A recent Wall Street Journal article by Rachel Dodes featured the unlikely subject of padded “booty boosting” underwear as a new trend for women. The article suggests that the derriere has become the new frontier for boosting and shaping, especially as more “bootylicious” stars like Jennifer Lopez and Kim Kardashian are celebrated for curvier silhouettes. There are some downsides to the padded under layer:
“If you wear anything less than a really heavy denim with it, you can see where those oval-shaped things stick out,” says one wearer. She dubbed the situation “VBPL,” for “Visible Booty Pop Line,” riffing off the faux pas of VPL, “visible panty line.”
Dodes presents some history on how backsides have been assessed throughout history, including mixed messages on what was appreciated or associated with a larger posterior:
Large behinds historically have been celebrated as sexy in Latin American and African cultures, even as they were viewed with suspicion further north. In the 19th century, pronounced posteriors were associated “with having a smaller brain, less intellect, but being more sexually promiscuous.”
With our current preoccupation for women to look young and sexy at all costs, it seems like being perceived as smaller-brained or more sexually promiscuous are frankly what much of our fashion is designed to do anyway. And isn’t this just another shade of what cultures have done throughout history, particularly for women? From the Japanese binding girls’ feet to keep them tiny, to African tribes wearing nasal rings to lengthen their noses, to the American addiction to Barbie Doll breasts…
We are two of those women who cannot *imagine* wanting their booties to stick out more than they already do. A friend also blessed/cursed with a plush tush commiserated, mentioning how often she hears from black and Latin men about the “very fine junk in her trunk” YET how she has “literally and figuratively spent her life working her ass off, when really it seems she was just born in the wrong country!”
Nevertheless, it sounds like everywhere from Target to Victoria Secret to Maidenform to QVC, Booty Pops and other booty-boosting panties will attempt to wrestle for our consumer dollars. We know everyone has to make a buck but frankly we find it a little boring how much women seem to look so similar to each other these days. What do you think about this new trend? Would you try it? What do you think about cultures establishing beauty standards and attempting to shape women across a populace?
If you want to read the whole article, check it out at http://online.wsj.com/article/SB20001424052748703394204575367460682040670.html
And please share your feedback on this backside story. We love hearing from you!
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