Is Cosmetic Surgery the "Biggest Swindle" of the 21st Century?

by WiredBerries Editors — November 16, 2007

Dr Howard Webster, president of the Australian Society of Plastic Surgeons, says that more and more he's getting women into his practice with "perfectly" shaped and sized breasts who want augmentation. Of these women who fall under this category Webster says, "Her ideal of good breasts was implanted breasts. Her normal is a distorted normal."

Health professionals, social commentators, and even politicians are increasingly concerned about the growing number of people relying on cosmetic surgery to rectify poor body image. Even young teenagers are falling into the trap before their bodies are even fully developed.

Mia Freedman, a social commentator and former magazine editor says "it's the evolution of eating disorders, in terms of how young women harm themselves in a bid to meet unrealistic expectations." She believes relentless, unrealistic depictions of artificial beauty in the media are partly to blame, especially for young women. "Every celebrity in their age group that they aspire to is already doing [cosmetic enhancements]," Freedman says. "The scary thing is you end up with a bunch of clones. The Hollywood starlets all look the same."

Sure, cosmetic surgery can help some women feel better about their appearance, which is a valid choice. Even so, Webster says that many women now seem to think that augmented breast are the "norm" and that normal breasts are somehow defective. Remember, this is coming from a man who makes his living off of performing these surgeries.

There's nothing wrong, in my opinion, with someone making the decision to go under the knife to make an "improvement." If that's what they want to do with their money and body, that's their right. But women in general need to be aware that many of these "improvements" are not improvements. They are choices. They are choices to have a smaller nose or bigger breasts. But if you're someone with naturally small breasts or a distinctive nose, for example, please don't consider your beautiful, healthy body to be "defective." That idea is being called "the biggest swindle in the 21st century," which is the unrealistic belief that our bodies need to go under the knife if they don't fit into a cookie cutter mold of what it currently considered attractive. After all, there's nothing more beautiful than someone comfortable in her own skin.