TikTok is Setting a Dangerous Beauty Standard With the “Bold Glamour” Filter
If you’ve been on TikTok recently, we’re sure you’ve seen the “Bold Glamour” filter. And, if you haven’t, every major news outlet is talking about it. The filter enhances eyes, bone structure, creates fuller lips and exaggerates many other facial features. Inarguably, it’s setting a dangerous precedent for beauty standards for users of the app. Not only has it resulted in insecurities, but it also gives users an unrealistic expectation of what they see on screen versus in real life.
According to Today, “TikToks tagged with #boldglamour have more than 207 million views, leading some users to wonder whether the filter is contributing to unrealistic beauty standards for women and if it could harm TikTok users' self-image and mental health.”
Users and researchers say that the filter reads people’s skin tones, perceived gender and hair color, then determines the amount of makeup, lip fillers and skin tightening to apply to get that “influencer look.” The filter also does not glitch like some other beauty filters do, even when people put their hands in front of their face or the camera. So, it’s easier to convince people that this is “natural” beauty.
Hany Farid, a computer science professor at the University of California at Berkeley, said the filter is probably using “generative AI,” a technology that studies zillions of pictures and text samples, often scraped from the web, to create new images or words.
Do you think this poreless, airbrushed beauty standard is pushing the boundaries too far? Do you think it's healthy for regular TikTok users to be consuming this type of content? Feel free to DM your thoughts to @theedgemag on Instagram!