Watch Buzzfeed’s video on how beauty standards impact men around the world
Women aren’t the only ones subjected to rigid beauty standards. Men absolutely face pressure to fit certain physical molds—and lately, the issue is finally getting some attention. Recent research has shown that men face body image insecurities and covet “idealized” bodies, in the same way women do.
This week, Buzzfeed released a video highlighting “Men’s Standards Of Beauty Around The World,” and we are still processing our (kinda, sorta, maybe a lil bit weird?) feelings about it. The video features various male models, representative of different countries’ standards of beauty, along with facts about each ethnicity’s ideal man and some interesting tidbits on male objectification in general.
The pressure for men to subscribe to “conventional” beauty standards has been on the rise in recent years, and the video points out some pretty convincing evidence based on research gathered from “professional publications, entertainment, and social media.” In the beginning, it states that “men’s beauty products have increased by more than 70% worldwide between 2012 and 2014,” and from there, it goes into the specifics.
As it turns out, the pressure to be beautiful manifests itself in very different ways around the world: cosmetic surgery is becoming more common for men in Brazil and South Korea, men in Turkey regularly remove their body hair, and men in India are increasingly using celebrity-endorsed skin lightening creams.
There’s obviously much more to global beauty standards than the video encapsulates — South Korea’s model isn’t necessarily an accurate depiction of beauty standards for all of East Asia, in the same way Nigeria and South Africa’s models probably wouldn’t be representative of, say, Egypt (which wasn’t a part of the video). But it’s a start, a kick-off to an important conversation about male beauty standards—so that’s something.
Check it out, and tell us what you think.
(Image via Buzzfeed.)
