Is beauty really worth the pain?

User Rating:  / 0

PoorBest 

Details

Created on Friday, 09 September 2011 15:33

Hits: 1785

Opinion

By Sierra Lopez

Throughout time there has always been one major thing that has connected humans all over the world.

Someone’s appearance can determine his or her career, popularity, historical background, relationship status, and friendships. A pool of beautiful fish comes in different sizes, colors, and shapes so why would our pool be any different. Is there a perfect beauty or is beauty still in the eye of the beholder?

There are many different views on what is beautiful. Some believe the more curvy body is true beauty and some would argue that the thinner body truly exemplifies beauty. The entertainment world of modeling is based on a dress size of two and a 5’9” canvas, but the average American woman is a dress size 14 and is 5’4” tall. That is seven times the waist size and five inches shorter than the modeling world’s ideal buyer.

The growth of women getting breast augmentation has also grown 39 percent, resulting with 300,000 procedures in 2010 according to the American Society of Plastics Surgeons. This would appear to mean that the fuller body was the most appreciated body type but believe it or not, most women strive to have a body that isn’t exactly the healthiest.

Statistics show that girls between the ages of eleven to thirteen see themselves as overweight and 80% of thirteen year olds have attempted to lose weight. The suicide rate for women with eating disorders between the ages of fifteen to twenty-five is 80%. But do not be fooled. Eating disorders do not only exist for women. 10-15% of people with Anorexia or Bulimia are male, but men are less likely to seek help because they believe that those same disorders are “women diseases.”

The pressure to be fit and attractive hangs over the heads of men just as much as it does women. Many men have received surgery to “fix” their nose, hair growth, breast size, age wrinkles, and liposuction on multiple body parts.

Cosmetic surgery and other related procedures in the United States have increased 32% last year to 8.7 million with Botox anti- wrinkle injections according to The American Society of Plastic Surgeons. Men are also known to receive surgery for “six packs” and bulging Pecs to fit the leaner group of men according to the same source.

Men and women from all over the world have gone through such surgeries and have taken their bodies to dangerous points such as painful recovery, infections due to bacteria entering cuts and stitches, and the emotional pain of not recognizing the person in the mirror, to look a specific way due to the ideal body of our time.

“It’s been a battle that I’ve had with my poor self-esteem that started a long time ago and the continuous need to feel like I should fit in somehow, and I never can fit in….” says Jenny Lee, a model also known as the 21 century Human Barbie, who was interviewed by Oprah Winfrey on the “Oprah Show. “

Were you come from can influence your preference of looks but the one thing that never changes, no matter where you are from, is the fact that everybody wants to be beautiful or loved. Some people will go to more extreme lengths to “enhance” the features they already possess or to fulfill their minds or culture’s ideal beauty.

In the end, the real question is not whether your beauty is good enough for those around you, but is whether your beauty is good enough for yourself. How far will you take your body to look “beautiful” is up to you.