Beauty (And Plastic Surgery)

Does being beautiful require cosmetic surgery?

I remember coming across an article online regarding beauty in Korea. Unfortunately, Korea has become one of the most popular countries to perform cosmetic surgery. I thank my parents everyday for immigrating to America and raising me here. I can only imagine the stress Korean students go through to see the media and popular culture emphasize the importance of “beauty.” In both of the links below, the authors make it an issue that Asian countries are increasingly dependent on plastic surgery. I agree, it is an issue. High school students take college entrance exams every year and their graduation presents are makeovers. I am not kidding. Right after their college entrance exams, they head straight to the doctor of their choice and make appointments. That way, they can do it over the summer and let the swelling go down before entering college.

This past summer, I took a trip to the motherland, Korea. I studied at a university and spent a lot of time with current students at that university. It was no big story to them when they heard that one of their friends just got a nose job or a double-eyelid surgery. Rather, they congratulated them and most importantly asked, “How’d it turn out?” Most people blame this increase on plastic surgery on the insecurities of women. However, I think its not just limited to insecure women. Males take a large part in this by giving attention to women who are more “perfect”. They are more attracted to women with large, almond-shaped eyes, high noses, and chiseled chins. Also, the media and celebrities take a large part in cosmetic surgery. Many celebrities publicly tell what part of their face is fake. There is barely any shame left. Now, even men do it. Being aesthetically pleasing brings in more jobs, more dates, and more emotional security. So why not, right?

Definitely wrong. Hence, I wanted to ask: If someone gets cosmetic surgery and turns out “beautiful”, then does that person’s past face matter?

Beauty can generally be defined as something/someone that is aesthetically pleasing. However, I feel that someone can easily be called “pretty.” That simply means that their physical appearances are attractive. But to be called “beautiful” means to be beautiful inside and out. Many people misinterpret beauty as merely a physicality but it is so much more than that.

Even in Korea, I was disgusted by how alike everyone looked. Yes, the women were for the most part, pretty but they were like walking mannequins. They had the body, the face, and the hair but not the attitude. You could tell they were still insecure. You could tell they were pleased by head turnings of men. It lacked quality. All my guy friends agreed that they’d prefer someone who was mediocre with a confident aura rather than someone who relied on knives and shots to boost their mentality.

Therefore, I believe beauty is a necessary component in humans and art. It is what differentiates each and every one (piece of art) of us. Like many people have already posted, what is aesthetically pleasing is different to each of us but what is beautiful is something else. As cliche as it is, we are all beautiful in our own way, we just have to find that way. The aesthetic part of being beautiful is so small, its almost nonexistent. Being beautiful does not require having the perfect face and body.

Now here are the disturbing yet factual links:

http://www.time.com/time/asia/covers/1101020805/story.html

http://www.koreaherald.com/national/Detail.jsp?newsMLId=20101122000840