Why Are Women Getting BBLs?

I remember the first time I came across a BBL on my TikTok for you page and I immediately thought to myself, if I ever get cosmetic surgery, it’s going to be this. A “BBL effect” trend raged through the app, which mocked the superiority complex of these girls, however I was still so obsessed with the surgery. I couldn’t help but wonder why everyone on social media was running to get this surgery (like I would be doing if I had the money).

What exactly is a BBL? BBL is an acronym for Brazilian Butt Lift, and it is a cosmetic surgery that augments the size and perfects the shape of your butt by taking fat from “problem areas” and relocating it. It achieves the small waist, huge butt combination that is so sought after in our generation. The surgery takes unwanted fat from your body and makes your butt bigger, it sounds like a dream.

The BBL was created in 1960 in Brazil by a surgeon named Ivo Pitanguy and increased in popularity as the desired body type for women shifted from “tits on a stick” to an hourglass figure. It's an extremely invasive surgery with the mortality risk being one in every 20,117 surgeries. The healing process spans across approximately 2 months of unbearable pain along with the inability to sit or lay on your butt without the help of an extremely weird looking pillow. Plus, it costs you about $20,000! With all of this, you still run the risk of “losing” the shape if you don’t follow a workout regimen or eat properly during the healing process. The pursuit of this perfect hourglass silhouette comes with a very high price, so why are women still running to these surgeries? Why do I, knowing the risk, still idolize the BBL?

Women’s bodies are treated like trends that are controlled by the male gaze and social media. As women, we feel this helpless need to keep up with whatever is considered desirable. If we go back to when Victoria Secret models were the “dream girl”, we also see a peak in anorexia and bulimia in our generation in their misguided attempts to achieve that body type. If we go back even further to the Renaissance era, plus sized women were recognized as desirable because they had the wealth to eat during a hunger-stricken time period. Now, in the new age of social media, Instagram models are profiting off their portrayal of a “perfect life” that we wish to obtain, and the common denominator between them are their perfect hourglass silhouettes. The BBL look is trendy.

This means that at some point, the BBL will go out of trend. As the next “ideal” body type comes, women will continue to switch their strategies in order to achieve the look. It’s crazy to me that human bodies can be subject to such judgment, but unfortunately that is the world we are growing up in. A world that tells me through TikTok that my body is not ideal. A world that creates insecurities based on whatever men find desirable.

In spite of that, do what you want. Do whatever is going to make you the most confident in a world that will constantly try to pluck a self conscious attitude out of everyone in it. It’s important to recognize that there is no ideal body. Trust me, in a couple years it’s going to change. If you want to go get a BBL surgery because your body genetically has more of a box shape and an hourglass figure would make you more confident, do it! Just make sure it is for you and not some crazy BBL trend.

From my perspective, the rise in the BBL trend is due to women being indirectly told about the standard “dream” body. But a “dream” body is subjective. Make sure you are able to call out when society is telling you to do something versus when you actually want to do it. Everybody is a “dream” body, so pursue whatever you desire.

Strike Out,

Writer: Chanel Gaynor

Editor: Ridha Islam

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