Nip:Zip::Tuck:Zap

The other day, my mom and I were driving somewhere when an interesting story came on the radio [FYI: my mom only plays NPR and Christian music when she's driving us kids somewhere, because she wants to balance out all that "stuff" me and my sister's listen to---funny, right?]. The creator of Nip/Tuck, Ryan Murphy, was talking about his newest show, Glee, and even though I ardently admire all things show choir related [I kind of wish Georgetown had a show choir...that would be awesome], his aside on Nip/Tuck and plastic surgery's decreased popularity caught my attention.

Murphy claimed that he created Nip/Tuck to present the ugly reality of plastic surgery through brutally realistic recreations of surgeries; he wanted to demonstrate that artificial physical alterations only speak to deeper psychological problems that only proper counseling can fix. The show first aired at the boom of plastic surgery in 2003 and is closing at what Murphy argues is a time when plastic surgery is not nearly as popular. He contributes this demise of sorts to the rise of less invasive procedures [botox, lipodissolve, and other nonsurgical alternatives]. While Murphy applauds this shift [after all, it's just stupidSTUPIDstupid to go under the knife for an unnecessary surgery], I don't know if I am quite as thrilled.

While plastic surgery is admittedly stupid, it at least requires people to think about their physical alterations significantly more than a botox injection or lipodissolve requires. I mean, getting any kind of invasive surgery like liposuction or a face lift requires multiple doctors' appointments, consultations, and overall health evaluations; any kind of non-invasive procedure doesn't require this. Rather, such procedures simply allow people to immediately satiate frivolous desires, thus exemplifying society's general problem of focusing too much on temporal pleasures that never lead to true happiness--it's just an easier way of doing something relatively bad.

Of course, women are the most frequent culprits of using medical procedures to alter their physical appearance. Most women want to present themselves as the best people they can be [I, of course, have no problem with this desire; women should want to be proud], whether it be in clothing, makeup, physical fitness, etc. However, plastic surgery, or any kind of surgical physical alteration, in my opinion, is a show of weakness. It's just a way of avoiding dealing with your truest person and openly admits that you are not happy with who you are; rather than demonstrating a lady's pride in herself, it discloses disappointment.

These procedures serve as ways of avoiding dealing with the deepest sense of self by becoming, physically, something you truly aren't. It is admittedly easier to go into a doctor's office for a 10 minute botox appointment or a one hour lipo-dissolve session than it is to face your innermost concerns. So, these noninvasive procedures simply encourage continued ignorance of the real problems at hand; they make it easier to be something you're not. And for this, I almost hate botox more than breast augmentations.

Women are better than these procedures. Women have the self-control and ability to improve themselves without any kind of medical method. Supermodels and movie stars should no longer serve as standards of beauty [Come on, we all know about how stupid those people are thanks to the tabloids]. By turning to medical physical alterations, ladies are just selling themselves short and admitting to stereotyped weakness; it shows an inability to fully embrace and love being the woman you are lucky to be.

Now I'm not saying women should lay around and not do anything to deal with any perceived physical shortcoming. I just think individual women should utilize their personal strengths to improve themselves, whether it be through going to counseling, surrounding themselves with people who help them feel as beautiful as they truly are, or even new workout regimens. Injections and surgeries will never make you feel truly beautiful, only life filled with appreciation and gratefulness can do so.

Yes, it is understandable for every person to express some kind of unhappiness with regards to physical appearance. Yes, it is understandable to want to "fix" whatever you deem wrong. This being said, it is not understandable to put yourself at risk for "fixing" things that need not be fixed [under normal circumstances, no one needs a butt implant, no one needs a breast augmentation, no one needs rhinoplasty]. Doctored physical alterations, whether invasive or not, simply fail at trying to resolve deeper unhappiness. After all, I personally think that women should be proud that they are aging, women should be proud to physically show all that they have overcome whether young or old. Why on earth would you want to pretend that your life has been less than it is? Why would you want to ignore symbols of hardships you've overcome? Why would you want to eliminate physical manifestations of memories? Why would you want to hide wrinkles that represent a lifetime leading to greater wisdom? In my opinion, it is these physical markings that make a woman most beautifully feminine [plus, you just look silly (and somewhat unattractive) when you try to be something you're not].

