Cosmetic Surgery: Self Improvement or Self Mutilation?
Webster’s Dictionary defines plastic surgery as surgery concerned with the repair, restoration, or improvement of lost, injured, defective, or misshapen body parts. There are two types; cosmetic surgery, usually for superficial purposes and reconstructive surgery, re-building the body part. Either way, it forcibly manipulates structures of the body into desired shape. Plastic surgery has been routinely performed in America since the 19th century and was first used to help soldiers that were severely scarred from battle. More recently plastic surgery has become a hot trend, not just for the rich and famous, but for people of almost any economic status, male and female alike. Instead of it being a medical procedure used to help people who are disfigured because of birth defects or accidents it appears to be becoming a substitute for exercise and a quick fix for aging. Why do people feel the need to undergo a surgical procedure to change their physical appearance? Are they even really doing it for themselves or so they can feel comfortable in a society based on looks. Even television is polluted with reality show that are based on ordinary people getting not so realistic makeovers. Psychologists worry about what impact programs like The Swan, Extreme Makeover, and MTV’s I want to be Famous have on the people who undergo such drastic cosmetic transformations and the feeling of inadequacy in those who don’t. I understand how it would be a necessity for someone to live a normal life if they were say, disfigured in an accident or fire, something like that but if a person was going to undergo a surgical operation because they wanted a tinier waist line or perkier breasts it seems a little unhealthy.
Sometimes it is due to psychological problems behind the wanting to alter yourself like Body Dysmorphic Disoreder. A disorder where people are obsessed with achieving physical perfection. Studies have shown that...