Are we in our cosmetic surgery era?

"Instagram face" is everywhere and I don't know what to think

Jan 31, 2023

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Personally, I feel that the shame women take on when it comes to their bodies is an important and underreported public health issue. As such, we need to be talking about why cosmetic surgery has become so pervasive in recent history—with all its complex, flawed, and often contradictory nuances.

To level with you, I haven’t had any cosmetic surgery (yet), though I’m certainly open to having minimally invasive treatments like Botox. I’m also unequivocally squeamish, so I’m not sure that this trend will ever be right for me. But that’s just me. Before we go any further, I want to be very clear that I truly don’t care what anyone chooses to do with their body as long as they’re happy, healthy, and believe it’s the right choice for them. I also genuinely believe that cosmetic procedures can completely change someone’s life and how they appear in the world (for the better).

The real reason that I’ve been thinking about the recent virality (and destigmatization) of cosmetic surgery is because I’ve also realized that I’m one of the few people in my friend group who has not had anything done. For the record, I’m 29, and while my group often skews into the high disposable income bracket, they’re nowhere near the super-rich/celebrity types that I typically think of when I think of plastic surgery.

Lately, it feels like “Instagram face” is taking over New York City in one fell swoop. When I asked my followers on Instagram for their candid thoughts on this trend, one of the replies resonated particularly:

“I haven’t had plastic surgery, but I feel a huge amount of pressure to since all of my friends started getting procedures. I look a lot less perfect standing next to them!”

Honestly, I feel that. To put the rise of cosmetic surgery in perspective, a 2022 national survey reported that cosmetic plastic surgeons across the U.S. have seen a 30% increase in patients at their clinics compared to pre-pandemic levels. Many of them say their businesses have doubled, and that demand is being driven by women between the ages of 31 and 45. There are a few obvious factors I’ve observed that are behind this trend:

There’s increased access to practitioners who do these types of procedures.
People are now looking at themselves on Zoom all day, and our exposure to beauty filters on social media is off the charts.
Credit companies are starting to incentivize cosmetic surgery financially.
Thanks to TikTok’s algorithm, specific surgeries are literally going viral (ICYMI, Buccal Fat Removal was the latest).

As with any trend, it’s hard not to want “in” as that is how the engine of consumerism is designed to work. We are creatures of community. But this particular beauty trend feels a bit more dangerous to me than, say, the thin eyebrows that rocked the nineties. Because frankly, it’s not a trend at all. Cosmetic surgery is often permanent. “Instagram face” is inspired by filters and digital avatars, directly playing into our desire to look less human, more filtered, and closer to the hypersexualized avatars so prominent across gaming (and the internet at large).

In my research for this essay, I stumbled upon an interesting take on what “modern beauty” trends actually represent, via the brilliant beauty writer Jessica DeFino. She writes:

“Modern beauty means being as divorced from your humanity as possible. Like a complete separation from all that is human about you.…Why is this is a problem? Beyond the social, financial, and political consequences of not conforming to a baseline standard of beauty that’s constantly being raised, you mean? Because the bigger the distance between our bodies and our understanding of beauty — and the bigger the cultural emphasis on being or feeling beautiful as a pathway to happiness, actualization, or embodiment — the bigger the risk to our physical, psychological, and psycho-spiritual wellbeing (and the smaller the opportunity for happiness, actualization, or embodiment). Basically, unattainable standard of beauty + cultural obsession with beauty = lower quality of life!”

On that note, I want to highlight a handful of the questions and replies that folks sent me on this topic. Let’s dig in…

Can plastic surgery truly be an individual act of “empowerment” if it impacts how other women feel about themselves?

When cosmetic procedures are inextricably linked to adhering to cultural expectations of beauty, which are still defined by the male gaze, the idea of them being “empowering” has its limits. There’s no easy way to separate our perceptions of beauty standards from their history. The reality is that our society orients women, no matter their sexuality, to pursue male attention (we’ve talked about this before). As much as we might like to believe cosmetic enhancements are an individual act undertaken to boost our confidence, it’s simply impossible for it not to have a wider impact on those around us. We’ve touched on the question of whether beauty can be separated from the desires of others and given that we have to look in a mirror to see our own appearance literally—can your appearance ever really be just for you?

When a person alters their appearance, that private act is actually a social practice. Our perception of modern beauty and desired beauty goals are inseparable from our environment and social circles because our beliefs do not come from our own internal autonomy. When an individual opts in to “empower” themselves with surgery, is it possible for it to not perpetuate unrealistic standards for everyone else? The majority of the world was not born looking like a supermodel (and definitely not an avatar) so as more of us try to achieve that standard of beauty, surely it makes the problem worse? Clare Chambers, author of Intact: A Defence for the Unmodified Body defines the impact of individuals participating in anti-aging beauty treatments on a community as “coerced modification.” On top of all this, beauty has always been closely correlated with community, self-expression, and power. Participating in beauty (or fashion) trends is a way of identifying with a group, but it also displays a certain financial status in that you can afford various beauty trends. This is especially true of cosmetic surgery given its price point. Does it make it wrong to do it for yourself when it could harm the collective as a whole? No, not necessarily. At the end of the day, we’re all just living in this highly flawed society, and we’re trying to get by. But it’s certainly something to mull on!

Should people who opt to have cosmetic surgery also be provided with mandatory counseling/therapy?

