# I'm gonna assume you are physically plain, "imperfect" or outright homely... **URL:** \ **Category:** In My Humble Opinion\ **Created:** [December 31, 2018, 2:56pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984 "2018-12-31T14:56:35Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![Dobbs](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/5f9b8f/32.png) [@Dobbs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Dobbs)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 3:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/61 "2019-01-02T03:12:18Z")
Because I’m not runnin’ for office or lookin’ to get married. ---
**Author:** ![Sunny\_Daze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunny_daze/32/438_2.png) [@Sunny\_Daze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunny_Daze)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 3:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/62 "2019-01-02T03:43:56Z")
I’m waiting for advanced technology. I’d like to be 18 again. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 4:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/63 "2019-01-02T04:03:17Z")
> [@2Bits](#): > > …why haven’t you gone ahead and had plastic surgery, breast enhancement, hair plugs, etc yet? because no-one had yet pointed out that I’m physically plain, “imperfect” or outright homely… And it’s too late now. ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 5:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/64 "2019-01-02T05:42:23Z")
> [@Sunny\_Daze](#): > > I’m waiting for advanced technology. I’d like to be 18 again. Me too, Sunny, me too. I want to have a drink that makes me about 20 again. ---
**Author:** ![pohjonen](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pohjonen/32/423_2.png) [@pohjonen](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pohjonen)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 5:49am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/65 "2019-01-02T05:49:04Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#): > > Me too, Sunny, me too. I want to have a drink that makes me about 20 again. I’d settle for 40. ---
**Author:** ![kenobi\_65](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/kenobi_65/32/13178_2.png) [@kenobi\_65](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/kenobi_65)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 7:22am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/66 "2019-01-02T07:22:33Z")
> [@Beckdawrek](#): > > Me too, Sunny, me too. I want to have a drink that makes me about 20 again. It doesn’t make too much tequila for my brain to start thinking that I’m 20 again. Thankfully, I’ve managed to not allow it to engage in the sorts of activities that I would have done back then. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Beckdawrek](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/beckdawrek/32/3647_2.png) [@Beckdawrek](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Beckdawrek)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 7:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/67 "2019-01-02T07:35:27Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > It doesn’t make too much tequila for my brain to start thinking that I’m 20 again. Thankfully, I’ve managed to not allow it to engage in the sorts of activities that I would have done back then. 😃 Yeah, and then you wake up the next morning with a cotton-mouth and a very large head. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/68 "2019-01-02T07:42:45Z")
> [@monstro](#): > > I don’t think folks who seek out plastic surgery are necessarily vain money-wasters (which seems to be an implicit message in a number of posts here). They are just people who are bothered enough about a particular body feature to get it reshaped. I suspect most do it for themselves primarily, while also hoping it will enhance their appeal to others. I don’t really see a problem with either motivation, as long as they aren’t intense enough to be neuroses. People should ONLY do cosmetic plastic surgery because THEY want it. Most ethical plastic surgeons will reject someone who, for instance, thinks he’ll get a promotion if he gets a hair transplant, or a woman who thinks her husband will stop drinking if she gets breast implants, that kind of thing. My aunt, who has since died, had a facelift because SHE wanted to have a facelift, and while she looked fine before, the surgeon did an excellent job. ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 7:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/69 "2019-01-02T07:44:08Z")
> [@RickJay](#): > > This is one of the most weirdly obvious things ever; it’s expensive. > > Plastic surgery has an incredibly high cost, and not just in terms of money; on top of the cash, it’s a medical risk, there’s pain and recovery time (including time away from work) and it’s frightening. There is also the very real risk it will go wrong, or that even if the procedure goes okay the results will be disappointing. > > While almost no one is Hollywood perfect, the truth is very few people have one obvious physical deficiency that ruins their looks so drastically that a single procedure will really change their attractiveness all that much. Cosmetic-only surgery is rarely covered by insurance. ---
