Is this new era of plastic surgery transparency meant to make us feel better?
When deep plane facelifts become the new norm
Somewhere between Kylie Jenner sharing the details of her breast augmentation in a TikTok comment and Kris Jenner looking unnaturally taught, my social feeds are now full of people sharing their plastic surgery.
Celebrity makeup artist Erin Parsons posted a TikTok saying she was 46 and “revealing all”. Her revelations included a rhinoplasty, lower face lift, neck lift and an upper and lower blephoplasty. Erin even tagged her Drs in the caption.
Another celebrity makeup artist I follow, Kristofer Buckle, has been sharing incredibly candid pictures of his recovery from a deep plane neck and lower face lift, brow lift, chin implant and upper eye blephoplasty.
That’s not to mention the many TikTok posts I’ve seen from people, whose names I don’t know, sharing the details of their procedures.
On one hand, I do respect the honesty. I know that Kylie, is damned if she does share this information and damned if she doesn’t and in some ways, yes, I do think her opening up about this, is a brave decision.
But, on the other hand and not just Kylie here, I also feel this is a time when we are promoting plastic surgery more than ever. Can you imagine what a pay day it’s currently like for all these doctors, whose patients usually arrive and leave by secret entrances?
Don’t tell me that Dr Garth Fisher (Kylie’s surgeon), wasn’t punching the air when he woke up that morning. While speed dialling a Calabasas-based florist, of course.
I’m so torn between these procedures being gatekept for the elite who previously tried and sell it to us commoners as ‘pilates routines’, ‘good DNA’, or whatever else they come up with and having an open and honest discourse about the ridiculous nature that is our ever-changing modern beauty standard.
I really respected influencer Stassie Karanikolaou (who also happens to be Kylie Jenner’s BFF), when she admitted to a) having a BBL on her podcast and b) regretting it.
"I literally have another surgery in a few weeks to try and reduce the size of it even more. This decision I made when I was super young has now been affecting me."
Admitting to plastic surgery is one thing, but publicly saying you regret it, is even more powerful. But, then, in the next breath, Stassie said she’d just had her breasts augmented a month ago.
It’s like trading a Jellycat for a Labubu. All you’ve done, is “correct” your body from one “trend” and altered it again to fit another.
Being the slimmest you can possibly be, is now the beauty standard and a BBL doesn’t work for that.
No, now it’s all about having tiny shoulders and unnaturally large breasts that defy gravity in your spaghetti strap LBD.
I don’t want to body shame Kylie here, but one of the things that made me laugh when she commented on influencer Rachel Leary’s video, “445 cc, moderate profile, half under the muscle!!!!! silicone!! garth fisher!!! hope this helps lol”, is how Rachel described Kylie’s boobs as, “The most perfect looking, natural boob job ever”.
Dude, I think the fact that Kylie was so open to share the information, shows that even she knows they’re not meant to look natural.
I think she looks incredible, don’t get me wrong, but she also looks like she’s straight out of the Playboy mansion circa 2007. She is the tiniest she has ever been, with boobs the size of her head.
It’s like all the celebs that got BBLs but kept their thigh gaps.
Yes, I respect Kylie for being so transparent, but don’t make her now body the new beauty standard because you’ve moved on from the other one.
Maybe the answer, isn’t that we all have access to a deep plane facial. But rather we leave the wealthy elite to buy Vogue covers and mess with their faces, while we enjoy the privilege of growing old in ours?
I think yes be transparent so we all know that ‘look’ has been bought and paid for because it’s disingenuous to pretend it’s your olive oil skincare routine, eating clean and barre classes.
But it just becomes something else for some people to covet and strive for who won’t have access to the top docs or the money for them so will make bad choices and get into debt or use docs that aren’t as good and we up with another round of ‘my botched plastic surgery: I just wanted to look like kylie’ on ch5 and on the front cover of Bella magazine.
As celebs age they often keep going with the surgery striving to maintain the effect and go from once looking pretty great to looking ridiculous cos they don’t know when to stop - Sharon Osbourne for one who once had great surgery but now looks like a horror. I do think Jane Fonda still looks fabulous though and I love her 😍
Also, seeing people in their 20s, 30s, 40s, 50s all with Botox and pumped up lips just means 20 year olds look 40 not that 40 year olds look 20.
Love this take Laura! I think we have to consider the prices these people are paying too - the girl who does fillers in her spare room down the road won't give you the same finish that Kylie's aesthetician will.