of it completely. Trim – yes. Shave it – absolutely not. I had a friend do that and he said the itching that occurred when it grew back was worse than water boarding. Wax it – hell no. Did we all not learn from the infamous scene in “Forty Year Old Virgin?” Laser it off – come on. Lasers should be used for one thing and one thing only: the development of laser guns. The point is I don’t want to do any of those things. I want to keep my chest hair and have the option of showing it off if I so choose without judgment or stones thrown (literally and figuratively).

Back in the day I worked at a CD store. And Tina, the store’s manager, LOVED that I had chest hair. She was always asking me to go into the back room and take my shirt off so she could look at it. Yeah, I guess that’s pretty much the definition of workplace sexual harassment, but at the time I was really flattered. (FYI, I never did go into the backroom and take my shirt off for Tina. But the night I quite the CD store to go back to college she bought me dinner and drinks and I showed her then. I regret nothing.) So there is a precedent that chest hair is more than acceptable. I just feel it should be celebrated even more.

I’m not asking that we go back to the simpler days of yore when unbuttoning your shirt down to your navel was considered bitchin’. With the exception of gold medallion makers, no one wants that anymore. I’m just asking that when I show a little bit of chest hair that you not only not judge me, but also acknowledge the beauty. We are all God’s creatures. Some of us are just hairier than most.