17 Jul Nearly Every Seductive Bikini Pic You See On Instagram Is One Big Lie

Photo-sharing apps such as Instagram are used on a daily basis by almost a billion people worldwide, and their popularity won’t be waning anytime soon. Yep, never have we been a world more obsessed with sharing photos of ourselves than we have in the last few years.

But the thing is, we’re rarely content with the photos we take with our smartphones. We’re constantly being inundated with images of perfection, and as such, we’ve become intent on imitating this level of flawlessness.

It can be argued that from the get-go, Instagram has always fostered this sense of inadequacy in relation to our pics by offering us an array of filters and effects with which to ‘improve’ upon our original.

Not everything is what it seems on Instagram:

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And just to rub salt in the wounds of our insecurities, the entire app is awash with Instagram models who use their page to showcase their seemingly perfect bodies.

Then there’s also the fitness bloggers like Jen Selter who has made a career out of perfecting her body, namely her derrière, and sharing revealing pics of herself.

And while these people are incredibly impressive and have every right to show off all the hard work they put into their bodies, it does inevitably mean that ordinary users will unfavorably compare their own bodies to these models.

That’s not to say that these high-profile Instagram users shouldn’t be showing off their toned bods, we just need to be aware that the perfect body simply doesn’t exist. I mean, we all have features that we deem flaws and plus everyone’s idea of beauty and sex appeal varies tremendously.

Unfortunately, us women remain fixated on this idea that there is an ideal bikini body and we’re desperate to replicate it.

And ‘desperate’ is no exaggeration. We will try anything to achieve the perfect bikini body – and that means getting rid of our cellulite, getting trim, and ensuring our skin has a captivating glow.

But what if ‘achieving’ this ‘perfect’ figure simply meant digitally altering our pics before uploading them?

Yes, this is done in Hollywood circles all the time. And that sort of makes sense considering their photos are ultimately seen and scrutinized by hundreds of millions of people.

But retouching photos with the sole purpose of eradicating flaws is now becoming much more mainstream.

In fact, there’s an app called Facetune which has made retouching and removing out flaws a cinch for the not-so-tech-savvy people out there. With a few taps and pinches, users can essentially become their own idea of “perfect”, and this includes carving their own slender figure, reducing their wrinkles, and ridding their skin of any blemishes. It’s basically plastic surgery, only digital.

We definitely take our social media personas way too seriously. But one woman is combatting this by recreating celebrity Insta pics with hilarious results:

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“Everyone’s editing their photos. If they tell you they’re not editing their photos — if they tell you they’re not using Facetune — I’d laugh at them,” says beauty blogger Thania Peck, who boasts 122,000 followers on her Instagram page.

Peck, who refuses to reveal her age, admits to using the app to brighten her eyes and darken her lashes. “I saw some [influencers] at Coachella in person, and it’s night and day [compared to their social-media feeds],” she added. “I saw one that I thought was a mom until she turned around and I recognized her!”

Since it launched back in 2013, the Facetune app has been downloaded over 50 million times, according to a rep from the company. Its simple tools can be used to whiten your teeth, reshape your body and smooth out your skin.

Of course, there are other retouching apps out there, such as AirBrush and VSCO but Facetune is the most popular app of this kind. In fact, the $3.99 version of the app became the most most-downloaded paid app of 2017.

Those whose career revolves around taking ‘flawless’ pics often argue that retouching their snaps is not about vanity but simply about maintaining the kind of image their job requires.

“I feel like [photo editing is] almost a necessary step to continue your Instagram business,” says Catherine Lynn, who posts ads for brands including Fashion Nova and Flat Tummy Co. She believes digitally altering her photos saves her a lot of time and money.

Usually, Lynn will slim down her waist, increase the size of her butt and apply digital makeup. She told the New York Post, “People can call it fake all they want, but in traditional marketing, the ads, commercials, and billboards are all Facetuned.”

Below is a more subtle digital modification, courtesy of Catherine Lynn. Note how her waist has more of an inward dip in the ‘after’ photo, making it appear slimmer and her hips wider.

Before digital modification:

After digital modification:

Many who edit their photos for professional purposes argue that social media is essentially an alternate reality.

“This isn’t real life; this is Instagram,” social media influencer Shaya told the paper. “I have had success in it because it turns out people don’t really care if it’s real life […] People appreciate my transparency when it comes to editing. It is surprisingly okay and trendy to have a flat chest, but not the butt.”

This is one of Shaya’s pre-edit photos:

This is how the exact same photo looks post-edit (again, notice how her butt is larger in this one):

“When I was a teenager, it was perfect images in magazines that would leave me feeling negative about myself,” says fitness blogger, Sia Cooper, who has a whopping 1.1 million followers on Instagram.

“Now we’re all glued to Snapchat, Twitter, Instagram and Facebook 24/7 with a constant stream of what appear to be perfect images from friends, models, celebrities and other influencers,” she adds.

Cooper now posts pics that reveal what her body looks like before and after they’ve been edited in order to warn people that appearances can be deceiving on Instagram.

Here is one of her ‘before’ photos.

And this is the ‘after’ photo. Her skin is smoother without a hint of cellulite. Plus her butt is firmer and perkier.

“It is so easy to make your butt bigger. I just don’t want people to compare [themselves to others]. You just don’t know what’s edited or not.”

Overall, I think it’s fair to say that if you’re an avid user of any form of social media, you should take every photo of this kind with a grain of salt.

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