Looking Forward … Looking Back

Abstract

What we have in cosmetic surgery is a conundrum. If cosmetic surgery is decried as an unnatural practice that subjugates women by making them mere vessels of beauty imperatives imposed by the media and society as a whole, we deny women the intelligence and decision-making faculty to make choices about their body. If, on the other hand, we recognise it as an acceptable practice and one that rightly enjoys the time and attention given to it by medical practitioners, then we are supporting the right of doctors to interfere in yet another facet of women’s lives, to make substantial amounts of money from this and without too much scrutiny of, or medical justification for, what they are doing. Neither position is tenable so we sit in an uncomfortable space between the two when we try to face the complex questions that cosmetic surgery poses. Theorists have too often drawn a demarcation line between social and cultural pressures on women and the right of women to make choices about their bodies. They have argued among themselves rather than turning their critical gaze on the doctors whose business it is to change women’s bodies. What we find in looking at the process of cosmetic surgery is that, whether seen as agents or victims, their initial motivations for deciding on cosmetic surgery is only the beginning of a complex journey for women to an outcome that they may, or may not, want or accept.