Voice from Russia: The beauty industry has declared war on our bodies

I recently read about a new trend where men are having fillers injected into their scrotums to make themselves more attractive. Some, trying to save money, turn to unlicensed beauty therapists. Others go even further and inject hyaluronic acid themselves at home and, as a result, they sometimes lose the very thing they were trying to improve.

Admittedly, the problem is still more common in the United States, but even here we already have dancers and performers who regularly fill that area with whatever they can get their hands on, apparently in the hope of impressing women.

To put it bluntly, there are plenty of questions, such as who is supposed to find an enlarged scrotum attractive? I can at least understand men who use fillers to increase the size of their penis, although that procedure raises enough questions of its own, but has anyone ever met a woman who chooses a man based on the size of his scrotum? The most he is likely to achieve is to surprise her.

It’s an interesting phenomenon because as recently as 30 years ago, people suffering from body-image problems had very few tools with which to “improve” themselves. The most accessible option was flamboyant clothing, and even that only really became available during perestroika for Russians. 

Soviet citizens who were dissatisfied with their appearance had far fewer ways of “boosting their attractiveness” and men had practically none. A man who looked too extravagant risked attracting the attention of the authorities, while women with body-image issues often took up sewing or knitting and made their own unusual, custom-made clothes. People in the 1980s had few other means of changing their appearance as even dyeing one’s hair a bright color was difficult and could attract unwanted attention.