On an island where beauty takes many forms – from beach-tousled natural to plumped-up club siren – Ibiza both mirrors global beauty pressures and provides a sanctuary from them. Here, you can let it all hang out… or have it all tucked in. With Europeans dropping a cool $17 billion on cosmetic procedures last year – roughly the entire GDP of Iceland – tweak culture is now firmly injected into the fabric of modern life. And with that figure expected to balloon to $36 billion by 2034, according to Expert Market Research, we have to ask whether we have swapped self-acceptance for self-enhancement?
In an era where fillers are as routine as facials and lunchtime Botox barely raises an eyebrow, the needle is definitely shifting. But when does self-love become self-harm? Full disclosure: I recently succumbed to the needle. Botox has all but erased a scar I’ve had on my forehead since childhood – and with it, my ability to throw withering looks. I’m frozen in time – at least from the brows up – and wonder if smooth skin is worth the cost of character. It feels like a small part of my identity has been wiped clean.
I chuckle at my vanity, wait impatiently for the effects to wear off, and chalk it up to experience. At 54, I’m late to the party. Others are already in deep. A 40-something friend is locked in a running battle with her practitioner over how much more injectables her face can take – I’ve witnessed the stand-offs – while a 27-year-old male acquaintance sometimes spends more on tweakments than he does on rent. I worry about what he’s doing to himself – or whether he’ll even be recognizable – in 10 years’ time.
It’s not just anecdotal. A report in the Journal of The American Academy of Dermatology outlines a phenomenon called ‘perception drift’ – “a slow drift away from one’s original self-image”. After a cosmetic treatment, “patients develop a new baseline and subsequently fixate on new perceived flaws.” The result? A never-ending quest for perfection. The report also flags social media’s role in promoting “unobtainable beauty standards”, a concern echoed by Dr. Michael Prager, a leading cosmetic doctor with a clinic in Knightsbridge, London. He warns that young people are increasingly overdoing treatments to resemble their filtered selfies.
Meanwhile, 20-something, aesthetically enhanced reality TV stars on shows like Selling Sunset and Love Island have pushed tweakments fully into the mainstream. In the UK, some clinics now even offer Love island-inspired treatment packages, as young viewers rush to look like their favorite pop culture personalities.
With the global perception of beauty narrowing, we’re homogenizing how we look, says Professor Heather Widdows, author of Perfect Me: Beauty as an Ethical Ideal. “It’s a completely transformational change in society to value appearance the way we do,” she says, likening it to a mass religious conversion. “We’ve got rid of one set of values and put another in place without noticing.
“As embodied beings, appearance – beauty – should matter,” adds Professor Widdows, “but it should not be all that matters, or what matters most.” Let’s be clear – I’m not here to judge. What someone does to their face and body is their business. But I do know this: I’ll be making a more conscious effort to remind friends, family and even casual acquaintances that what makes them beautiful to me is their quirks, flaws and unfiltered individuality. The stuff you can’t inject.
Beauty Rebels
1
Tess Holiday
Model and founder of #effyourbeautystandards, Holiday is breaking size stigma.
2
Laetitia Ky
Ivorian artist using hair sculpture to celebrate black beauty and challenges Eurocentric norms.
3
Jameela Jamil
Actor, activist and founder of I Weigh, Jamil is a fierce critic of diet culture and the illusion of perfection on social media.
