Beauty Demands

Major influences on children’s development of self-concept include communication from others about the self, comparisons they make with others in their immediate environment and the role assigned to them by the community 1 . The face is a key component of many adults’ self-identity and to the developing child, the face provides an early and continuing source of information about a persons’ personal identity 2 . If the face is so important, should we let children have cosmetic surgery? The Nuffield Council on Bioethics defines cosmetic surgery as surgery which will alter a person’s appearance, and which has a primarily aesthetic rather than functional aim. Their 2017 report identified specific ethical concerns for teenagers in particular as sensitive to peer pressures, and at a vulnerable stage of development with respect to their sense of their own identity. A survey by the American Academy of Facial Plastic and Reconstructive Surgeons found 55% of surgeons said patients now seek...

Why risk cosmetic surgery? Why risk infection, pain, possibility of life-long complications, just to look prettier? All surgery is dangerous but facelifts aren’t the same as (say) knee replacements that enhance our lives in obvious ways; with knee replacements we weigh up the risks versus the benefits and decide the risks are worth it. And choosing to have cosmetic surgery abroad, adding a foreign country into the mix, that’s just madness! Contrary to popular opinion, ‘unnecessary’ cosmetic surgery may improve life as much as a ‘necessary’ knee replacement. Of the 100+ recipients of cosmetic surgery tourism that Ruth Holliday, David Bell and I interviewed, observed, and travelled with for our forthcoming book Beautyscapes: mapping cosmetic surgery tourism (MUP, 2019) ,  all had carefully weighed risk against benefit. They told us that they hoped cosmetic surgery would give them better opportunities at work, in romance, in day to day living. Further, they sought cosmetic surge...

There is a great deal of confusion that surrounds the aesthetic industry and what procedures within it are subject to regulation. As the popularity of cosmetic procedures, such as breast augmentation and rhinoplasty, continues to rise in the UK, so too do the number of complaints and the volume of incidents involving risky practices and untrained or inexperienced practitioners. If you look up ‘cosmetic surgery’ on the internet, the results are crowded with 0% finance deals and 2-4-1 offers, encouraging individuals to commit quickly to potentially life-changing, and life-threatening, procedures. At the same time, the news is littered with tales of celebrities and everyday people who’ve undergone botched surgeries or have had painful reactions to poorly administered Botox or dermal fillers. There is a great deal of societal pressure, particularly on women - who still have the vast majority of surgeries - to achieve the perfect ‘look’, which can be perpetuated by the likes of ...

The disturbing case of breast surgeon, Ian Paterson, who mutilated countless patients over a period of several years, was a shocking example of a rogue surgeon. English criminal law plays only a minor role in regulating harmful medical misconduct, traditionally limited to gross negligence manslaughter. The conviction of Ian Paterson, in 2017, however, involved multiple convictions for serious non-fatal offences: unlawful wounding and intentionally causing grievous body harm, for which Paterson is now serving a twenty-year prison sentence. This case raises important questions about the role of the criminal law as a response to harmful and unreasonable/unjustifiable surgery. Paterson’s crimes include carrying out unnecessary, mutilating surgery on people who were falsely led to believe that the surgery was necessary and therapeutic. The prosecution’s case suggested that Paterson’s crimes were motivated by the lucrative financial rewards from his private surgical practice. Reflecting on P...

The vulva is a fraught and evolving site that is calling out for dedicated study by feminists. We need to analyse, broaden, and deepen cultural representations and discussions around vulvas. The vulva is enjoying a zeitgeist. Fur cup, yoni, cunt, front bottom, hoo-ha, pussy , va-jay-jay, camel toe, muff, map of Tassie, vagina. After hearing the sound recording of the now President of the Unites States advising men to ‘grab em by the pussy’ women rose up in fury to march against gendered violence as well as against the President himself. Global newscasts showed crowds in cities across the world dotted with homemade signs featuring the word vulva and images of vulvas (most were pink, an omission of note: see https://amydame.ca/2017/05/09/not-all-pussies-are-pink-not-all-women-have-pussies/ ). Alongside my sisterly anger the nerd in me felt happy that, at last, people were using correct terminology: instead of ‘vagina’ we were hearing ‘vulva’: the proper general descriptor for labia m...

Beauty pageants, long a target of feminist critique, are sites where femininity is defined, packaged, evaluated, and standardized, along with Western “virtues” such as individualism, whiteness, and patriotism. They are regarded as culturally conservative and hegemonizing events from which non-white women, women with disabilities, and even non-Christians have historically been overtly or tacitly excluded (Gardner 2009). So when the first openly transgender person, a young trans woman named Jenna Talackova, was admitted as a contestant in the 2012 Miss Universe Canada pageant after a public appeal, a number of currents immediately collided. Trans people have suffered more violence and marginalization at the hands of Western society than just about any group that pageants excluded; today, trans rights are widely regarded as the vanguard of progressive causes, anticipated in some ways by gay and lesbian rights, albeit in uneasy alliance with feminism (e.g., Enke 2012). Transwomen in pa...

I am an anthropologist and have studied cosmetic surgery practices in Tehran, Iran, named as the “nose job capital of the world” (CBS, 2005). Hardly surprisingly, there are intriguing contradictions and paradoxes in regard to perceptions towards and practices on the body, beauty, and cosmetic surgery among people including Islamic jurists, plastic surgeons and also official authorities. The recent news about the ban on “ugly” teachers from teaching – as worded by Western media (e.g. Euronews, 2017) convinced me to write this post:   The increasing demand for cosmetic surgery in Iran is peculiar in terms of its contextual dynamics, which have been reflected in the Western media with a tone of surprise; how could this be happening in an Islamic state whose leaders are anti-West? Seeing Iran listed among the countries with the highest number of cosmetic surgeries together with other “Western” or “Latin-American” countries wherein public bodily display is allowed, and/or is seen...