**Author:** ![Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hilarity_n.suze/32/6223_2.png) [@Hilarity\_N.Suze](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hilarity_N.Suze)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 8:33am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/70 "2019-01-02T08:33:28Z")
Rule 1. No elective surgery. “Elective” defined as I am conscious to consent to it, in which case my answer is “No.” Because I’m a wuss. I don’t like pain. I don’t react well to pain pills. I have panic attacks in doctors’ offices (also hair salons). I worked in a hospital, in the legal department, and I saw what hospitals did to people. I did once consider breast reduction. I had a consultation during which the doctor (who I might add had no bedside manner to speak of) said he might be able to save my nipples if he sliced them off first and put them on ice, but I probably wouldn’t have any sensation. He did say insurance would very likely cover it so he was eager to get started. I didn’t uncross my arms for about a week… There is a Rule 2 but it only applies for exceptions to Rule 1. ---
**Author:** ![septimus](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/septimus/32/410_2.png) [@septimus](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/septimus)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 8:53am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/71 "2019-01-02T08:53:28Z")
Cosmetic surgery is hugely popular in Thailand. Women who can’t afford, or want to avoid the ordeals of, nose jobs, get eyebrow jobs! They may travel to the Big City and then hide during the week of convalescence just for an eyebrow job. About 99% of the women here have naturally jet-black hair. These days it’s almost uncommon to see a woman with black hair — they all dye it brown. Twenty-five years ago there was a new song at the top of the charts. The singer, seen on TV, was breathtakingly beautiful. Even her nose was pretty. What did she do with the sudden cash windfall from her hit song? She bought … a _nosejob_. Haven’t heard of her since. ---
**Author:** ![penultima\_thule](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/penultima_thule/32/3833_2.png) [@penultima\_thule](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/penultima_thule)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 9:34am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/72 "2019-01-02T09:34:21Z")
> [@2Bits](#): > > …why haven’t you gone ahead and had … breast enhancement … etc yet? Because I’m the odd kinda bod who prefers my belt around my tits rather than my tits around my belt. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 10:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/73 "2019-01-02T10:19:18Z")
Ugly guy here. If I had the money, I’d get my teeth rebuilt. There does not exist anything that would fix my hair or face. Other than those three, all I need to do is exercise and eat well. The real issue is internal. Mostly, I haven’t had relationships often because I’m afraid of people in general, and don’t know how to be smoothly comfortable interacting with strangers in social situations. ---
**Author:** ![DesertDog](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/desertdog/32/11503_2.png) [@DesertDog](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/DesertDog)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 1:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/74 "2019-01-02T13:29:11Z")
> [@Hermitian](#): > > I remember there was a girl in my calculus class in college. Great personality, great figure, pretty face…except for her nose. I swear it was about twice as big as it should be. If that girl had her nose fixed, I would not blame her one bit. I hope she did. A good friend of my brother and S-I-L is Jewish with a stereotypical honker. She said when she arrived at Bryn Mawr she looked around at her fellow classmates and wondered, _How can they breathe through those tiny things?_ ---
**Author:** ![RTFirefly](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/c77e96/32.png) [@RTFirefly](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/RTFirefly)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 1:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/75 "2019-01-02T13:50:49Z")
> [@2Bits](#): > > …why haven’t you gone ahead and had plastic surgery, breast enhancement, hair plugs, etc yet? _Don’t get strung out by the way I look Don’t judge a book by its cover_ Response and earworm in one short post. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Corry\_El](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ecae2f/32.png) [@Corry\_El](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Corry_El)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 3:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/76 "2019-01-02T15:09:24Z")
