The Ugly Side Effects of Being Extremely Attractive
Everyone's rightly obsessed with weight-loss — but for the wrong reasons
For diabetics, "Ozempic" is just the name of the drug they would need to take unless they wanna get a shout-out from the obituary section of their local newspaper.
But for celebs, TikTokers, and anyone looking for a set-it-and-forget-it way to achieve cosmetic weight loss, Ozempic is the new calorie-burning magic drug that is so effective it's probably demoting $2,000 Peloton bikes to laundry chairs as I write this.
The side effects are gangbusters.
Nausea, vomiting, diarrhea, acute pancreatitis, kidney problems, bloating, fever... getting a jab of this stuff is like the aftermath of trying to French kiss a king cobra — but the many, many people who use it do swear by it.
Hell, even Elon Musk got on Wegovy (a stronger version of Ozempic), and to be fair, he no longer looks like he was gonna need adjacent seats and extra leg room at the Mars rocket.
The demand is so high people have been turning on their VPNs and maxing out credit cards on the black market to get their hands on the drug. Let me emphasize black market here, because Apple has been trying to achieve this kind of brand loyalty for decades and it's only found mild success in comparison.
Turns out you only need Walter White’s kitchen appliances and Mindy Kaling's before-and-after photos to make marketing great again.
Who wants to blame this on beauty standards?
Some of you might be tempted to think that decades of prolonged social media exposure to Photoshop's Liquify tool are responsible for this fat-trimming obsession.
There is some truth to that.
As a man, I can't go to the movies and watch roided Marvel hero muscles without getting the overwhelming urge to panic browse Craigslist’s barter section in search of supersoldier serum on my way home.
I imagine it's much worse for them gals, being forced to pull off Kardashian contours just because they're on, only to end up looking like a Picasso doodle as even 4's and 5's with receding hairlines refuse to get horny for a body mass index greater than 25.
But beauty cannot be intellectualized.
Let's stop the fact-phobia for a second here and be honest: you can't just take a copy of the Cosmo cover that featured plus-size model Tess Holliday, glue it on your vision board, and stare at it until some kind of astrological magic makes morbid obesity rank higher in the beauty canon. That's not how it works.
Beauty is a gut feeling. A hunch that comes deep down from the biological traits that made us good at spotting healthy genes.
The body-positivity movement can keep trying to counterfire this truth with loads of Wattpad-level fanfiction lore on what they think constitutes beauty — but it's called "survival of the fittest" for a reason.
Which is why Ozempic sells so well.
People may be free to clog their coronary arteries with a traffic jam of toaster strudel if they feel like it, but deep down they also want to enjoy some of that thin privilege making crowded elevators and clothing stores so much easier to navigate.
It's never about health though.
Whether they talk about losing weight or growing comfortable in it, it's always about appearance for these people. Nothing but a stomach-holding beauty pageant aimed at turning heads.
So what if Ozempic makes you barf your pancreas? As long as they can get a pass on the belly button challenge, it is mission accomplished.
Bodies aren't made to be beautiful, though.
They're made to be habitable.
But if you take a look at how our fanatic obsession with aesthetics has left everyone judging books by the cover, it’s no wonder why kids don’t read anymore.
Fair enough, obesity it's a complex condition. It's far more intricate than "calories in, calories out," and influenced by many environmental factors and genetic predispositions. And to their misfortune, some people simply got dealt the absolute Royal Flush of fat-storing genotypes.
But health does not come in every shape and size.
In extreme cases where someone can't simply juice cleanse their way to skinny, getting a fix of the O-zee can sometimes be better than keep accumulating ballots for the "Win a Trip to Strokeland" ruffle. Especially if your doctor is already reminding you heart palpitations don't count as cardio.
That might come across as a bit of a fat-shaming flare-up, but high societal pressure will never be as deadly as high blood pressure. So health should be our prime concern here, not beauty.
The good news is, no one really needs to budget for a $2,000 Peloton bike just to be able to break a sweat.
Elon Musk. Is that the same guy who initially questioned COVID vax safety? Can't be. Must be a different Elmo.
I’m available for an interview if you need to deeper on the topic of being extremely attractive 👌