Is Kylie Jenner a girl’s girl?

This week, within just a few hours, cracks emerged that damaged relationships once considered unbreakable: the one between Elon Musk and Donald Trump, and the one between Kylie Jenner and her body. A British YouTuber, Rachel Leary, posted a video on TikTok begging Kylie Jenner to reveal the details of her plastic surgery: "What exactly did you ask for when you got your boobs done? It’s the most perfect and natural boob job I’ve ever seen." A few hours later, Jenner responded in the comments: "445 cc, moderate profile, partial under the muscle!!!!! Silicone!!! Garth Fisher!!! Hope that helps lol." Garth Fisher, a Beverly Hills plastic surgeon, thanked Kylie in an Instagram post, highlighting the high level of confidentiality and care he and his team offer. Fisher emphasized that his aesthetic procedures are not “cookbook surgery,” but rather acts of thoughtful, personalized care.

Kylie Jenner and the rebranding of cosmetic surgery 

This is the first time Kylie Jenner has spoken openly about her cosmetic treatments. Until recently, she denied having undergone invasive procedures, she only admitted to a mix of fillers, lip liner, and push-up bras (which, apparently, don’t count as “real” surgery). Online, through tweets and TikTok comments, she was immediately celebrated as a "girl’s girl": a woman who truly cares about the well-being of other women. In a BBC documentary, Make Me Perfect: Manufacturing Beauty in China (available on YouTube), Chinese influencer Abby Wu shares her story of undergoing over 100 plastic surgeries, including six nose jobs and three just on her eyelids. Her first procedure, liposuction, happened when she was just 14. Wu says she will never stop trying to become more beautiful. Jenner, on the other hand, emphasizes that surgery was never a way to hide insecurity. Quite the opposite: she has always loved herself and wants others to love their own bodies too. Only one of them, in my opinion, is telling the truth.

Aesthetics, power, and paid sisterhood

The paradox at the heart of the Kardashian-Jenner conglomerate lies in the fact that they are not true girl’s girls: their bodies, their aesthetic, the beauty standards they promote are unattainable for anyone without their same wealth and resources. At the same time, the ubiquity of their faces and figures has contributed to the Kardashianization of younger generations: a widespread normalization of aesthetic treatments and intense focus on body modification. As beauty editor Jessica DeFino notes, this body work isn’t perceived as productivity, but rather as integral to existing as a contemporary woman: “Just as girlbossing empowers the girlboss individually while still perpetuating patriarchal hustle culture for those beneath her,” she writes, “so too does performing beauty to gain power in a culture that rewards women for their appearance only further reinforce those same patriarchal values.” 

It becomes quite difficult, and problematic, to label Jenner as a girl’s girl. This attempt at honesty is seen as a gesture of sisterhood, aimed at women she previously misled, but in truth, it fits neatly into the same narrative that (while disguised as liberating) continues to perpetuate oppressive and harmful dynamics. Because a gesture of solidarity is not true solidarity if it can be monetized.