Within
each of those groups lie a couple of subsets that consistently bear
the worst discrimination by society at large, as well as by members
of their own group. Those people who fall outside of ideal
aesthetics as far as body type, wrinkled skin, or facial beauty are
concerned, have to bring a great deal more merit to the table if they
want to advance socially and economically, than those who either have
the good fortune to possess youth and beauty, or those who've paid to
acquire or retrieve them.
As
we all suffer from the pressures of group mentality, every person who
has elective plastic surgery in order to enhance their appearance, is
guilty of bullying yet another to join the group of oppressors. The
“norm” for Physical attractiveness thus reinforced, those who are
not endowed with perfect facial symmetry, those who have a proboscis
that has millennia of breeding within a geographic region to thank
for its shape, who have a Roman nose, a Semitic schnoz, or a Greek
proboscis will find their ethnicity a challenge. Those who have a
breast size not considered to be optimal by the Madison avenue
selection committee, will not only feel inadequate for having
“enhanced” models in swimsuits reminding them from that high
pulpit that is the billboard, but they will also have “friends
supporting their decision to do what they want to,” because nothing
says friendship like being an enabler.
When
it comes to being self destructive, we have options as basic as and
simple as being in a miserable mood, because after a quick look in
the mirror, we feel inadequately far from a physical ideal. By being
linked to visual stimuli such as advertisements that provide a near
constant barrage of reminders of what we should want to look like,
our body image is a powerful component of our overall self image.
Being under constant bombardment of cultural ideals, which don't
allow for a diverse range, causes many of society's members to
succumb to the pressures of achieving the desired aesthetic by any
means available. Of those who wallow in the misery of feeling
physically inadequate, some look for salvation in a salve, others
choose to starve themselves, and the most rapidly growing segment of
those who've been pummeled into disliking their own look, are those
who volunteer to pay money to someone who would cut them with a
knife.
The
medicalization of the visual signs of aging, and the wide spread
advertisement of the ease of combating the outward evidence of that
most natural of phenomena lead to ageism. This is socially reinforced
when combined with a suggestion of obligation to join the herd
trudging toward a more youthful appearance, or to approve by not
being outspoken against the common practice. Every person who has the
skin on their face pulled tight is guilty of perpetuating the notion
that there is something wrong with proudly displaying one's own true
age. The prevalence of this practice among women, is something that
only a misogynistic, patriarchal society would promote, or even
accept. With every person who is encouraged by a so called friend to
have a face lift, instead of being reminded that they are beautiful
and dissuaded, we encourage the use of phrases like “not aging
well.” As a result of every additional person walking around with
smooth skin after turning fifty, the expectation and perception of
how we should age is warped and twisted into a new, further
unattainable, fake reality. Those who opt not to be modified, are
then even more likely to be thought of as the abnormal, the freaks,
when in truth, we are torturing reality and seeing its face twisted
into a button nose, puffy lips, pronounced cheekbones, sunken cheeks,
and nary a wrinkle in sight. Embracing a reverence for the hard
earned wisdom that is evidenced by gray hair and sun dried skin, is
not foreign to other cultures with whom we have a great deal of
interaction. Funny how we enjoy adopting their cuisines, their music,
and their visual aesthetic, while we adamantly reject absorbing their
respect for the aging segment of their populations. In some Asian
countries, the attitudes we exhibit toward our elders could only be
seen as shameful.
Our
current culture places such a high value on physical beauty that it
has become commonplace for people to be willing to subject themselves
to plastic surgery to come closer to the Barbie or Ken image that we
have all, at one point or another in our lives, helped to establish
as the beauty ideal worth striving for. Even people
who easily get queasy when seeing something as innocuous as a mild
bruise, still go under the knife to have their pectoralis
muscles
made less functional and frequently damaged by being ripped away from
the ribcage during their chosen procedure.
Finally,
we have made “ugly” and “old” treatable medical conditions.
Without thinking about it, we have become willing accomplices in the
mass torture of our own friends and families. We did this by
subjecting those our culture has deemed less appealing to being cut
up, cut open, forever scarred, changed from the identity they grew up
with, to the point of sometimes being made difficult to recognize by
those who truly love them. If it were happening to a distant group of
complete strangers, the ire of our collective sense of social justice
and moral indignation would be inflamed to the point of action. Why
then, are we willing to turn a blind eye to that trait in ourselves?
