Among this group of women, a fixation with larger lips has increased over the years, slowly but surely boosting lip augmentations such as lip filler , lip threading, and Botox. I grew up in a predominantly white area of north London. As the only Black kid in my class, I became hyperaware of my physical differences early on. Reading preteen magazines like Mizz and Bliss only emphasized the feeling of otherness, as makeup guides were applied to fair-skinned models and the light pink lipsticks that often came free with issues never matched the deep brown tone of my lips. Katie Price then known by her pseudonym, Jordan was one of the major celebrities in the UK leading the plump lip look, alongside other glamour models and white reality TV stars. As lip augmentations crept into mainstream celebrity culture and beauty trends, full lips evolved into a beauty standard that persists among white women to this day.

Now black women online are uniting with the PrettyLipsPeriod tag to celebrate the beauty of black features on black women. The social media campaign is the brainchild of Dr. Yaba Blay and Thembisa Mshaka. Black women were encouraged to take a selfie of their lips with the hashtag PrettyLipsPeriod and upload it to either Instagram or Twitter. Ladies, share your pictures below. Texan by birth, Los Angeleno by situation. Lover of Tame Impala and Shoegaze music.

I was in fifth grade the first time it really sunk in that my full lips were viewed, to some, as undesirable. We were learning about minstrel shows in my performing arts class and the message of the visuals—white faces covered in black tarlike paint with exaggerated cherry red lips—were loud and clear: Black features were a mockery, a cartoon form of entertainment. They most certainly weren't something you wanted to, say, walk around the halls of a Southside of Chicago charter school with. No year-old should ever possess an insecurity like this, but I didn't like the size of my lips.

Skip navigation! Story from Beauty. If you type "lipstick tutorial" into YouTube's search bar, hundreds of thumbnails of white women saturate the results page, guiding you to the perfect plump pout. Over the years, a fixation on larger lips has increased, slowly but surely boosting lip augmentations such as lip filler , lip threading, and Botox. In , a Vice poll about lip filler even saw voters liken the procedure to getting a haircut or manicure — but I can't help finding lip filler's popularity jarring.