For some of us, going make-up free isn’t an option.🙅🏽‍♀️

For others, it’s no big deal heading out in public without a ‘mask’ on.🤷🏼‍♀️

But just when did we take makeup to this extreme, where contouring is the norm 🎨, the perfect selfie is the holy grail 📲, and the pursuit of perfection is fuelling a booming cosmetic enhancement industry globally - according to the American Society of Plastic Surgeons 18 million people underwent surgical and minimally invasive procedures in the US in 2018 - a quarter of a million more procedures than in 2017.

If you think that’s a lot, compare that with Australia, where in 2018 we saw $1 billion spent on 500,000 cosmetic procedures (including 20,000 breast augmentations and 30,000 liposuction procedures), which actually puts us in a stand-alone category as the country with the MOST cosmetic surgery operations per capita ...

With the rise of social media and pressure to conform to unrealistic celebrity image, just how far then, are we willing to take our obsession with perfection?

We’re taking this question, and plenty of others, to 200+ teenagers in an open forum at the Melbourne Writers Festival today, as part of the #mwf2019 Schools Program, where we’ll explore the rise of narcissism, the complexities of body image and the role of social media in the filtered lives of teenagers.

‘In Search of Selfie’
girledworld Q&A Teen Forum
Thursday September 5, 2019.
State Library Victoria (Isabella Fraser Room)

All deets at Melbourne Writers Festival.