It’s all over the internet: teen girls and boys showing their swollen, bruised lips with captions like, “I screwed up” and “gross.” Following in the footsteps of bizarre and dangerous past trends like “The Fainting Game” and car surfing, the Kylie Jenner Lip Challenge has convinced millions of teens to suffer for the chance of plump pillow lips à la Kylie. In case you never got the details, here’s a quick guide to the trend.
How it’s done: Put a shot glass against your mouth, suck until an air vacuum forms around your lips, and remove the shot glass.
The result: Swollen lips, bruised lips, bruised mouths, bleeding lips, broken shot glasses, stitches, scarring. In other words, not the perfect pout for which the users are aiming. The effects can last for days.
How it works: Sucking on the shot glass creates an air vacuum around the mouth, which increases blood flow to the lips, causing them to swell. Depending on the cup, the glass could break under the pressure. If you’re lucky enough to avoid that fate, you’re still potentially popping blood vessels in the process.
The racial angle: Many have taken to Twitter and Instagram to point out that the huge lips the teens are trying to attain have often been the target of racism against black women. One person tweeted: “Don’t forget, these are the features they tried to teach you to hate.”
What’s Kylie got to say?: She claims that she’s never gotten surgery to enhance her pout, though many people doubt her statement. She told Britain’s Grazia Daily: “Stop talking about my lips.”
This trend has many bemoaning the herd mentality of teen culture today. The answer to my mom’s favorite question, “If they jumped off a cliff, would you follow?,” seems increasingly to be yes. After pictures started flooding the internet showing the harmful repercussions of the challenge, why did people continue to try it? The answer, ‘it’s trendy,’ shouldn’t be enough. Just because something is trending does not make it safe. Embrace your own beauty; who knows how much celebrities pay for the features you covet.
Information taken from Daily Mail UK and Washington Post