June 22nd is WHAT day now?

So I hear that today was International "No Panty Day" (on Twitter and Facebook at least) and if that isn't enough to get me to dust off my blog then nothing is.

If, like me, you awoke this morning to discover your Facebook and/or Twitter feed plastered with images of women in various states of undress, like this popular one:

then you may have wondered what the hell was going on.


Well, I can't help you there because after hours (ok, minutes) of exhaustive research, I've discovered that no one knows where the hell International "No Panty Day" came from. The closest thing to a theory of origin is that it's inspired by "No Pants Day", which may or may not be a thing that happens on the first Friday of June (or on April Fool's, depending on who you ask) and involves riding public transportation while pantsless and underwearless.

Hygienic.

Bottom line: no one knows where it came from or who started it. I can only assume that, like Lolcats, it sprang fully formed from the nether regions of the internet. Most likely from the vicinity of 4chan.

But I'm honestly less interested in where it came from than I am in how it was received. I didn't pay much mind when I first saw it because, like other independently-minded young women, my sartorial decisions aren't influenced by memegenerator pics. But then I noticed it trending on Twitter. And ... like the masochist that I am, I clicked the hashtag. And I found... this.

If you're a masochist like me then you clicked the link and discovered two main types of posts. One type is from women who are silly enough to be influenced by memegenerator pics and smart enough to realize that International "No Panty Day" isn't all that interesting unless you announce your missing undergarments to the world. Namely, this kind of woman:

It's Courtney Stodden, so I admit that it's pretty much low-hanging fruit, but you get the idea.

Those posts were a revelation to me. I never knew that so many women felt trapped by their underwear. I do hope that Victoria's Secret is paying attention. Less lacy diamond-encrusted contraptions and more comfy (cute) cotton undies, guys. The lady-folk (well, some of us, anyway) are obviously crying out for relief.

The other type of posts is from the multitude of people who were obviously just waiting for yet another slut-shaming circle jerk to come around. They look like this:



and this:

Clearly, this poor child has no clue how a hashtag works. And no sense of irony.

If you look really closely, you'll notice how many of the slut-shamers are women. It's like an international pastime with our gender.

I especially enjoyed the ones so steeped in self-loathing that they couldn't resist the obvious fish jokes:

She does know that healthy vaginas aren't supposed to smell like fish, right?

Aaannyhoo, Courtney Stodden (and this girl) aside, it doesn't look like International "No Panty Day" had many takers, much to the chagrin of horny male juveniles and opportunists everywhere, I'm sure.

Why did it flop? Probably not because we as a gender have evolved enough to become immune to demeaning suggestions from a massive audience (though I eagerly await the day we arrive there). I imagine that few women tossed their underwear today because it's just not practical.

As a boyshorts girl myself, I have absolutely no plans to dump my underwear today or any day, partly because I live in jeans and, as all women (and few men) should know, wearing jeans (especially skinny ones) without underwear generally leads to a pretty yeasty outcome. Especially in a tropical country.

Furthermore, considering the lengths to which most women will go to avoid pantylines, how's anyone supposed to know who's honoring the day and who isn't (short of social media broadcasts, of course)? If no one can tell, and no one knows whether to trust the tweets, then what's the point? Who's benefiting from this little exercise? Is it the newly-liberated women incubating brand-new vaginal infections or the men wondering if the little extra jiggle means what they hope it means?

But that isn't the real question. The real question is what happens to the unfortunate women for whom International "No Panty Day" happened to fall (as so many holidays and beach days do) right in the middle of their menstrual cycle?

Perhaps it's best not to know.