Plastic Surgery

Part of me understands it's not my body; a person's personal decision to change their body has no effect on me.  

But another part of me argues that all bodies are beautiful and something as invasive and synthetic as surgery shouldn't be needed to see that.  I'm not saying that people who get plastic surgery are necessarily vain or vapid, but I do wonder why a person would do something so drastic to change their appearances.

And I admit a strong personal bias.  When I was 10-14 all I wanted was rhinoplasty, I thought it would solve all my problems: my peers would stop bullying me ("you're too ugly to rape" "you're so ugly you should kill yourself"), my teachers would stop telling me that I was failing as a future housewife, the family taking care of me would let me out of their basement, my mother would stop blaming me for how much she hated her job, etc.  I actively compared myself to models in magazines and celebrities and my popular peers, just like all the women I knew did.  And I figured that if I couldn't afford rhinoplasty by the time I'd turn 16 or if it wouldn't work - if my ugliness couldn't be fixed - I'd just kill myself.  Replacing these toxic people with friends and family who genuinely loved and supported me, and finding positive messages to replace the hate, saved me.

Of course I can't know whether each person getting plastic surgery is led to it for this reasoning...but nobody should have to go through that and no amount of surgery can fix toxic relationships and self-loathing.

The Ugly Kid

That's a true story, albeit summarized and shortened.  I was The Ugly Kid in K-12 and until I left the horrible parish of my childhood, that's all I was.  At 10, I began saving up my allowance for rhinoplasty and at 15, I concluded that nobody would ever want to date/marry/kiss me because of my ugliness.  This was mostly because of my broken nose, but only recently have I realized how much undernourishment and confinement in a basement had affected my appearance.

Although high school friends & faculty greatly improved my self-image, college finally valued my mind above all, and my post-school life has been fantastically slutty, a small part of me is still The Ugly Kid.  It is liberating: how I look to others doesn't factor into my functioning 95% of the time, I don't spend any money on makeup or jewelry or hair junk or wonderbras, someone who's attracted to me but doesn't care about who I am is easily filtered out.  And when someone calls me ugly, I just don't care - my first and last thought on the statement is "wow you're not creative."

Recently, my history as The Ugly Kid just happened to come up in two separate conversations and both people replied that I'm beautiful.  When I tell my story, that's not the reaction I'm going for.  I appreciate the thought, but I'm not fishing for compliments - that's not the point of the telling, I use my experience to teach and connect with others.  "But you're so beautiful, I can never believe you were The Ugly Kid" has good intentions but leaves me feeling invalidated.
I don't like it when someone, anyone, calls me beautiful save for 2 circumstances: when I'm wearing something formal and when I'm wearing nothing.  I only remove my clothing when I have control over the situation, and I put a lot of work into looking good at formal occasions.  Otherwise, I really don't understand why anyone would call me beautiful.  Do they want something of me?  If someone knows me well enough to want to compliment me, I'd like to think that this person knows that I'd rather be called smart or witty or twisted, etc.  Let me own that I was The Ugly Kid and help me seek revenge on those who prey on other Ugly Kids.

Body Positivity: Figure Drawing

My cousin-in-law is an artist and, when I was 11, she began taking me to a figure drawing studio every other Sunday.  This continued until the studio closed six years later, but then I took honors art classes in high school and those involved figure drawing.  And then I kept doing figure drawing throughout college.

It took a few years, especially since my mother poked my belly and called me fat when I was in middle school, but this exposure to naked bodies dramatically changed my beauty standards.  In figure drawing, the most interesting bodies are "flawed" - fat, saggy, scarred, and marked.  Drawing different bodies so frequently shifted my understanding of the "ideal" body, so I rejected the mainstream standards in favor of every body.

The best way to develop body positivity, especially in children, is to see every kind of body in a welcoming setting over a long period of time.

Full, Free Documentary: Miss Representation

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=SGlSkdKzolo

The thing is, and I thought this when I interned at Project Girl, it isn't entirely "the media's" fault that depression and eating disorders are so prevalent - a strong support system in an individual's life can help overcome that influence. But altering mainstream standards is easier than providing personal support to millions of people.

Ugly Girl vs. Pretty Girl

Working at O'Hare, two kinds of straight (usually white) men really stand out. The airport construction worker and the elitist businessman, and they stand out because they're similar in how they hit on me. Because they assume that I have a vagina*, apparently that means I'm there for their advances. I tend to ignore them, especially since they hit on all "women" equally and a flight attendant will probably kick them out - you go, girls!

But then these guys will call me pretty. I don't want to be pretty, I want to be smart. Firstly, I don't see how Michael Cera can be pretty to these skeezy guys. Secondly, my appearance is not an invitation. I know that some of these guys, usually the construction workers, probably think that calling me a "pretty girl" is the utmost compliment and they probably mean well. How are they supposed to know that I would be irritated while their wives/daughters/etc. appreciate it?

Throughout school, especially when I broke my nose at 9, I was The Ugly Girl. Of course, now I know that it was because I was malnourished, abused and generally disconnected from my own body. At the time, it was incredibly painful. Up until 8th grade, I saved up all my money for plastic surgery, I mildly dieted and stuffed my bra. Then I embraced my Ugly self and actively decided to walk my own path as an Ugly person. I honestly thought "if Ringo Starr could be a BEATLE with his giant nose, I can be a normal person with mine."

In high school, though, my acceptance of my Ugliness didn't make rejection any easier. Now I know that a couple people did have crushes on me, but I was still holding out on my Prince Charming who would perceive some personal beauty beyond my malnourished, abused body (as though such personal beauty couldn't exist without that validation). And I wasn't willing to act dumb or to give flattery where it wasn't due, so my refusal to compromise with stupidity made me even more alone romantically. And then some guys bet each other to ask me out.

At college**, though, things finally opened up. Firstly, I WAS IN A HEALTHY, NOT ABUSIVE PLACE!!! Secondly, a mind-centric group was available. I was finally able to form myself and to pick my scene. Things turned around!

It's not that I don't want to be perceived as pretty, just not 24/7. Or even 8/5. How about 2/3, two hours a day three days a week? When I CHOOSE to be perceived as pretty. Although I would absolutely never choose to relive those Ugly years the same way, being The Ugly Kid taught me to value smarts over beauty. I'd far rather be called "smart person" than "pretty girl."



* one of the many reasons why I love it so much when people call me "sir" or get confused in public bathrooms

** at an all-women college, a lot of students really enjoyed not being "pretty" (makeup, done-up hair, jewelry, heels, bras, etc.) all the time. However, a lot of women there thought that they MUST do/wear these things when a man, even a gay man, was around. I could never get a reason out of them as to why.