I have heard that upwards of 40% (and by some drunken accounts 60%) of Koreans have had plastic surgery. I know this is because it is a frequent topic of conversation among nosy foreigners (a reminder to myself that when I edit this I need make an awesome pun on the word nosy in regards to plastic surgery, because people love puns). I like not knowing, because even the best plastic surgery is a major major turn off. I feel like a lot of people I talk to find it a turn off. Yet, my anecdotal evidence gets trumped by the free market, which inform me that plastic surgeons are super rich, so people must secretly like it (is there any scummy thing the free market can't vindicate?).
While too many people have plastic surgery, the good thing is that unlike in the US, it's a lot harder to tell. This is in part because apparently Koreans are great plastic surgeons, apparently celebrities come to get their plastic surgery in Korea (and not celebrities like Billy Baldwin , but celebrities like Alec Baldwin). It is also in part because Koreans place their vanity toward their facial beauty and specifically the size of their eyes and the smallness of their nose (their natural noses are already like 87 times smaller then my nose, a fact that continues to be pointed out to me every single day). Their procedures are far more difficult for me to pick out then big silicone bean bags tacked on to ones chest. Which allows me to maintain my cognitive dissonance towards it, because temporarily our lives are so much easier when we ignore things we don't like (for example, death). Further, I can't tell because the average Korean women wears a dozen layers of makeup, though I also can't tell with the guys (its probably because I am not checking out enough guys, so I guess I need to get on that).
Having lived in Korea for a month and a half, I dig Korean girls way more then I did while in the US. So, I guess the moral of this post is that beauty is all around us. We just have to learn to appreciate it and then enhance it.
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nice conclusion. what do you think about how most every american gets braces? Cosmetic surgery seems to have a pretty secure place in humanity's future. at least wealthy humanity's.
ReplyDeleteIm not against braces because they are less for vanity and more for dental health.
ReplyDeleteIm writing a short story about one man's struggle with the complexity of cosmetic attraction. Its quite weird and iv been working on it for like a year.
I was talking to one Korean guy yesterday and he compared it to working out and overall self improvement. He said the risk and cost is all on the person getting it, but the society is the one who benefits. His wife then interjected that there have been subtle overtures for her to get it. It was interesting and unique (to me) perspective.