So, I was pondering how I would maintain a youthful look as I approach my late 30s/40s, and it occurred to me that the only problem I would have with getting breast implants or botox (well done subtle botox that tightens my skin rather than making me look like I have a plastered on smile) or any other kind of surgical beauty enhancement would be the judgmental attitudes of friends and family. I know that in general society thinks of breast implants or plastic surgery in general as shallow and superficial. I can’t say that I understand why, though, any more so than applying make-up or coloring one’s hair. Is it the relative danger of cosmetic surgery as opposed to other beauty-enhancing techniques? The cost? What? I say that if it makes you feel more attractive and better about yourself, do it and there should be no reason for others to judge you.
So Dopers, do you judge people who have had plastic surgery? Do you consider it excessively vain? And if so, why?
A good question. I’ve pondered surgical improvements, and I usually conclude the best thing for me to do is face aging with The Proper Attitude. I think it would feel a bit like failure if I gave in and had them cut me. Why? I haven’t quite puzzled that out yet.
I would think less of them if they didn’t want to do it and felt forced by a husband or boyfriend, but if you want them for yourself than more power to you.
I wouldn’t necessarily think less of the person, but unless the boob job were done to repair appearance after disease or deformation, I’d think less of her boobs.
I hate hate hate the look and feel of fake breasts to the point that when I was single it was a sexual deal breaker for me. Just yuck.
I’ve always said I don’t care what breasts look like as long as there are two and they’re home grown.
“well done subtle botox that tightens my skin rather than making me look like I have a plastered on smile”
Bear in mind that’s probably what all the people with the plastered-on smiles were looking for, too…
I wouldn’t think any less of somebody who had some work done as part of a whole regime of maintaining healthy and young looks. If somebody who let themselves otherwise go downhill got a boob job, or botox, or whatever, that’s not such a good thing. It’s like guys who have never taken care of their skin, so it’s old and wrinkled and leathery, but they use the Grecian Formula religiously and as a result they’ve got 40-year-old hair over a 60-year-old face…
To each her own and all that, but yeah, I’d think less of someone who’d gotten fake boobs. I’ve got a friend who’s on the verge of plastic surgery addiction. In her teens it was just diet pills and bleaching/straightening her hair. Now she’s slowly turning herself into a Pam Anderson clone. But she’s currently living somewhere where fake tits are as common as fake tans. I just can’t get inside the mind of someone who’d get to that point where they need them to feel better about themselves.
I’ve thought about why I find it unsettling when, say, nose jobs are lower down on the list. Maybe it’s because you’d be inserting foreign objects into your body (not that I have a problem with a fake hip or pacemaker…). Or that they rarely, rarely look good. Or that I’d have serious doubts about being in a relationship with a man who liked fake breasts.
I think part of it is the scale of things. Surgery is a major undertaking with potentially fatal side effects. Eyeshadow isn’t.
Another is the “fun” factor. Makeup and hair are fun. Even if I lived completely alone, I’d still want to do my make up and hair now and then. But having bags of chemicals sewn into me? Not really very fun. Indeed, kind of Frankenstein-ish.
I’d think a little less of someone who had implants. The idea just seems kind of gross to me. I can’t imagine sewing foreign objects unless it was a lifesaving kind of thing.
Eh, your money, your business. shrug
I did come here, however, to tell a short story-lette.
A friend-of-a-friend, when in her late teens, was pretty much coerced into having breast implants by her own mother, who told her that no man would ever be interrested in her unless she wasn’t so flat-chested (she wasn’t. Loving family, ain’t it?)
She had the surgery. Years later she joined the SCA and wanted to fight, but was worried about rupturing. It took a group of people to come up with a ‘good’ armor design for her.
Last I’d heard, a year or two back she had surgery to remove the implants. Gotta be weird body-image foo with that, no?
Pretty much this. I have a relative via marriage with a boob job and when I see her in her tight fitting outfits, I just think “Huh… fake boobs”. They fail to have any attraction to me at all. Of course, she’s no one whose boobs I should be considering in detail anyway but you can’t help but ponder it since the word on the street is that guys fall all over her.
I don’t really think poorly of her but she could be wearing two styrofoam balls pinned to her shirt for all that her knockers impress me.
How would a boob job help maintain a youthful appearance? I’m thinking of a photo someone sent me of an old woman in a bikini. She was probably in her 70’s, skin tanned to leather, and every part of her body looked aged, except for those fake boobs. It was grotesque. Your whole body will age, not just your boobs.
Boobs would be the last thing I’d have done. I’d love to get rid of my jowls though.
If it makes you truly (and doesn’t lead to insecurity which feeds the need for more plastic surgery) feel better about yourself, and you’re solely doing for yourself, then I don’t see why not.
I don’t think less of women who have boob jobs, I feel an enormous amount of pity. I don’t know what else can I think about someone who would intentionally place potentially dangerous objects into their body in order to “feel better” about their standing in the never-ending race to remain attractive, which, in a patriarchal society means fulfilling hetero male-dictated and socially/media-reinforced notions of worth being directly tied to physical looks.
Subvert the paradigm. Shake off the power structure. Embrace your body. Love yourself.
I wouldn’t think less of you, I’d think less of your boobs. They just don’t look as good. But do what makes you feel better. Forget what everyone else thinks.
An ex-girlfriend of mine got a boob job a couple years ago. She was a real looker in her 30’s but now she’s in her 40’s and I think the sagging was getting to her. If it was up to me I’d say she didn’t need it, but she really lucked out and it’s a great boob job. Now I’ve just gotta work on trying them out, I think she’s game.
Ladies, no matter how many times we try to tell you, the majority of reasonable thinking men would prefer small ones that are real over big ones that are fake. Of course I have no official cite for this.
Particularly since the fakes ones stand up so unrealistically and practically scream: “I got a oob job!” you’re not fooling anyone.
As for the guys who disagree, anyone who wants his woman for nothing more than a pair of tits usually winds up with just that.
Donatella Versace (WORKPLACE WARNING: women in bikini tops) (YOUNGSTER WARNING: wrinkly woman in bikini top) is kind of a walking ad for why this is a mistake in this photo. She’s 53, apparently. She’s seemingly wearing someone else’s lips and breasts and hasn’t taken particular care of anything else.
The last woman I was intimate with was 50, and she looked about a thousand times better than Ms. V. I think she looked great despite whatever amount of sagging or wrinkling there may have been; that’s just the way it is. Fake breasts are like plastic sushi – for display purposes only. It’s a rather minor consideration of whether or not they’d look better in a tube top from ten feet away, or get more hoots when appearing on a Girls Gone Wild video, when she’s in bed with you. So, yeah, I guess I would consider implants excessively vain because they sort of wreck what it is they’re trying to be. I would assume this is not the case with a breast lift, but I’m not really that informed.
I’d love some kind of stats about what percentage of face lifts or Botox jobs look fake – obviously not all of them, but there are so many famous and wealthy people walking around with frozen faces that it would seems to be pretty high. Personally, I’m confused as to why the obvious face lift look is preferable to just being a little wrinkly. Limit the sun damage (see the photo above) and you’ll still look good.
Let’s bear in mind she didn’t say she’d be getting a boob job so she could have larger breasts, it was so she could have more youthful-looking ones. My assumption at that point was to make them less saggy rather than larger, and that in general she’d be going for subtle restorative surgeries rather than obvious augmentative ones.