> [@senoy](#): > > I’m a guy. I am judged less on my looks and more on my personality. Changing my looks surgically is a much bigger hit on my personality than it would be a gain in my looks. > > Also, perhaps more importantly. Why do I care what I look like? I don’t have to look at me. I’m married and love my wife more than I love flowers in springtime, so I’m not trying to attract a lady and really, what other reason is there for “looking good?” I agree it’s not so genuine to ask and answer this question without regard to gender. Whether it’s externally imposed or internally generated (by nature or nurture, I’m not here to debate how it comes about) women feel much more pressure on average to look ‘good’. Especially than happily married men like you and me. I make a serious effort to stay in shape, partly for general health, but partly for appearance. I put on skin care cream and stuff my wife tells me to, and I wouldn’t rule out some topical treatment to help with hair loss but that would be the limit. Anything involving cutting or implanting anything is out of the question for me. She has raised semi-seriously the possibility of cosmetic surgery for her. I assume it’s a trial balloon to see if I’d like her to, which I would not. But if she really wants to, obviously she can. She did have some age spots removed recently. But regardless of that she looks amazing at ca. 60. She has looked like (I think) a woman should at each age, without trying to look like she’s some completely different age. Her looks have been an attraction to me all along, I admit it, just not the main thing. ---
**Author:** ![Mnemnosyne](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/mnemnosyne/32/3347_2.png) [@Mnemnosyne](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mnemnosyne)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/77 "2019-01-02T16:12:35Z")
If the technology existed to make it both reliable and extremely safe, to the point where I could design my looks the way I design a character’s looks in a game with a good character creator, and then say ‘I want to look like that’ and actually come out that way, then I’d want to do it. At that point, even if expensive, I’d probably try for it, because being able to look exactly how you _want_ to look is worth a lot of happiness, I think. Still, it’d have to be pretty affordable for me to actually be able to do it. ---
**Author:** ![Nawth\_Chucka](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/c57346/32.png) [@Nawth\_Chucka](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Nawth_Chucka)\ **Post date:** [January 2, 2019, 4:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/78 "2019-01-02T16:49:59Z")
> [@nearwildheaven](#): > > People should ONLY do cosmetic plastic surgery because THEY want it. Most ethical plastic surgeons will reject someone who, for instance, thinks he’ll get a promotion if he gets a hair transplant, or a woman who thinks her husband will stop drinking if she gets breast implants, that kind of thing. > > My aunt, who has since died, had a facelift because SHE wanted to have a facelift, and while she looked fine before, the surgeon did an excellent job. Then we must have unethical cosmetic surgeons here in Utah; you should see the billboards for vaginal rejuvenation, they concentrate on fixing what childbirth has ruined (and they do NOT concentrate on continence). ---
**Author:** ![nearwildheaven](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/n/90db22/32.png) [@nearwildheaven](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/nearwildheaven)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2019, 12:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/79 "2019-01-03T00:12:17Z")
> [@Nawth\_Chucka](#): > > Then we must have unethical cosmetic surgeons here in Utah; you should see the billboards for vaginal rejuvenation, they concentrate on fixing what childbirth has ruined (and they do NOT concentrate on continence). :eek: I’ve NEVER seen anything like that out here in the Midwest! I’ve heard of “mommy makeovers” where a woman has a breast augmentation (bigger, smaller, or lifted), tummy tuck, and a vaginoplasty, which incurred the ire of gynecologists, which are probably the most territorial surgeons on earth. Is it all those Mormon women wanting to undo the damage they got from having all those babies? 😕 A while back, I heard about women having their genitalia altered so they would look like this or that porn star’s. Um, really? My reaction to that was, “Some women have too much money and free time.” When I worked at the hospital, it was not uncommon to see, on an OB order set, that “specimens removed” listed baby, placenta, and vulvar mole. This isn’t the same thing. ---
**Author:** ![Haldurson](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/51bf81/32.png) [@Haldurson](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Haldurson)\ **Post date:** [January 3, 2019, 9:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984/80 "2019-01-03T09:54:44Z")
I have been focusing on self-improvement for a few years now, and am doing pretty well, making a lot of progress. It’s a never-ending battle, actually. But even if all of those things that I’ve been working on were perfect, I still think that I’d have much more important priorities than plastic surgery. And btw, I’m gradually going bald and working on that would be both easier and less expensive. And even that doesn’t make the cut for things on my to-do list. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/im-gonna-assume-you-are-physically-plain-imperfect-or-outright-homely/826984.md?page=5)