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It's our attitudes to female beauty that need surgery It's our attitudes to female beauty that need surgery
(4 months later)
Like a lot of people, I have a fairly fluid system of personal beliefs. I try to keep myself open to other points of view because what I think is not necessarily always right, but I firmly believe that in order to argue against something you must educate yourself about it. And that's why I've spent the last couple of weeks having a good rummage around in a subject that troubles me greatly: the current concept of female beauty.Like a lot of people, I have a fairly fluid system of personal beliefs. I try to keep myself open to other points of view because what I think is not necessarily always right, but I firmly believe that in order to argue against something you must educate yourself about it. And that's why I've spent the last couple of weeks having a good rummage around in a subject that troubles me greatly: the current concept of female beauty.
Three things helped me unpick my thoughts. The first was a day at the Anti-Ageing Health and Beauty Show at Olympia London; the second was a demonstration evening at a "non-surgical" clinic in west London and the third was watching Unreported World last Friday on Channel 4. If you're getting ready to dive behind the sofa while I rant against fillers, Botox and cosmetic surgery then just hold your horses – you know what my views are by now: the decision whether or not to have a cosmetic procedure is and should remain one for the individual concerned. Would I have Botox myself? No, probably not. Would I have my neck lifted to lose my sagging jawline? I honestly couldn't say, because the extent to which my nascent jowls descend into the "full wattle" could make me feel differently. But I can tell you this: if I decided to have anything done at all it would a) be for myself and not merely to conform, and b) extremely unlikely because I can't really afford it.Three things helped me unpick my thoughts. The first was a day at the Anti-Ageing Health and Beauty Show at Olympia London; the second was a demonstration evening at a "non-surgical" clinic in west London and the third was watching Unreported World last Friday on Channel 4. If you're getting ready to dive behind the sofa while I rant against fillers, Botox and cosmetic surgery then just hold your horses – you know what my views are by now: the decision whether or not to have a cosmetic procedure is and should remain one for the individual concerned. Would I have Botox myself? No, probably not. Would I have my neck lifted to lose my sagging jawline? I honestly couldn't say, because the extent to which my nascent jowls descend into the "full wattle" could make me feel differently. But I can tell you this: if I decided to have anything done at all it would a) be for myself and not merely to conform, and b) extremely unlikely because I can't really afford it.
So is "beauty" becoming the preserve of the wealthy? Unreported World seemed to suggest not. The programme left me with the sense that if I lived in Rio I could pay for my potential de-wattling in a number of different ways. If I was short of cash I could even have it done for free by allowing a trainee to have a bash. I could have it done very quickly too, especially if a spare slot comes up on the health service surgical rota – because obviously no one in Brazil needs an appendectomy as much as I need my neck wrinkles sorting out. In Rio, cosmetic surgery is available on credit, at knockdown prices, and all the women want it because somehow they've been persuaded that beauty means success and that both can be purchased with a swipe of the plastic. So far so shocking, then.So is "beauty" becoming the preserve of the wealthy? Unreported World seemed to suggest not. The programme left me with the sense that if I lived in Rio I could pay for my potential de-wattling in a number of different ways. If I was short of cash I could even have it done for free by allowing a trainee to have a bash. I could have it done very quickly too, especially if a spare slot comes up on the health service surgical rota – because obviously no one in Brazil needs an appendectomy as much as I need my neck wrinkles sorting out. In Rio, cosmetic surgery is available on credit, at knockdown prices, and all the women want it because somehow they've been persuaded that beauty means success and that both can be purchased with a swipe of the plastic. So far so shocking, then.
The real rub is that all three – the show, the clinic and the TV programme – promote a particularly narrow definition of beauty, arrived at by a committee made up of the media, advertising executives and beauty industries. It is beauty in the form of flawlessness, and almost all of it is achieved by means of a costly intervention of some sort. The UK alone has a cosmetic surgery industry worth billions (£3.6bn by 2015). This is not personal maintenance and good grooming. This is a production line to manufacture identikit women. It means a 26-year-old mother in Rio cannot get a decent job because she keeps being told there are "issues about her appearance" (post-baby tummy). It means a middle-aged woman can be told by her interviewer that working with her would be "like working with my mum" – as if that was automatically a bad thing. And it goes a long way to explaining the faint scent of fear and desperation that permeated the anti-ageing show a few weeks ago.The real rub is that all three – the show, the clinic and the TV programme – promote a particularly narrow definition of beauty, arrived at by a committee made up of the media, advertising executives and beauty industries. It is beauty in the form of flawlessness, and almost all of it is achieved by means of a costly intervention of some sort. The UK alone has a cosmetic surgery industry worth billions (£3.6bn by 2015). This is not personal maintenance and good grooming. This is a production line to manufacture identikit women. It means a 26-year-old mother in Rio cannot get a decent job because she keeps being told there are "issues about her appearance" (post-baby tummy). It means a middle-aged woman can be told by her interviewer that working with her would be "like working with my mum" – as if that was automatically a bad thing. And it goes a long way to explaining the faint scent of fear and desperation that permeated the anti-ageing show a few weeks ago.
I'm not qualified to comment on social and economic issues in Brazil, except to say that the programme I watched made me feel very sad for the women struggling to get out of the favelas and finding yet another manmade obstacle in their way. I wonder how close we are to the same thing happening in the UK. I wonder how long it will be before we too start to believe that the only valid beauty comes with a four-figure pricetag, or that the only route to success is via the operating theatre and the Botox couch. And I often wonder what's happened to the individuals. There used to be so many of us with gap-toothed smiles, self-belief and quirky little imperfections. We need visible older women now more than ever before: women who will proudly stand on the soapbox of their years and announce that there is nothing to be afraid of in looking like ourselves. I see an abundance of beauty in older faces – faces of people who have not been afraid to "over-exercise" their facial muscles with a thumping good laugh, or a bloody good cry if the occasion demands it. I couldn't be more in favour of making the best of ourselves but, please, let's do it in a way that expresses our character and individuality instead of allowing ourselves to be herded towards a blinkered, commercialised and prejudiced view of how we should look.I'm not qualified to comment on social and economic issues in Brazil, except to say that the programme I watched made me feel very sad for the women struggling to get out of the favelas and finding yet another manmade obstacle in their way. I wonder how close we are to the same thing happening in the UK. I wonder how long it will be before we too start to believe that the only valid beauty comes with a four-figure pricetag, or that the only route to success is via the operating theatre and the Botox couch. And I often wonder what's happened to the individuals. There used to be so many of us with gap-toothed smiles, self-belief and quirky little imperfections. We need visible older women now more than ever before: women who will proudly stand on the soapbox of their years and announce that there is nothing to be afraid of in looking like ourselves. I see an abundance of beauty in older faces – faces of people who have not been afraid to "over-exercise" their facial muscles with a thumping good laugh, or a bloody good cry if the occasion demands it. I couldn't be more in favour of making the best of ourselves but, please, let's do it in a way that expresses our character and individuality instead of allowing ourselves to be herded towards a blinkered, commercialised and prejudiced view of how we should look.
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