“Beauty is a curse on the world.”
This is the signature of The Carver, a serial killer from the hit television show “Nip/Tuck,” which features two fictional plastic surgeons in Miami, Fla.
Even though this quote is only writing, a measly sentence pulled from a script, is there something more here? It seems so.
A recent study done by the American Academy of Cosmetic Surgery revealed that although only 10 percent of Americans have ever had plastic surgery, almost 20 percent wish they could.
The study, which is based on 1,010 interviews (representing 1.4 million households), shows that since the ’60s and ’70s, the tables have completely turned. No longer is cosmetic surgery ‘hardly talked about’ but instead it’s on the minds of more and more individuals.
The age group of those studied ranged from 18 to 65 years. One in five of these individuals admitted that they wouldn’t mind going under the knife for one reason or another at some point in their lives.
Of those that said yes, the majority were women, young adults or people living in the Western part of the United States (no shocker there, what with Hollywood’s superficial ways and all).
It was merely 12 percent of men who said they’d get plastic surgery for one reason or another, whether it was for competition in the work place or for a female friend.
What’s even more disturbing is that 54 percent of those who said they wouldn’t receive surgery were due to potential costs of the procedures. It’s surprising that 47 percent had the common sense to fear looking unnatural after surgery while only 27 percent were afraid of being unhappy with the outcome.
I think that when Americans are taking the time to vote on whose abs they’d prefer (51 percent of men said Nick Lachey’s) or whose eyes are the most envied (47 percent of women said Jennifer Aniston’s), it’s time someone set our priorities straight.
No longer do vacations, those luxurious escapes that families once treasured, matter. Instead, taxes are being spent on a new rack for the lady or a bit of ‘lipo’ for the hubby.
It seems that we’ve grown too unhappy with ourselves, based on the current obesity epidemic, to actually take control by using more logical means. Our ideas of beauty are being based on the cover girl of the latest Cosmopolitan magazine or People’s Sexiest Men of the Year edition. Where has the belief of beauty in the flaws gone? Where has the concept of everyone looking unique gone? I can only guess.
More than 236,000 surgeries were performed in the U.S. last year (not including Botox or laser hair removal), which amounts to too many scalpels and not enough self-confidence. Is there really anything to be gained by looking exactly like Brad Pitt or by mastering the lip-pout of Angelina Jolie? Is it that the life of someone that beautiful is any better than the life of someone less appealing?
In our minds, it seems as though that’s true. Yet in reality we fail to remember that these people do not wake up looking this way. They’re pampered 24 hours a day, without a single moment to themselves, so that they look as perfect as we need them to look, and for what? So that we can continue to lust over bodies, faces and hairstyles we’ll never be able to master.
We don’t need statistics to know that life in the fast lane is starting to slow the traffic on Main Street.

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