In the summer of 2021, one Love Island episode divided its fans. The offending incident arose from a game of ‘confessions,’ wherein a male contestant divulged to his housemates — many of them injected and implanted — his aversion to ‘fake’ women (he was dumped not long after). Since then, the subsequent debate as to whether cosmetic procedures constitute self-care or cunning deception have transcended its onscreen and online forum origins, settling on a different moral battleground: dating apps. Now, it’s not uncommon to see single men updating their profiles to demand potential matches exhibit “natural beauty only.”
“It’s the patriarchy at work,” says Simone Paget, sex and relationship expert and host of dating podcast We’re Never Doing This Again. “Women are frequently discriminated against when they don’t conform to mainstream beauty standards, however, the same can be said about women who do fit into these narrow standards via cosmetic procedures. It feels like we’re chasing an ever-moving target.”
With bio updates like “filler-free,” the line between preference and prejudice is becoming increasingly blurry. While recent years have seen gay hookup culture skewered for its problematic, and highly specific, ‘type’ requests (read: “no fats, no femmes”, etc.) appearance criteria are also picking up steam in the world of heterosexual online dating. While women are perhaps more subtle with their articulated preferences — some disclosing their height to indicate anyone shorter need not apply — men are going for the jugular. It’s a somewhat ironic shift, considering a 2019 report in which Instagram, Tinder and Snapchat users were named more likely to pursue plastic surgery than the average person.
“The emphasis on appearance is an effect of image-based platforms, the endless options presented by dating apps, and in some ways, plastic surgery itself,” author Allie Rowbottom says.
Allie’s latest release is Aesthetica, a plastic surgery-centric novel that follows influencer Anna Wrey on her rise to social stardom. It opens with Anna’s preparation to undergo the controversial new ‘Aesthetica’ treatment, a catch-all reversal promising to undo the protagonist’s myriad of regrettable cosmetic procedures. With the social implications of cosmetic enhancement serving as its underpinning theme, Aesthetica explores the innate desire to align with an evolving beauty ideal in hopes of romantic and professional advancement via the male gaze. Considering the most popular cosmetic procedures involve body parts that advertise youth and fertility (lips, butt, breasts), even men deliberately seeking ‘natural’ women can’t help but be drawn to cosmetic enhancement, Allie says. Especially if they can’t detect it.
“I think [it has become] very common for men to think they’re attracted to women who have not had cosmetic work, only to find that they are attracted to women who have had extremely good cosmetic work,” she adds.
“The idea of a ‘natural’ look has become warped over the years,” Maria Sullivan, dating expert and vice president of Dating.com, adds. “While men see certain women as more ‘natural’ than others, it’s possible that more ‘natural’ looking women are getting subtle cosmetic work done more often than these men realize.”
Dr. Darren Smith, a board-certified plastic surgeon in New York City, believes the “obsession with natural” derives from two separate sources. Firstly, he says, it’s a response to plastic surgery’s growing ubiquity. Our overnight familiarity with the appearance of — generally “botched” — work has catalyzed an “extreme fear of looking fake.” On the other hand, we can credit our pedestalization of untouched beauty to social conditioning, as influenced by religion and concepts of morality. “There’s a practical concern predicated on the assumption that attractiveness confers an advantage socially and professionally,” he says. “In this view, plastic surgery offers an unfair, and thereby immoral, advantage, or from a religious standpoint, there are people that view plastic surgery as changing or interfering with God’s work, and this, too, is immoral.”
The latter argument is familiar to Allie: “The entwinement of morality and plastic surgery is inextricable from old puritanical ideals — the human body as God’s creation and ‘defilement’ of God’s creation as a sin. Given this, it’s no surprise that the stigma around cosmetic work is cultural: in some countries, those less invested in antiquated interpretations of religious doctrine, it’s a status symbol; in others, it’s a moral failure.”
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As such, the natural vs. unnatural binary is not only increasingly difficult to define, but innately subjective. What does fake really mean? Spray tans and hair dye? Does natural stop at acrylics? Is makeup acceptable? Simone says you’re “damned if you do, damned if you don’t,” whereas Allie describes the Catch-22 as a modern iteration of “be hot but don’t try.
“Who among us is ‘natural’?” Allie continues. “Fifty years ago women were getting their hair colored in secret — it was considered shameful to have gray hair, but shameful to dye it. This was the definition of a no-win scenario as are most of the ideals foisted upon women.”
Naturally, this leaves women in a tricky spot when it comes to the actual disclosure of their cosmetic enhancements. While women on TikTok showcase the strength of their Botox — a once highly-stigmatized injectable, now almost as benign as hair extensions — cishet male Reddit users are debating whether women should feel obligated to share the procedures they’ve undergone with their dates up front (“I feel like I would rather know beforehand than find out after investing in that person”). “Perhaps you should disclose your feelings about it in your profile as fair warning before someone invests their time in you,” reads a popular response.
“I’m in my early forties and entering back into the dating arena,” Simone shares. “I look great for my age, but still, I feel like the needle has shifted (no pun intended). I don’t rush to tell potential romantic partners about non-cosmetic procedures I’ve had, so why would I share the cosmetic ones? That’s intimate information that they’re not privy to right away.”
In their righteous rejection of “fake” women, Allie says, it’s possible these men will repel viable prospects; forgoing great connections with women whose cosmetic tweaks they can’t detect, or with those who can’t relate to their demands for “effortless perfection”. Then there are the men themselves, among whom there is a rising demand for jaw filler and rhinoplasty. It’s possible those who opt to remain — and privilege — ‘au naturel’, will only further limit the dating pool as they’re passed over for men that closer align to the current beauty standard. Discriminating against female bodily autonomy may result in much fewer fish in the sea, which as one ill-fated Love Island contestant can attest, may not end well.
“We’ve seen that when singles base their swipes solely on appearance, the ensuing relationships don’t typically work out in the long run,” Maria says. “Physical attraction is what draws you to someone, but personality is what keeps you interested, and character is what can keep you happy.”