Plastic surgery

When I was 17, plastic surgery was considered an invention for brainless, rich American women. That was over 10 years ago. Nowadays, it's part of our society. A friend is getting a nose job, uncle Tom got some hair implants for last year's father's day and grandmother Abigail has been saving money for the last 2 years to get her turkey double-chin removed. I have some ideas about what I'd get done if I just had the money: I definitely need to change my armpits - they just don't go with the rest of the body. And of course the usual program: get some nice tits, full-body hair removal, tummy tuck, arm liposuction and ear reshaping. And I want my little daughter to look half Korean. It's just more fashionable than simply being white. I'm just kidding.

I think nowadays it's perfectly ok to improve one's physical appearance. I mean, not actually changing it, only fixing some little defects or even handicaps. But why would a good looking person want to completely change in shape, color and size until turning into an unnatural looking freak? On the right, good old Donatella Versace.
Some people just don't know when to stop. Their problem is that they never run out of money. And the surgeons don't stop them. And they should.

The best example is Jocelyn Wildenstein (left), the World's scariest celebrity by plastic surgery. She was born in 1940 in Switzerland and was a real beauty in her youth. She married the billionaire art dealer Alec Wildenstein. After years of marriage her husband started to date other women and Jocelyn decided to attempt transforming herself into one of Alec's beloved giant cats. With the help of plastic surgery. She has received several silicon injections to the lips, cheeks and chin along with a facelift and eye reconstruction to look more feline like. (Remember "stalking cat", discussed in the article "body modifications").



Or poor Michael Jackson. Recently I saw one of his older videos: "Don't stop 'til you get enough". He was so charming, with a truly enchanting smile. He was nothing but a boy, just at the doorstep of real manhood - a maturity he never reached as a man. Instead, he did everything to turn into a gender that had been unknown to the World before.
By the way - have you ever noticed that his sisters Janet and La Toya probably chose the same type of nose when they got their rinoplastia?





I have to say that most of the people who choose the way of plastic surgery try to improve their physical appearance. But as energy can't be created nor destroyed (e=mc2), the patients more than often take the energy for the reshaping of flesh from a poor source of prime matter: their central computer (they turn kind of stupid,that's what I wanted to say).
This is the case of Cindy Jackson, a farmers daughter from Ohio. She used to play with Barbie dolls when a kid, which fueled her escapist fantasies, as she admits. She dreamed of a happy and glamorous life for the doll and herself. In the late 80ies she was left with an inheritance and started her journey from homely young woman to a Barbie look-alike. She is the record-holder for having more cosmetic surgeries than anyone else in the world (over 30 procedures): facelift, 3 mini facelifts, 3 eyelid surgeries, upper lip lift, liposuction on her knees, thighs, abdomen, waist and jaw-line, 2 nose operations, breast augmentation etc etc.
But what is more incredible is that a friend of her, Tom Whitfield-Lynn, felt inspired by Cindy and decided to transform himself into Barbie's boyfriend Ken. In Ohio farming communities, everything is possible...

Breasts of course. Half of our female friends probably have thought about changing size or shape of their bust. Some eccentric individuals don't just get a boob job done (not to be mixed up with blow job) but voluntarily accept to permanently carry to melons in front of their chest. This is possible thanks to string breast implants which continue to grow after they are surgically implanted and can result in abnormally large breasts. Due to a number of medical complications, the device has been banned in the European Union and the United States. In the photo, Maxi Mounds, an American adult entertainer. Each of her breasts weighs 10 kilos!
I try to imagine how she deals with certain situations of everyday life: putting her shoes on, entering an elevator, eating without seeing the food on her table etc. And there is the problem of the shifting of her center of gravity... I imagine her trying to pick up some coins she has lost, losing her balance, landing on her mega-boobs and bouncing away like a rubber-ball...

Sometimes, the scalpel can give hope. Controversy brews over plastic surgery used in children with Down Syndrome. On the left, 29 years-old Julio Camblor, 10 years after he decided to undergo aesthetic surgery.
It is a challenge for the aesthetic surgeon to make good-looking people more handsome. But it is even more rewarding to "normalize" people who are isolated because of their ugly facial expression so that they may be reintegrated into a group of friends from which they may have already anxiously withdrawn. Children with Down's syndrome are frequently concealed from the public by their parents. The children suffer from two disadvantages: Their mental abilities are limited and they have ugly facial features. (statement of a surgeon)

I can completely understand the motivations of parents of children like the five-year-old British girl with Down syndrome, who has undergone three aesthetic procedures. The only thing they want to achieve is to make their and their daughter's live more bearable. Normally, the operations that are chosen for individuals with Down syndrome are the following:

• Shortening of the tongue to stop it from protruding and make the patient look less deficient
• Removal of folds of skin from eyelids to reduce the mongoloid appearance traditionally associated with Down syndrome
• Pinning back of ears to prevent them from sticking out
  

Of course these physical changes should always be followed by a complete stylistic change: haircut, contact lenses, clothing etc.

Talking about eyelid surgery: the most common surgery in Asian countries is the westernization of the eyes. Chinese, Japanese or Koreans complain about their sleepy and sick looking eyes and get them "opened" or "rounded", even at very tender ages (performed in children and ocasionally in newborns, specially if they have been adopted in a Western country). See some examples of eyelid surgery in this video.
Hispanics living in Europe or the US choose operations that make them look less indigenous or Latin (rinosplastia, cheekbones, eyelids) and lower their ethnic stigma.



Hope can also be given to transsexuals. Female facial proportions are completely different to male ones. The case of the woman in the video shows how many operations have to be programmed to achieve the desired result, which, in this case, is the feminization of a male's features.





Last but not least, the odd case of Korean Hang Mioku, a woman addicted to plastic surgery who has been left unrecognizable after her obsession led her to inject cooking oil into her face.


See you next Monday with the last post of the "extreme bodies" series.