To
think that we could not discriminate when we are
in fact hard wired to do so seems childish or purposely ignorant. We
all inherently use a scale of “attractiveness” to determine how
we deal with people in our daily lives. We base this system of
hierarchy at least in large part on our hard-wired gauge of mate
selection for the purpose of procreation. Studies show
that there are are a large number of visual parameters that we base
our attraction on, which include proportion, height, gait, and
posture among others. Yet, it's interesting to note that we also
discriminate based on olfactory inputs, but at least we seem to limit
that behavior to mate selection. None
the less, we tend to favor those who match our biases, and
opportunities for advancement
tend to go to those who are willing to adapt. Luckily, the
meritocracy is an accident, or a hard punch in the face away. Best
for all to keep that in mind, when contemplating the easy way out.
Most
of the time, we know that we should keep botulism far away from our
mouths and our food preparation surfaces, yet when it comes labeled
as plainly as BO(tulism)TOX(in), but carries the promise of making us
younger looking, a good percentage of our population, whom we would
ordinarily not think of as imbecilic, allow their plastic surgeon to
inject it directly into their flesh. The level of trust required for
this transaction is heart warming, or is it more of a willingness to
take huge risks to cling, desperately, to the A-list for a few years
longer, or is it to give one's-self the illusion of the chance to
make it there? An interesting statistic would relate to how many of
those patients take the time to educate themselves on the potential
pit falls and down-sides.
As
with any surgery, there are risks associated with cosmetic
procedures. These include, but are not limited to bleeding,
infection, adverse reaction to anesthesia, and unexpected scarring.
Mortality is also not unheard of. Less severe complications are far
more likely. Decreased sensitivity, particularly in the case of
breast augmentation is not a widely publicized side effect, nor is
the increased likelihood of problems with breastfeeding. Implants can
also mask tumors on mammograms and self examinations, likely leading
to a delay
in breast cancer detection. Implants can even rupture, leak, or
become displaced. It's considered “normal” for a thick scar to
form around the implant. This thick scar tissue, referred to as a
capsule, can become very hard. This “capsular contracture” may
result in pain and sometimes change the appearance of the breast.
These problems increase with the age of the implant. There is also
ongoing research on links between these implants and autoimmune or
connective tissue diseases. Yet despite all of these risks, every
year, the number of plastic surgery procedures increases at an
alarming rate. Some industry statistics go as far as to predict a
four-fold rise between 2005 and 2015.
So,
even as we superficially preach that beauty is on the inside, fewer
of us are likely to want to live by that dictum, if we can afford not
to. After all, if a prettier face will give us a leg up, even when
legs up alone don't do it, a greater percentage of us will prepare to
whore ourselves out for social and economic advancement in the next
years. Keep a lookout for who, among your coworkers, comes back from
vacation looking more attractive. They're probably out to be your
next boss.
As
a societal norm is a product of that group's member's values, seeing
the narrowness of the accepted range can be viewed as a symptom of
the flaws of our culture, and it can be similarly distasteful to
looking in a mirror. The more individuals give voice to their
acceptance of aging, of a variety of body shapes and facial types,
the stronger a mesh we would weave. It is debatable if our emblematic
divisiveness is more likely a part of the original problem, or its
outcome, but it's a simple deduction to see that we would be a
stronger group for being more inclusive of greater diversity.
Breeding
self hatred for not measuring up to an airbrushed idol …, and the
methodology the medical establishment has adopted for healing the
affected, is to cut on the healthy, and to let the disease, which is
cultured in agencies all over Madison Avenue continue to do its
damage.
In
the end, what we should be using as the measure of our evolution,
both on a personal, and on a cultural level, are our kindness and the
degree of our social inclusiveness, as well as our willingness to
embrace a simple love of self that rejects a shallow standard. In the
end, until we sincerely embrace the idea that substance IS more
important than visual beauty, that form truly does follow function,
we will continue to be more closely related to the great apes than to
the great spirit.
