"What happened, and is it related to patriarchy? Has porn spurred this on? Seems I read one feminist who said it's because men prefer women who resemble younger, less powerful girls than fully developed women. Doesn't seem to be as important for men to shave their pubes."
I'm confused as to why only feminists can answer this question. I'm not one, but I'll try.
First, I think that the porn hypothesis has a lot going for it.
Second, I think that there was a reaction/backlash to "women's liberation" and the drift of this reaction was to diminish the perceived threat of women, to contain it...
The threat first presented itself in the late sixties and was articulated in shows like "Bewitched," "I Dream of Jeanie," even, I'd say "My Mother the Car" -- all shows in which women are either literally objectified or "loved" inasmuch as they are willing to give up their "special powers" and play the suburban game.
By the seventies the game was up as all the witches, genies, and mothers headed to work to support their families, with the general drift being that while, on average, women's earnings went up, men's headed down.
So I think there's a lot to say for the popularity of the infantile look of the pubic hitler mustache as a reaction to the rising power of women. In many cultures shaving or cutting hair is equated with emasculation and is practiced by women to be more appealing. I know that Turkish women wax/shave public hair. Having never had oral sex with a denuded woman, I can't say whether this makes it easier to do that or find one's way about.
I find the practice repulsive because I like women to look like women rather than little girls.
Joanna