The BBL

In 2021, a flight to Atlanta was delayed for two hours to accomodate for 24 wheelchair-bound women who had just received a little procedure known as the Brazilian Butt Lift (BBL). This was not an isolated incident. In the mid-2010s, the number of luteal fat grafting (BBL) procedures increased by 103 percent, as did BBL-related deaths. It was ass-mageddon. So, in this episode, Hannah and Maia trace the history of the BBL back to its very sketchy origins in Brazil under the purview of superstar plastic surgeon Ivo Pitanguy and a prominent eugenicist named Renato Kehl, and the impact that the country’s national mythology has had on the prevalence of the BBL today. From Miss BumBum contests, to Kim K’s reality TV butt X-ray, to Antony Bumba’s viral parodies of the BBL on TikTok, how exactly did we arrive at a culture where lives are risked for the sake of having a large dumpy? Tune in to find out.

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Intro and outro song by our talented friend Ian Mills:

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SOURCES:

Carmen Alvaro Jarrín, The biopolitics of beauty: Cosmetic citizenship and affective capital in Brazil,” College of the Holy Cross (2017).

Cansancao et al, ““Brazilian Butt Lift” Performed by BoardCertified Brazilian Plastic Surgeons: Reports of an Expert Opinion Survey,” Plast Reconstr Surg, 144(3) (2019).

Dara Greenwood, “The BBL Bubble: How Social Media Fuels Body Modification,” Psychology Today (2021).

Rebecca Jennings, “The $5,000 quest for the perfect butt,” Vox (2021).

Banseka Kayembe, “Are we witnessing the end of the BBL era?” I-D (2021).

Daniel F. Silva, “The hidden anti-Black history of Brazilian butt lifts,” Washington Post (2022).

Mimi Thi Nguyen, The Promise of Beauty, Duke University Press (2024).

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