If you’ve ever heard of K-Beauty, then you probably think it’s all about using ten products morning and night, including different types of cleansers and a serum made with snail slime, to get youthful, glowing skin that’s free of blemishes, lines, and pores.
South Korea eventually began to export this doctrine to American women as they became increasingly interested in skin care, and achieving a natural, youthful look. Now, women’s bathrooms can be seen containing K-Beauty staples such as oil cleansers, toners, moisturizers and facemasks.
While American women may be falling into the K-Beauty trend, South Korean women seem to be falling out of it. Korean culture has pretty strict beauty norms: Women are expected to have pale skin, big eyes, and cherry lips, plus body types that may only be achievable through dieting or cosmetic surgery.
South Korea’s beauty industry is one of the world’s largest and generates around $13 billion a year in sales. The country also has the world’s highest rate of cosmetic surgery per capita.
But recently, some Korean women started seeking freedom from the so-called standard procedure and have been protesting these specifications as part of a movement called “escape the corset.” South Korean women are ditching their makeup, long hair, and much of their skin care to strike back at the impossible societal expectations for women.
The “escape the corset” movement popped up this summer on YouTube and Twitter with women posting their smashed makeup and shorn hair to fight back against how women were supposed to look. Women also posted photos of throwing out everything except a few skin-care products and some lip balm, and posting their discards — dozens of exfoliating gels, mattifying powders, and lipsticks — on social media.
But more than being a trend of going without makeup, the “escape the corset” movement in South Korea is about women in a deeply conservative country finding the freedom to express themselves. Women have long been forced to conform to society’s beauty standards, and it was rare to see and hear such voices in the once conformist society. But times are changing and women are raising their voices in an effort to make progress on gender equality issues across the country.
By: Maytinee Kramer
