Plastic Surgery in a 'Pretty Privilege' World
To be clear, this is not a defence of plastic surgery. Convincing women to undergo unnecessary, invasive, and often dangerous procedures in order to conform to a rigid and exclusionary beauty standard does not exist outside of patriarchy- it is produced by it. Plastic surgery is not feminist, and framing it as such would be disingenuous. What I am interested in interrogating instead is this: what does it mean to uphold a rigid hierarchy of beauty while simultaneously stigmatising women who attempt to access it? And what does that contradiction reveal about who beauty is for?
A 2021 study examining perceptions of women who seek plastic surgery found overwhelmingly unfavourable results: women who undergo cosmetic procedures frequently experience hostility, moral judgement, and social stigma. Two other qualitative studies exploring the lived experiences of plastic surgery recipients reported that women felt labelled as “fake,” inauthentic, or deceptive. Earlier research reinforces this pattern; a 2009 study of 103 men found attitudes toward plastic surgery to be largely negative, with respondents describing it as “a lazy way out”, and other studies show that young men often attribute negative personality traits- such as vanity, materialism, and insecurity- to women who have undergone cosmetic procedures.
Beyond academia, this stigma is evident anecdotally and culturally. Navigating social media or everyday conversation reveals a persistent disdain for women who have altered their appearance surgically. As cosmetic procedures become more accessible to average women rather than remaining the domain of the wealthy elite, the judgement intensifies. I have witnessed, even among friends, reactions of shock or pity when encountering women with visible plastic surgery working unglamorous or low-status jobs. The unspoken assumption is that these women must have been so insecure or desperate that they spent money they “shouldn’t have” on their faces or bodies. This perception is rarely neutral; it is laced with contempt.
Entire online platforms are dedicated to “exposing” celebrities who have had plastic surgery, with the implication being that there is something shameful that needs to be outed.
All of this points to a broader cultural belief in the West- that beauty must be a birthright. You cannot buy it in any meaningful way; you either have it or you don’t. Beauty functions as a social currency: attractive women are listened to more, treated better, and afforded more grace.
If you want to be heard, you must first be seen- and no one wants to see an “ugly” woman.
Yet unlike other forms of social capital, beauty is framed as something with no class mobility. Attempts to access it are not only discouraged but morally punished. This raises an uncomfortable question: if beauty cannot be earned, bought, or altered without stigma, then who is it actually reserved for?
Western beauty ideals remain overwhelmingly narrow- white, thin, young, cisgender, and able-bodied. Pretty privilege, as the name suggests, is a privilege. A 2008 study found that conventionally attractive women are less lonely, more sexually experienced, more popular, more likely to marry, more likely to marry men of higher socioeconomic status, more likely to get hired, more likely to get promoted and more likely to get paid more.
When pretty privilege is so deeply entangled with white privilege, and when women who seek cosmetic procedures are simultaneously ridiculed, what is being communicated is that beauty is only legitimate when it appears effortless- and only whiteness is effortless. To reap the benefits of beauty, you must fit a criteria only meant for white women.
One of the most common cosmetic procedures in both the UK and the US is rhinoplasty. Surgeons have noted that the vast majority of reference images patients bring in share the same traits: narrow bridges, sharp definition, and smaller noses. These features closely align with Eurocentric beauty standards.
Women of South Asian, Middle Eastern, African, and East Asian descent are statistically more likely to have broader noses- features that are routinely marked as “flaws” within Western aesthetics. These women already navigate the compounded marginalisation of being both women and people of colour. They are measured against a beauty standard that was never designed with them in mind. Yet attempting to “fix” these perceived flaws through surgery often results in further stigma, accusations of self-hatred, or claims that they are erasing their culture.
It is an impossible position. Access to beauty is denied at birth, but attempting to access it later is punished. The message is contradictory but clear: beauty is a closed system. It belongs to those who are born close enough to it, and everyone else is expected to accept their exclusion with grace.
If we are serious about dismantling patriarchal beauty hierarchies, we cannot just critique women for participating in them. We must also interrogate why beauty is treated as an inherited virtue rather than a socially constructed advantage. Holding beauty as rigid while stigmatising those who attempt to access it preserves the myth that some women simply deserve better treatment than others. Until that myth is challenged, pretty privilege will remain not just a social advantage, but a birthright guarded by shame.
Written by Menna Hosny
