Interest Conflict

Cosmetic Procedures Are Gaining Among Men

OK, I work for most of the nation's dermatologists, so perhaps I shouldn't comment on this story, but isn't this comment from a plastic surgeon for an article on cosmetics a bit troubling?

Dr. Darrick Antell, a leading plastic surgeon in New York City, said women patients tell him they have always compared themselves to the models they see on fashion magazine covers. But now men are making the same kind of comparisons.

"From Calvin Klein ads for underwear to GQ, I think the media have made men more aware of how good they should look," Antell said. "They see an ad and say, 'I don't have abs like that.'"'

How good I should look? Listen, I'm all for exercising for your health, taking the stairs instead of the elevator, and eating a balanced diet. I'm eating a pear while I type this! But doing those things to meet the standards of a model in a magazine--a person whose job is to spend his or her time endeavoring to look the way he or she looks--is patently absurd. By thinking such things are possible, we devalue the things about living a real life--one with a job more meaningful than pursuing one's own aesthetic beauty--that we should appreciate. No, I don't have the abdominal muscles of a porn star or the chest of a body builder. Maybe I could, if I really tried--but what would it profit me or society at large? Shouldn't I worry more about how good I should be than how good I should look?

To me, the fact that cosmetic surgery is growing at such a rapid pace is a sign of a significant shift away from substance and toward style. You can see it in any number of ways on any given day. The Bush Inauguration will cost $40 million; it's said to be meant to honor the troops and their families. As Wonkette noted this morning, though, saying that supporting the troops is the theme of the inaugural isn't the same thing as, well, actually supporting the troops. Why cancel the balls and send the $40 million to the troops in the form of, I don't know, the armor they asked Rumsfeld for? Why use the money to help military families in America who are struggling to make ends meet because their primary provider is on an extended tour in Iraq? Why back up your words with actions?

Why, indeed. Why appreciate the inner qualities that develop as we age when we can use the miracles of modern medicine to revert our appearance to an age more appropriate to our stunted inner development? Why do the hard thing--take action to help the troops, or age gracefully--when we can do the easy thing--paper over the first with words and plasticize or Botox the second?

According to the article on cosmetics,

"Cosmetic surgery is more negatively viewed by Americans because it is threatening to become so commonplace," said Pepper Schwartz, a University of Washington sociologist. "People feel pressured to look a certain way if everyone you know who is 50 is having surgery to look 40."

That's not our main trouble, America. Yes, it's troubling that people can't accept aging. What's more troubling is that we judge our politicians and public figures by the same standards as our porn stars. The latter should be pleasing to the eye and willing to say whatever we want to hear, and need not concern themselves with the truth and deeper meaning of their statements. But the former? Right now, we seem not to distinguish. Which is why there's no answer to my questions above. We'll accept the ridiculous answers the Bush administration gives to questions like "Why not spend the inaugural money on armor, or helping the families of the troops, or helping tsunami victims?" so why should they change? They say what we want to hear--"We support the troops." And we assume that they mean it, that they do something about it. You can't tell me that all the folks on the road with those yellow ribbons on their cars believe the words of the president to be as empty a gesture as putting a magnet on a car. But empty they are. Saying his inaugural is "about the troops" does as much to protect the men and women serving in Iraq as a magnet on your car does. If Bush is a better man than those he represents--those who spend the money from their tax cuts on facelifts rather than the faith-based charities Bush insisted would benefit from them--he'll lead by example and donate his entire inaugural fund to either the Red Cross, to help disaster victims in Asia, or to a group that helps military families in the U.S.--which would be more appropriate because he, not a tsunami, caused much of their plight.

In our cosmetic society, that would be one move that would both look and actually be good.