Women are not barbie dolls--we are human. We get scars, we get wrinkles, things sag...we get old. That's life. Ladies just need to accept the reality of things and stop trying to turn themselves into seemingly everlasting beings.

Man Skirts: Femininity gone terribly awry

Upon arriving in Saint Louis, I saw a man wearing combat boots paired with a pleated, knee-length, khaki skirt. At first glance, I thought I must have been seeing things. At second glance, I thought he must have been a cross dresser. At third glance, I decided he must have just been a guy wearing a woman's skirt. At fourth glance, I realized, "O boy. This is a legit guy wearing a legit man skirt...whatever that may be." [I would have looked a fifth time, but I was toting too large a bag to do so]

I heard of the "man skirt" phenomena. But I thought it had only touched the upper-echelon of fashion; that is, I thought it had never made it past the runways since Marc Jacob's obsession with them became made obvious in his collection. Apparently, this is not the case. The man skirt trend has even reached Lambert Airport [scary, right?]. While part of me wants to say, "Skirts are comfortable, and, hey, if girls can wear trousers, guys should be able to wear skirts," the larger part of me SCREAMS, "Men in skirts just look stupid and like they're trying to be something they're not." [This being said, I find traditional kilts acceptable in the proper setting.]

For me, this man skirt phenomena puts the issue of total gender equality in a new light. It's one thing for women to take on more masculine fashions, but it is a completely different thing for men to take on female fashions. Is trying [I say trying, because I think it will fail...miserably] to make skirts an acceptable and normal part of guys' wardrobes a way of respecting femininity or actually taking away from femininity? I'm sure that designers would all say that it's about the clothing, the movement, the fabric, and that there should be no gender discrimination when it comes to fabulous clothes. I, however, feel that men stealing away skirts [however ridiculous they look] from being solely feminine is just a way of further asserting male dominance rather than a way of respecting femininity. When a woman wears a properly fitted pant suit and blouse, she looks undeniably feminine because it can be cut and shaped in such a way to accent her feminine figure. When a man wears a skirt, he looks like he went into his overweight grandmother's closet and pulled out something that he thought would provide a nice breeze of sorts.

Man skirts, therefore, do not demonstrate any kind of respect for femininity. It simply mocks it. I'm sorry---you can't make a skirt look masculine. Society is ingrained with the idea that skirts are feminine, and trying to make skirts a male fashion trend just emphasizes recent notions of eliminating the idea of true femininity. You cannot create equality by having all feminine characteristics sucked into male trends to make them acceptable. Not at all. Likewise, you cannot create equality by having all male trends sucked into the world of women. We must learn to embrace differences, embrace men and women as separate, and respect each other. We must accept the skirt as feminine and find it beautiful as such, not needing to be embraced by men to be completely acceptable.

Forcing the breakdown of visible gender differences, like by having men wear skirts, will only create a facade of solution. Truly, we must learn to embrace femininity and masculinity as separate, but equal, entities. We can't create true gender equality by lumping the two genders together----that just yields one visible gender, not equality.

Thus, women need to embrace being women, and men need to embrace being men. That's why I think it is extremely important for ladies to look back to times when femininity was at its prime for inspiration; they shouldn't look to today when femininity is twisted and rejected by many for the purpose of allowing feminism to endure. True feminism can't exist if we take a centrally humanistic perspective; we must take a uniquely feminine perspective.
Hence, I blame Marc Jacobs for contributing to society's brutal attempts at eliminating femininity's existence [I also blame him for making attractive male models look like idiots on the runway].

Let us keep skirts to ourselves, Marc!