Throughout the years, women's perfect body types have evolved, shifting with society's
ideas of what "perfect" even is.
In reality, there's no such thing as a "perfect body," but these are some of the fitness trends,
ideals, and concepts we saw hit the mainstream in the 2010s.
It's hard to believe Keeping Up with the Kardashians has been around since 2007, or how influential
it's ended up being.
By 2010, the family and all their uncomfortable moments had taken over pop culture, and so
had all of the stars' curves.
While all three Kardashian sisters are certainly thin, they also helped emphasize the supposed
importance of having big hips and booty to spare.
But the media at large continued to promote an overall thin body type as the ideal, to
aggravating results.
In fact, a 2011 study found that the super-skinny ideal of the era seriously messed with real
women's minds.
And not in the way you might think!
According to the study, published in Science Daily, when women spent five consecutive days
looking at magazines with thin, idealized body types, a surprising result occurred.
The readers began becoming more conscious of their own bodies, and began choosing to
diet, reporting to researchers that they were increasingly skipping meals or cutting carbs,
whether they really needed to for their health or not.
According to a 2011 article in the Daily Mail, a poll of female students from ages 18 to
65 conducted at British universities reached the conclusion that one out of three respondents
would be willing to die younger in exchange for the so-called perfect body.
That should tell you how powerful media pressure can be.
But in 2012, the ideal started to shift the other way, heading to an embrace of so-called
"real" bodies — as in, the body types more common to regular people, not starving models.
Nothing reflected this shift more than the HBO series Girls.
The show matter-of-factly presented frequent nude scenes featuring lead actress Lena Dunham.
Because Dunham's body isn't like the rail-thin models people often see in fashion magazines,
the show sparked a conversation.
Whether you liked the show or not, the representation was liberating for women everywhere, who finally
saw their body type represented on screen.
“I think I may be the voice of my generation.
... Or at least a voice, of a generation.”
In October 2013, Kim Kardashian shared a selfie of herself wearing a tight one-piece swimsuit
that perfectly showed off her, um, assets, including her behind and a good amount of
side boob.
The photo has racked up over 1 million likes since Kardashian posted it with the simple
caption, "#NoFilter," and the post really started to hone in on the trend of having
a big booty as part of the perfect body type.
Though having a big booty has gone in and out of style when it comes to women's perfect
body types over the years, 2014 brought it all the way back.
"Titus! Dancing is about butts now!"
"It is, girl!"
That year, Nicki Minaj released the music video for her hit single "Anaconda," and it
was, well, full of butts.
2014 was also the year when Kim Kardashian broke the internet with her revealing photos
in Paper magazine, including one interesting shot of her balancing a champagne glass on
her rear end.
The butt became so popular in 2014 that The New York Times ran an article on the matter,
and the paper interviewed an Instagram influencer, Jen Selter, who had acquired followers due,
in large part, to her posterior.
She told the publication,
"When I was growing up, everyone wanted to look like skinny, bony girls.
Over time, butts have become a thing."
And boy, was she right.
In the mid-2010s, a movement all about accepting one's body and remaining positive about it
began to spread like wildfire.
Kaila Prins, a body positive wellness coach and burlesque teacher, discussed body positivity
in an interview with Psychology Today, defining it as
"...the idea that you can live comfortably in your body, as it is right now, or work
on treating it right through nourishment and joyful movement and self care without punishing
yourself for looking the way you do."
In a move perfectly aligned with the body-positivity movement, the female-oriented publication
Women's Health announced it would no longer print the phrases "bikini body" or "drop two
sizes" on its cover.
However, as Prins made clear in her interview, body positivity isn't about neglecting your
own health.
She said,
"A common misconception is that body positivity is about 'letting yourself go,' or sitting
on the couch eating junk food all day and not caring."
On the contrary, the body positivity movement was merely focused on not conforming to societal
ideals of beauty.
As the body positivity movement continued to grow and expand, the fashion industry started
to take part in the movement.
In 2017, the Council of Fashion Designers of America reminded designers ahead of New
York Fashion Week that health was of the utmost concern when it came to their models.
Other activists worked to shift the perception of the word "fat" away from being insulting,
such as author Roxane Gay.
She said in an interview with Harper's Bazaar,
"A lot of times people see fatness as sickness and that's not necessarily the case, just
like thinness is not necessarily equated with health."
But though body positivity started off popular, by 2018, many people began to take notice
of the movement's flaws.
In fact, one former follower of the movement, plus-sized blogger Stephanie Yeboah, spoke
to The Guardian about how body positivity didn't work for her anymore.
She said,
"It has become a buzzword, it has alienated the very people who created it.
Now, in order to be body positive, you have to be acceptably fat — size 16 and under,
or white or very pretty.
It's not a movement that I feel represents me any more."
“I think body positivity is an incredibly positive thing that should stay —"
"But you need to entwine —"
"But you also have to talk about health."
In place of body positivity came body neutrality, which is exactly what it sounds like.
No longer was the point to celebrate what you have — you just have it.
But that isn't to say that body neutrality is about giving up — the only thing you
let go of is stress.
As Joan Chrisler, a professor of psychology put it in an interview with The Cut,
“It doesn’t mean suddenly stopping things like being physically active or choosing nutritious
foods.
Just focus on what feels good [...] Sometimes you’ll lose weight without trying.”
While these movements changed the standards by which women's bodies are judged, don't
get us wrong — plenty of people were still out there in search of the mythical perfect
body.
For evidence, look no further than the rise of Instagram, which served up more photos
of models, aspiring models, and trend-chasing influencers than the world had ever seen before.
The platform absolutely contributed to shifting what society finds beautiful, so much so that
one blogger went on a mission to uncover just what the Instagram version of a perfect woman
looked like.
Cassey Ho of Blogilates went on a mission to decode the Instagram standard of beauty,
and, boy, did she uncover a lot.
By looking at the top 100 female Instagram users, Ho was able to see which attributes
were the most popular across the platform.
According to Ho's research, the ideal woman on Instagram has a flat stomach, but isn't
muscular.
She's also not flat-chested, with Ho noting that 89% of the top 100 sported B cup breasts
or larger.
Finally, the tendency was to have an hourglass figure — a time-tested beauty standard if
ever there was one.
Those are definitely some high standards, and, to prove her point, Ho actually transformed
herself into the perfect Instagram woman for her followers, and the results were kind of
creepy.
Really, there's no such thing as the perfect body type.
In our opinion, every body is a bikini body.
Even this guy.
However, societal ideals still exist.
Though they fluctuate over time, it's almost ingrained into peoples' minds to be curious
about what shapes and sizes are deemed desirable by celebs and fashion magazines.
Museum curator Emma McClendon, who organized an exhibit on fashion and women's bodies,
told CNN,
"Whether it's contemporary or 19th century, they want to know what size it is or what
size it would correlate to, or what measurement it is.
We as a culture, as a society, are obsessed with size.
It's become connected to our identity as people."
So as time goes on, the so-called "ideal body type" will continue to change, because there
isn't an actual "ideal body" out there.
There's just… us!
Whatever the next decade has in store for us, just do what makes you happy — no matter
what the trends say.
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