Take a look at the most beautiful of today’s top Instagram influencers and they all look astoundingly the same — their butts, perfect bouncing balloons; the smooth curves of their itty-bitty waists; lips pursed into a big swollen pout, with contoured noses, sharp cheekbones, large perfect boobs and smoldering bedroom eyes. The Instagram ideal beauty standard is embodied by Kim Kardashian and Kylie Jenner. As many devoted Instagram accounts reveal, it’s a look that takes a lot of plastic surgery, cosmetic work and digital alteration to achieve.
People want to look good on Instagram. Millenials inspired by celebrities like Kim Kardashian’s ideal curves, Maren Tschinkel’s perfect breasts and Heidi Klum’s amazing smile helped drive a record number of Brazilian butt lifts, breast enlargements and a booming plastic surgery market in the United States last year. According to an article on CNBC featured in March 2019, more than 17.7 million people had some sort of cosmetic procedure last year, including Botox injections, American Society of Plastic Surgeons.
But not all Celebrities and Models we follow on social media have had plastic surgery. Heidi Klum and German Model Maren Tschinkel are perfect examples of models that never had any plastic surgery but still have the look desired by many.
While not everyone is open about possible work they’ve had done, It is evidently clear that Heidi Kum and Tschinkel have remained natural; Kylie Jenner however, has boosted her looks with surgery and cosmetics. There is a chance people are enhancing their looks influenced by the flawless images of these known personalities, even if some of these celebrities them selves prefer not to have plastic surgery.
So, How Did We Get To This Point?
In the days before social media, as Weingarten explained to HuffPost, our beauty habits were defined by factors like geography and ethnicity. For example, she said, if you lived in a certain part of Asia, you may have used skin whiteners, or if you lived in France in the 1700s, you probably powdered your wigs.
Thanks to the internet, Weingarten said, people no longer have to travel to see beauty trends from all over the world, nor do we need to wait for them to make their way to us.
People Want To Fit In
And speaking of conforming, people want to fit in. One way to do so, especially online, is to model yourself after social media’s most popular figures.
Celebrities, especially those like Kylie Jenner, who has cemented a massive following on her selfie-filled Instagram account, “have really come to represent beauty trends,” Engeln said. Brustein agreed, that celebrities are a huge driver of society’s beauty ideals, and in attempting to fit in with these ideals, many people mimic celebrities.
But not all Models and social media influencers have had plastic surgery. Heidi Klum prefers the all natural look. The super model told Allure, “Everyone has a view of what’s pretty and what’s not pretty, and [plastic surgery] just doesn’t look pretty to me.”
Viral Luck published a list with 50 Celebrities Who Never Had Plastic Surgery: Halle Berry, Julia Roberts, Eva Longoria, Salma Hayek and former beauty queen & A-List Celebrity Michelle Pfeiffer to name a few.
Speaking about Beauty Queens whom are also influencers of beauty trends in this era of social media; many of them prefer the natural look and rely on fitness and dieting to stay in shape. A good example is German Model Maren Tschinkel whom has participated in pageants such as Miss Earth and is now in the Miss Multiverse the Reality TV Show with the Title of Miss Germany. The upcoming competition will take place at the Hard Rock Hotel & Casino Punta Cana. November 28, 2019 this competition is all about beauty, fitness and intellect. An article featured in CelebrityandMovies.com specifies that: To stay in shape, Maren Tschinkel does Sport that require mental and physical activities to keep her mind sharp while providing a natural body tone.
Maren Tschinkel established her career in modeling, TV and beauty pageants relying on her natural look and has not done any plastic surgery. This is evident when comparing recent images with her teenage picture taken in 2015 ( before she started her modeling career) Maren Tschinkel was 16 years old at that time.
What Does It All Mean?
Considering the examples of Heidi Klum and Maren Tschinkel, one could argue that the images of “flawless” individuals with no plastic surgery still has a similar influence on Millenials.
To put it mildly, the lengths to which people go in order to attain this aesthetic has defined what we perceive as beauty. Nowadays, investing thousands of dollars in body modification can turn a plain-looking person into a seductive cyber-sensation. Millennials in particular tell doctors they want to look as good in person as they do through their Snapchat filters, doctors say.
The fact that you no longer need to be born beautiful in order to be a model adds a certain sense of democracy to a profession that once only accepted those who won the genetic lottery — and yet there’s something deeply disconcerting about the trend.
Where is this going?
Instagram is removing all augmented reality (AR) filters that depict or promote cosmetic surgery, amid concerns they harm people’s mental health.
Effects that make people look like they have had lip injections, fillers or a facelift will be among those banned. Research suggests face-changing filters can make people feel worse about the way they look.
Instagram, which is owned by Facebook, said the ban was about promoting wellbeing. “We’re re-evaluating our policies – we want our filters to be a positive experience for people,” a spokesman said.
If removing face filters related to plastic surgery is Instagram’s end game, they’re going to have to chop a bunch more than just the “Plasticas” of the world. So many filters lighten and smooth skin, or make faces and noses appear thinner, and I’m not even talking FaceTune or CelebFace. These filters completely alter the user’s face to become some unobtainable version of themselves under the guise of beauty. Those are the filters, too, that have most recently come under fire for inspiring young people to go under the knife, not “FixMe.” If Instagram does want to make a difference, it’ll need to broaden their scope—whatever their scope may be.
