The Return Of 'Thinspiration'

Amid the constant body positive chatter, is the access to surgical procedures, supplements, and aesthetically-driven social media dangerously normalising unhealthy beauty standards?

- SAMREEN TUNGEKAR

There’s so much Gwyneth Paltrow has been in the news for, but one thing that touched a nerve was her interview with Dr Will Cole on The Art of Being Well podcast, where she said she drinks bone broth for lunch on most days, among other revelations. The clip went viral on TikTok, and the internet smirked: “Classic case of an almond mom” – a mom who pushes toxic dieting.

This is just one of many examples of the recent ‘ultra thin’ look that is somehow, amid all the #loveyourbody speeches, creeping back in. We traced the commonality of a few instances. Besides Paltrow’s almond mom move, the lack of different-sized models on the runway for fashion month was slammed by various people, and stars showing up looking different by drastically losing weight, with the help of a diabetes drug, was highlighted. Over the last year, we have briefly discussed the return of heroin chic, as even the curvy Kardashian fam looked skinnier, giving rise to speculations about them reversing their Brazilian butt lifts. Not just bodies, even faces are under scanner, as buccal fat removal is doing the rounds, with over 252 million views on videos about the topic on TikTok.

All of these examples point to one thing: Losing weight, no matter the cost or the way, to fit a certain body type and look a certain way, is slowly being normalised again.

NO (REAL) FOOD, PLEASE