Let’s circle back to the idea that the shame we feel for our bodies is an impending public health issue. If plastic surgery is one way of pausing those feelings of shame by becoming more aesthetically “beautiful” (kind of like buying a new outfit!), then it’s hard not to see a world where it makes sense that patients are provided with mental health counseling when they get procedures. Something that came up in almost every message I’ve received on this topic (65+ and counting!) was the problem of body dysmorphia and losing sight of when “enough is enough.” In your messages, this commentary was mainly in relation to fillers (lips, cheeks, etc.) and it focused on your own experiences when starting fillers or noticing “addictions” amongst friends who have gotten fillers. Perhaps as a result of seeking constant validation of our bodies and faces—in places like social media and on dating apps—we’re dangerously correlating our outward beauty with our ability to feel happiness on the inside. A number of you (along with writers like DeFino) have questioned whether our constant pursuit of beauty is instead deferring our acceptance of ourselves to a future point in time when we might feel confident (after the results of things like anti-aging creams, fillers, and surgeries kick in). Perhaps counseling could help?

Can you have plastic surgery and be a feminist?

This is a fiercely contested topic, and I find it fun to think about. There are many opinions out there—from Cathy Davis stating that “cosmetic surgery is an extreme form of medical misogyny” in 1991 to EmRata’s recent perspective that, yes, you can have plastic surgery and be a feminist because how you present yourself isn’t indicative of your political pursuit for equality. My current view is that two things can be true: you can opt to have plastic surgery and believe in equality at the same time. But I do find it unconvincing to view cosmetic surgery as a feminist move (due to beauty’s historical baggage). And just like you can enjoy participating in gendered economies like nightclubbing for free, or enjoy listening to misogynistic rap music (see: Roxanne Gay’s Bad Feminist book for this one) while still being a feminist, you should also be allowed to opt into things that don’t quite add up (like Botox) if they bring you greater happiness. It’s worth repeating that feminists can also be deeply contradictory characters because we are, after all, human. But if we bring it back to the facts, the reality is that women are still celebrated for their looks more than their achievements.

When you actually define “feminism” — a political movement toward collective liberation — it’s clear that cosmetic surgery is not feminist. It doesn’t collectively liberate. It’s an individual “solution” to systemic issues — one that, in most cases, reinforces said systemic issues… I think the people who make this argument are, at their core, unwilling to give up standardized/industrialized beauty as a form of power (because it’s one of the few forms of power we have) and are instead trying to manipulate it into something radical when it’s not… Lots of beauty behaviors only feel “good” or “empowering” because a shitty system of oppression made sure you felt bad and stripped you of your power first, in order to force participation. — Jessica DeFino

What will younger generations of women think when they look to older women and see none?

This was a really interesting question. As we know, aging women have never been respected (due to them no longer being celebrated by the male gaze), so is our cosmetic surgery era an attempt to take back more power as we age? Perhaps.

But if significant subsections of women continue altering their faces, how will we know what a woman that’s 30, 40, 50, 60, 70, or 80… actually look like? Why are we so afraid of an older appearance? Is it because we’re afraid of death and wrinkles that signal that we’re closer to that inevitable future? I feel it’s hard to separate cosmetic surgery from our fear of losing relevance as women. Going back to DeFino’s perspective above, perhaps this current trend is unknowingly a nod to some beliefs central to a transhumanist philosophy. Perhaps our collective obsession with maintaining a youthful glow is just starting much younger in life compared to previous generations.

This response was one of my favourites as it relates to this topic (and yes, I ordered The Uglies immediately after reading this):

“This topic always makes me feel like a bit of a hypocrite, quite honestly, because I want every woman & person to get to do what they want with their own body. In terms of individual choices, I don’t see botox and filler and cosmetic procedures as any different than hair dye or tattoos or other treatments. Yet, I can’t help but feel that for the daughters of our generation, it will be hard to look in the mirror and love their own face if they’ve been saturated with the messaging that you can and should, change it all. Rhinoplasty comes to mind as it feels like a commonly passed down feature in many families. We often look at photos and see our noses closely resemble our parents. What does it say to a child if their parents have all changed theirs? I’m not sure. By no means is it wrong but how can we talk about in ways that don’t perpetuate specific beauty standards, rather than inclusive beauty standards? It reminds me of an old dystopian science fiction novel called The Uglies— effectively everyone is born in the suburbs of this community and when you turn 18 you undergo a major makeover with extensive procedures and are unrecognizable. Then they all move to the “big city” and all these beautiful people meet before moving to the suburbs to raise their kids and the cycle lives on. The premise makes me think of this same concept. Children when, they don’t look like the adults in their world, feel they must undergo procedures to be a “grown up.”

Overall, this topic does make me sad. It’s a reminder that all of us, at varying frequencies, think about how we want to change our faces or our bodies. I feel sad at how much brain power we have collectively used to obsess over appearance. At the root of all of this is perhaps the real problem: society stops valuing women after a certain age. Instead of trying to fix that huge problem, we try to continually “optimize” ourselves in order to remain relevant.

But I want to know what you think. Is the rise of cosmetic surgery the same as the thin eyebrow trend in the nineties? Will it fade? Is the shame we feel about ourselves in fact becoming a public health issue? Is it bad to want to look good forever? Can you be a feminist and have cosmetic surgery? Share anything this topic brings up for you in Diem.