This article discusses the media's new found celebration of plastic surgery. It discusses, in particular, the ABC television program, Extreme Makeover. This show takes people, after having been selected through a carful application process, to be essentially transformed by the hands of surgeons all taken care of by the EM budget. The contestants have to write in telling the EM team what they would like to change about themselves and their reasons for this desire. The team then chooses from this pool the person who is somehow most deserving of this makeover and brings them on, away from their family and friends for weeks, to change their entire bodies, wardrobes, and hair/makeup. What I found most disturbing, though, was that not only do these participants get the surgeries they've asked for in their applications, but they also receive suggestions from the team of surgeons for more procedures! I thought the idea of this was to help people to feel better about themselves by changing or 'fixing' the parts of their body they found most troublesome, but it is no way helpful to tell someone that there are parts of their body, ones they've never even noticed as an issue, that are so horrible to even look at that they need to be immediately altered through extreme surgery! All I'm seeing is a show that causes body image issues by making these contestants, and even the viewers, keenly aware of every little slip up in the creation of their bodies. I thought the idea was to make people feel more beautiful, not to create surgery addicts who lack any self esteem and don't hesitate for a second to go back under the knife.
The idea that Brazil has made plastic surgery available to everyone is very very bad. I think the fact that there was once a very high price for these procedures put one more very important barrier between them and most people. I don't think I need to explain how horrible these surgeries can be, so I think the less people who have access to them, the better. Keeping the recipients to a select makes it harder for them to be completely normalized, people don't feel that they have to participate because most people don't. But when these surgeries are available to everyone and at no cost, you no longer have an excuse not to partake. If there is something on your body other people may see as an issue, you would be expected to take care of it because there shouldn't be anything keeping you from that surgery.
I like how Natalie points out the fact that the surgeries done on the people during the Extreme Makeover didn't only focus on the trouble areas the patients mentioned on their applications, but also on areas they never mentioned before. Making them look at themselves in much more terrible way and bashing their self-esteem even more.
ReplyDelete
ReplyDeleteNatalie makes a very good point about EM and its’ goals and actions. I also find EM’s actions disturbing; the doctors have patients who have admitted to low self esteem and confidence issues and pointing out other problems with their bodies could have dire effects on a patient with such a character.
I understand Natalie’s perspective on how making plastic surgery accessible to all will cause people to believe that surgery is a must. However, making sure plastic surgery remains for the elite is unfair and unacceptable and I like that Brazil is giving the poor opportunity. Just as the article said, many woman in Brazil strive to become models and beauty pagent winners, but keeping this option open for just the elite will only further the income gap and thus increase the divide between the rich and poor. These procedures have allowed for a middle class to emerge in Brail and I think this is an economic step forward for the country.
-Zeina
Jane Vinocur
ReplyDeleteI agree with Natalie that the fact that Brazil has made plastic surgery available to everyone is not something to be proud of. To have someone with a psychological concern such as low self-esteem, or someone who feels they can’t advance in society looking like how they do, and give them the easy way out of just having surgery seems wrong to me. If someone is depressed, they’re going to fixate on something that they feel should make it better. If society tells them that their self-worth comes from not what’s on the inside, but from their outward appearance, and they’re not pretty by society’s standards, then maybe surgery will actually make them feel better. But if instead of surgery they’re recommended to go to a psychologist, they’ll see that being happy with yourself is so much more than being happy with your appearance.
I agree with Natalie. I dont think that Brazil should have made plastic surgery so widely available, even if the poor "do have a right to be beautiful." You dont need plastic surgery to be beautiful. If you are rich and ugly, you are still going to be rich and ugly. There is only a certain amount that plastic surgery can do for you. Also, there is was too much focus on physical beauty. Real beauty is not on the outside, and the fact that it is publicly available for people to change their outer appearance.
ReplyDeleteAs the late great Daniel Tosh once said,
"I'm all for women who get plastic surgery. Because plastic surgery allows you to make your outer appearance resemble your inner appearance: fake."
Zael
natalies point about extremem make over is very important to state because in many cases people who watch these shows, who might not be looking their best from the societies point of view, would feel that plastic surgery would be ok. and that what they see on this popular show is the way to make them selves look better and more acceptable to society. although platic surgery can be helpful to help victims of a shooting or an accident, surgery is dangerous no mater who you are.
ReplyDelete-bobby
ReplyDelete