In the past summer, when I jokingly told my mom that I wanted to do cosmetic plastic surgery, she responded, “Sure you can, but after that you don’t come back to our place; go to whoever you look like most instead.” I was at first shocked for her lack of humor, but then I started wondering if she opposed plastic surgery to such a degree. After all, people are more open and accepting about plastic surgery now than ever. A few years ago, people, mostly women, would travel from China to Korea purely for the Koreans’ advanced plastic surgery technology. Now the route of travel is reversed: the cosmetic plastic surgery industry in major China cities developed so fast that some Koreans would come to China to have their face remolded.
Back to the conversation between my mom and me. It made me wonder: how much do people care if a beautiful face is not natural? And can the person who got plastic surgery performed be regarded as the same person before the surgery? Someone reading a fashion magazine may not care if the featured models have got plastic surgery performed, but it’s harder to say so when it comes to husband and wife relationship. I once read an article in Chinese that reported a man filing lawsuit against his wife because only after their first child was born did he find out that his wife’s beautiful features were man-made rather than naturally born. The news is disturbing for the question it raised: is the wife a different person before she had plastic surgery? Not many people would agree with this notion: a few changes on her face are not adequate to change her identity. However, the difference hidden in her genome is strong enough to make her another person to her husband. He soon divorced her.
This is an interesting situation because suddenly the “reality” is not so “real”. Cosmetic surgery can indeed perfect one’s outside features, but when it comes to the humans’ reproductive needs, it no longer functions. People want their offspring to have advantage in the race of evolution, and an inherited beautiful feature is indeed an advantage considering the operation of cosmetic surgery costs money and contains risks. A few years ago people can look at their lovers’ childhood photo to look for any potential discrepancies, but now with the help of Photoshop, they have to find a more comprehensive way to decide for themselves.
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Just like Peiwen, I often joke with my mom about me receiving plastic surgery. Both my sister and I discuss the possibilities of when finishing college, going under the knife together in hopes of transforming into something we want to look like. Would this actually ever happen in real life to us? No, but that can’t stop us from dreaming about it. Why does appearance make us crazy enough to want to risk our lives? Why would we risk wounds and complications in order to look better to the natural eye?
In the American culture, to be beautiful almost gives you an upper hand on the world. Is it unfair that people who look better compared to others get treated better? Yes, it’s completely unfair, yet it seems to happen all the time. The boy looks for a pretty girl to date, a pretty girl to make pretty kids with, and to live a pretty life happily ever after. And the girl with the outstanding personality may get shunned temporarily because maybe her appearance doesn’t compare to other girls. I would like to think that some boys know better then to base everything off of looks, but that’s a whole other story…
Regardless of the dangers your may be facing while enduring plastic surgery, the amount of people that seem to be receiving cosmetic surgery significantly increase every year. The breast augmentation’s, rhinoplasty’s, and face lift’s have become routine surgeries in doctors offices, and instead of people looking at those things as real, life altering surgery, they just see them as a necessity, a chore, or something that must be done to make them feel better about who they are or how they look to others. Yes, I know it has been said that when you look better, you may feel better, but why can’t we just be happy with who we are? Do the risks we put ourselves in really balance out with the benefits? Overall it’s a personal decision. But I know, personally, that as much as I may dream about altering my appearance, I wouldn’t be able to risk my life in order to do so.
Nobody is perfect—although some may look closer to society’s idea of perfection than others. Personally, I have never been satisfied with my nose. Sometimes it’s too flat, sometimes too big, sometimes too wide. But I will never undergo plastic surgery. As unsatisfied as I may be with my nose, I realize that this is the way that I was meant to look and to change that is to change who I am.
Nowadays, cosmetic surgery is prevalent in all areas of the world. Women everywhere are obsessed with looking beautiful, but what exactly do we consider beautiful? We are all too familiar with the old adage “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder,” yet we insist that there is a certain look that will boost our self-esteem, self-image, and confidence. The solace that women find in going under the knife not only reflects their issues with themselves, but more importantly, it also reveals the underlying influence and power that society holds over women and their perceptions of themselves. As more and more women choose to undergo cosmetic surgery, their decisions create a vicious cycle, a cycle that affects all the women around them, a cycle that causes other women to feel self-conscious and inferior around these artificial beauties, thus indirectly encouraging them to undergo plastic surgery as well.
Shake what your mama gave you—not what your plastic surgeon made you.
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