Flip through the latest issue of Gulf Weekly.
I was introduced to a new app recently, by my 12-year-old sister, called ‘Perfect 365’. According to the website, it is ‘the best free digital makeup app’.
The process is incredibly simple, the app developers have seen to that. You take a picture, the app indicates which points on your face need work and you can choose from a menu of options such as ‘eyes’, ‘foundation’, ‘skin’ and ‘face’ to modify each aspect.
At first glance, it looked like a seemingly innocuous app, but when you think about the implications, it’s worrying.
Think about the message that this app is sending to its 30 million+ users; most of who are young and impressionable girls like my sister.
It is sending the message that our eyes need to look a certain way; our noses need to be sharper; our faces need to be slimmer.
With a tap, we can remove blemishes and even make cheekbones more prominent. You can virtually change the structure of your face. We’re used to magazines propagating unreasonable standards for women, and now we’re inflicting this upon ourselves. By changing how we look to such ridiculous standards, we’re projecting a fake version of ourselves.
It’s really tempting to tweak the shape of your eyes, or even to change their colour completely. But supporting this type of app is just encouraging the creators to further add to the subliminal message that we’re not good enough.
Instead, let’s encourage the beautiful diversity of our world. Let’s encourage the facets that make us unique.
