This Model Just Stood Up for Gap Teeth Everywhere

It’s a week for glorious clapbacks: Yesterday saw Keke Palmer taking on people drawing a line between the length of her hair and her sexual preferences, and today Jordyn Woods—model and high-profile friend of the Jenners—used her Instagram platform to officially rebuff everyone trying to make her fit in a box of standard beauty ideals.

The feature in question is her tooth gap—you know, the trademark feature of icons like Lauren Hutton, Madonna, and Brigitte Bardot. Even with its storied history, Woods says she still has people constantly criticizing her choice to keep her teeth as they are. She wrote on Instagram: “Today on set…often people have the nerve to say fix your teeth…for your information. No I will not fix my gap to blend in with the rest of society! My gap makes me who I am. Your individuality is one of your special powers in this generation where everyone’s trying to fit in and keep up. ��” [sic].

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The lady said it—everyone’s life is theirs to live as they see fit, and it’s somehow both comforting and dispiriting to hear that even models are constantly told to change themselves to make other people happy. And even if gap teeth didn’t connote a long line of beautiful, boundary-pushing people, they’re part of who Woods is, and that makes them great. Calling out the problem about forcing everyone to look the same is definitely a step in the right direction, as is putting the spotlight on people doing their own thing, à la Bella Thorne and her unshaven legs.

Love to see people rejecting beauty norms and paving their own way. Palmer said it best, yesterday: “When it comes to being a grown millennial, I’m all about breaking boundaries. Breaking barriers, breaking labels, and allowing myself to be free, and to be able to stand on that platform and say, We can all be free, even if we don’t look like what everybody’s seen before.”

Related:
-This Grocery Store Cashier’s Takedown of Makeup Shaming Is Powerfully Thorough
-Selma Blair’s Gray Hair Shaming Take-Down Is So Good
-Exclusive: Jordyn Woods Is Collaborating With Boohoo.com