BBLs, Protruding Lips and Contours: Undoing it All
How the incline towards the au-naturel has taken a toll on a decade-long, puissant beauty standards and appealing lifestyles.
Like the Kardashians are supposed to do, they broke the internet once again with the supposed rumors of removing their implants. Something around the corner here screams a major shift in how we perceive beauty which is skin deep.
Reversing the Sorcery: Undo-Plasty
A fresh term on the rise, ‘Undo-Plasty’ takes any surgery into its bracket which reverses the procedure an individual has previously undergone. While the procedures may have been common amongst the general folk, celebrities are joining the line of going back to square one, not wanting to start anytime soon.
On her blog, singer Courtney Love mentions how she wants her God-gifted lips, saying “I just want the mouth God gave me.” It is amusing to observe a decade long time of beauty trends enhancing each part of our body one brick at a time, leading to a crash completely due to a shift in a mere mindset. From lip plumpers to brow lifts, we have all matured a tad-bit to understand what is the best for our bodies.
While there are still not many helpful searches for ‘Why are thin lips attractive?’ there is a psychological backing to having fuller lips. Yet, the likeability of one’s lips is also heavily dependent on how you alter it, and how it sits on your face (which is likely to be exposed to mishaps if you plump it with surgery). In a 2018 article, The Cut mentions a praise for fuller lips, which could make someone livid, quote “There is a reproductive drive in chasing after full lips, given their connotations with sexual vitality; some have even suggested that lips are attractive because of their resemblance to the labia.”
The undo-plasty trend, however, does not shed light on the actual effects of modifying yourself and the perils of the same. It does not highlight how unnecessary some procedures can be in the likes of having the ideal beauty quotient.
In a much degrading sense, these ‘repair works’ only proclaim how we have come to consider plastic surgeries similar to trying on a lip-shade; a piece of cake, something innocuous in the long run.
The BBL Epidemic and Dynamic Beauty Standards
Yet, in the recent zeitgeist, Tik Tok had managed to influence a complete generation up and coming in the industry. Manipulating these young minds as far as to convince a whole band of female teens to take a trip to a third world country for a Brazilian Butt Lift (BBL) seems blasphemous and bizarre.
Such an occurrence only dreads us to await the next onslaught of beauty standards. While we all wanted the Jessica Rabbit body at some point in our lives, it is an aghast reality that body trends change as quickly as fashion clothes.
While focusing on NOT having curves may seem like a good option at the moment, it is bound to take the same route but to the other end of the extremes, ultimately bringing us back to square one.
A year ago, when the BBL trend was at its epitome with people trying to maintain it from home workouts, American model Kendall Jenner was accused of photoshopping her body (which is already extremely skinny) to bring a ‘slight curve’ on the belly.
With the rise in the acceptance of K-pop and Korean culture in general, it may be a pied piper tune towards the y2k skinny coming into the scene, but with the east-asian features as an addition. Anxious to even think about, the rise of eating disorders in such cases are inevitable. Not to mention that ‘skinny’ is another unachievable ideal to many.
A lifestyle analysis YouTuber, Salem Tovar, also brings up a great comparison of Tik Tok and Tumblr, mentioning how both the platforms romanticize mental illnesses, calorie counting, diet culture, body shaming and people photoshopping their bodies.
The Game-changer Skincare
Ah, skincare. A ritual of giving importance to oneself after the end of an exhausting long day, or the start of one. Post-pandemic problems got us all on the self-care bandwagon, with investing in it bar none.
The likes of having a daily routine, a stark contrast to the anxiety-filled year, comes from creating a sensation of being at home. Something very personal and nostalgic, to be able to take care of your external appearance becomes a challenge for and even vaastu astrologers and interior designers (yes, them) to design such spaces in one’s bathroom. Such a goal is made possible from quality materials with a high nostalgic value.
“When we say the kitchen is our home, well the bathroom was our sanctuary during the pandemic. People who were lucky enough to have a bathroom could escape there.” director of beauty, Claire Varga mentioned to WGSN. The rituals we conduct in our bathrooms also became a way to connect with our ancient pasts, from increase to bath-house wellness treatments to the rise in bathing cultures of Japanese onsen (hot springs), Indonesian flower baths etc.
Before we could even catch it to experience, WGSN mentions another term, ‘skinminimalism’ referring to the minimalist mindset of fashion, but in skincare products and ingredients.
Frugality, a notion for wellness through the least bottles and tubes decked up on your vanity, and an investment for years will be taken into consideration once we’re saturated enough to get gua sha and rollers for under a dollar.
An Allude to the Falsifiers
Having the Kardahsian, or the Instagram Face was all the rage prior to the doomed 2020. Clearly, nobody was born with the ideal Instagram face, as it was a holy grail of all the ‘acceptable’ features in various ethnicities. Think high cheekbones, sharp thick eyebrows, full lips, button nose and cat-shaped feline eyes. Just mentioning these characteristics is enough to understand how unachievable this would be in reality, no matter how many times someone goes under the knife (or going under the bus).
The rise of digital space leads to a much worse, accelerated outcome of the situation. Face filters, which started out as a fun way to pass time on Snapchat, are now seemingly unidentifiable on Instagram. ‘Catfish filters’, as the influencers have started calling it, are filters which when used alter your face to a great extent, yet blending in with the user’s true face indistinguishably.
The use of such filters goes both ways, with mostly the women of the Instagram community partaking in the reality. Some use it in order to call out the extreme blending of the filters, while some use it to claim that no filter has been used in a reel, story or a photo.
The latter is a concerning way to utilizing the advancements in technology, considering the increasing number of tweens and teens’ presence on the platform, with the app requiring everyone to be at least 13 years old. In retrospect, even a 13 year old is gullible enough to believe the false portrayal of the life shown on Instagram.
The Current Lifestyle
An amalgamation of self-care, societal expectations and an increased conscience and ability to question the wicked, generation z is taking hold of what is considered trendy. In such scenarios, the influence of their predecessors also weigh the value with presenting oneself in an ‘acceptable’ way, while keeping the fun ‘n frolic of the current zeitgeist in mind. We hope things don’t take the extreme turn as predicted though.
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Where do you think these body trends will go? Will they run around in circles or die down eventually?
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