Plastically Perfect

In a sea of stories about celebrities disfiguring themselves with surgical procedures designed to reduce, realign and resurrect, Heidi Montag’s stood out to me.

The Hill is one of my many guilty pleasure shows (naturally, I stopped watching after LC left. Duh!) and, like the rest of the viewership, I was not a fan of Heidi. She is portrayed as the most gullible, starry-eyed, platinum-headed collection of cells (even by LA standards), but one always felt that she was probably alright deep down.

I can’t explain why this before-and-after effected me so much, perhaps because her already-fake figure was, even then, starting to look unrealistic, or perhaps it’s the super-stretched, non-expression in the 'after' shot, like a bemused Fembot whose hard drive has crashed. Either way, it seems to represent to me the worst thing about a society that is able to morph its physique to attempt to achieve ‘perfection’.

Of course, it’s not surprising that in a world which holds this as the gold standard of aesthetic perfection…

…that people are always, and WILL ALWAYS, be dissatisfied with their bodies, but there is so much sadness in the decision to ‘perfect’ oneself this way.

Heidi might want to be Barbie, but if we can train ourselves not to respond positively to these ‘transformation’ stories, and rather be content to going to the gym more often, or buying new lipstick, then maybe we can halt mentality that unless Hugh Hefner wants to fall asleep on top of you you’re somehow wrong.