SBG’s article on Dr. 90210 has got me checking out the show occasionally to see just how bad it gets. The answer is: really bad.
Last week, a doctor was performing liposuction on a woman… who was a size zero. As he rammed the lipsuction hose under her skin repeatedly, like a very angry jack hammer (which I could barely stand to watch), he chatted cheerfully about how hard it was going to be to find any fat in this woman. Then, pray tell, WTF ARE YOU DOING GIVING HER LIPOSUCTION? And that’s not even touching on the general controversy over liposuction as a method of weight loss.
Right now I’m (not) watching a breast implant operation. If seeing them shove bags of snot-alike brutally up under skin that’s stretched inches out of shape with their instruments doesn’t make you think twice about implants, I don’t know what will. Maybe the footage of another woman, whose implant has ruptured, getting all the silicone dug out of her breast meat, looking like carcass hanging on a butcher’s hook. I can’t figure out what the point of this graphic footage is. Are they trying to let real life women know what they’re in for if they pursue major cosmetic surgery? Or are they helping women reduce their self-image to a lump of meat, so women can more easily contemplate dropping thousands of dollars on unnecessary surgery designed to make them conform to a societal ideal?
Additionally, the doctor had a lot of concerns about his ability to get this breast implantation right, given that the woman is very petite. Did he try to talk her out of it on that basis? Nah. Did he ask her what she’d done to try to get comfortable and confident with the flat chest she she has? Nah. He makes a comment that some women are quite secure about their small breasts, but those who aren’t should feel free to get implants. Afterwords, he was so proud of his work and how beautiful he’d made this woman. It was all he could talk about.
I’ve got to say… cosmetic surgery is not evil, and I’m not judging those who want it. I do empathize with the urge to “correct” a feature that’s particularly large or small or doesn’t look like it did twenty years ago. But at some point, you have to consider this is a multi-billion dollar business fueled by a lot of really negative messages about how we have to be beautiful not only to find mates (which is belied by all the not-so-gorgeous happy couples I know, even here in L.A.), but to be successful. Even men are starting to see a correlation between looking young and vibrant and becoming Vice Presidents in their companies. Excuse me, but since when did we expect CEO’s to be hotties? What the hell does beauty have to do with your ability to take charge of your department and make the right judgment calls? Like I said, I’m not even convinced the majority of men consider hotness a prerequisite for marriage: most men seem to be very intimidated by spectacularly gorgeous women. But if we don’t keep up the myth of necessary beauty, this billion-dollar industry of unnecessary surgery might fall apart.
And the bottom line is: cosmetic surgery for fashion is a double-edged sword. Smaller breasts were in vogue in the 70′s and 80′s – if that fashion comes back (and it will, sooner or later, as all fashions do), will the women getting implants now rush to get them out?
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Hey girls I am 40 and yes a size zero. IT SUCKS!! haed to find the right fit ever. every size has there problems
heidi(Quote) (Reply)
Very true. The first time I became close friends with a woman who was quite tall and slim, I thought, “Wow, she must just walk into stores and be able to fit into anything.” Whereas I often need to hem petite pants, which throws off the line, etc.
She found it no easier than I did.
Not only does every size have its problems – every size can also be beautiful if people would just open their minds.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
I think most of the problems with sizing are actually problems in the way the fashion industry is run. Ever since ready-to-wear clothing began to dominate the market, they’ve tried very hard to straddle the middle of the road and appeal to the “average” woman. The problem is that a very very tiny number of women will actually fit into a median size like that, so the vast majority of women end up unhappy. There are far too many individual differences for that to work- with things like table heights you can make most people happy with average (with the exception of the very petite or very tall) but there are just so many measurements involved with clothing that it will never work.
So if everyone is unhappy, a lot of women turn to the advertising to figure out which body type they should idealize so those clothes will make them look like the model. The joke, of course, is that even the model doesn’t look like that in the clothes straight off the rack- they’ve been pinned and altered before they were allowed anywhere near a photographer.
(This is why smaller lines that have decided to mark out a distinct territory (there are a few lines that claim to be specifically designed for either curvy or very slender women) end up with such devoted customers. Rather than making everyone go “Meh” they decided to market to a smaller group and make that group happy. A few manufacturers are actually moving towards this with digitally measured custom-fitted jeans. The number of stores that have the booths to do the measuring is still very limited, but they’re going in the right direction.)
MaggieCat(Quote) (Reply)
Reading all this talk about women’s sizes reminds me how very fortunate I am to just need my measurements to know exactly what size clothing I need. I really can’t understand why the clothing industry persists in using vague sizes for women’s clothing.
Patrick(Quote) (Reply)
I love hearing fashion history and costuming theory from you, Maggie. Seriously – really puts stuff into perspective.
Jennifer Kesler(Quote) (Reply)
Have you ever heard the saying “If you can’t be kind, be vague.” ? Women have been so conditioned to take it as some statement about their personal worth if they have to go up a dress size, that manufacturers realized they could sell more dresses marked with an ’8′ than with a ’36′. Over time what a size “is” even shifts to keep people in the same bracket as they age and/or gain weight. Today’s 14 isn’t the same as a 14 from the ’70s.
It wasn’t always like this- several years ago my grandmother was cleaning out some vintage clothes from when she was around my age/size and I snagged a few of them, and a lot of the blouses were sized via the extremely sane method of bust measurement rather than S/M/L or a randomly assigned number.
MaggieCat(Quote) (Reply)
Over time what a size “is” even shifts to keep people in the same bracket as they age and/or gain weight. Today’s 14 isn’t the same as a 14 from the ’70s.
And then there are those times you go into a store where you’ve ALWAYS purchased your jeans and you go to the same cut, style and size that you are physically wearing into said store, go to the dressing room, and discover you’ve apparently grown out of your size. Even though you’re actually wearing your size.
Makes the brain melt a little.
sbg(Quote) (Reply)
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