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labiaplasty
That’s right, labiaplasty.
Labiaplasty (sometimes spelled labioplasty) is a plastic surgery procedure involving the labia, any of four folds of tissue of the vulva (female external genitalia).
Jeanine Plant’s latest in the American Prospect Online:
Levine came up with the idea for her social experiment during the Christmas season of 2003. She had maxed out her credit card and questioned the national pastime that promised national security, family, friendship and spirituality. A few months into the experiment, she pays off her $7,000 credit card bill, yet remains ambivalent. She comes to recognize that much of her social identity — whether it be taking in a film or skiing in Vermont — revolves around consumption. To be sure, going a full year without shopping creates some socially awkward situations. She recounts a painfully self-conscious conversation about accepting a friend’s movie invitation. And Levine admits that this kind of behavior is only acceptable because she is a writer who happened to be working on a book about not buying stuff.
From aesthetic and ascetic extremes, both books prove the patently obvious truth that consumerism is a fundamental part of our way of life. For many people, what they buy is their sole mode of expression — most people are not writers, artists, or pundits. Even writers, these books show, are loath to forgo this outlet. For others who take in the theater or rearrange their faces regularly, consuming makes them feel like they have accomplished something. Kuczynski describes some women in New York or Los Angeles, usually wives of very wealthy men, whose lives revolve around nothing more than self-maintenance. In Los Angeles, for instance, women “live with this notion that it is all about looks.” And then “they wake up one day and realize they are nothing but a shell of skin.”
I thought Plant’s contrast between Levine and Kuczynski’s new books would serve as a good follow on to Tuesday’s post. I’ve touched on this topic before, but the author’s observations say it all:
“We want to be wanted — by our husbands, by our lovers,” Kuczynski writes, as if to mean these men won’t love these women unless they have a D-cup. Some of the women Kuczynski writes about have taken their habit to such an extreme that they get labiaplasty.
Indeed, that pretty much says it all about our hollow fucking lives as American Consumers. It’s not just empty calories we are consuming, it’s empty lives we are leading. When the free market dictates that industrial megafarms can choke out the small local farmer, and farmer’s markets dry up (a good example of where Government intervention could apply, busker) as an alternative source for healthy food for families using food stamps or WIC, the faults of the free market absolutism become apparent.
See also: Capitalism With a Heart
9 Responses to “labiaplasty”
Fred, you misunderstood me. When I said the problems of nutrition and obesity don’t have “a regulatory solution”, I meant on the consumer end, as in we can’t regulate what or how much people eat.
The need to protect independant farmers from pressure to adopt factory farming processes or be crushed, so that people will still have good food to choose from, is a different issue and one where we’re in complete agreement.
And labiaplasty is an excellent example consumerism gone mad, yes.
But if you’ve got a nasty roast beef pussy, you’ve just GOT to do something, right?
self-esteem and all that junk.
crazies and their plastique surgery. bah.
Lol- “nasty roast beef pussy.” nice. You should work in Arby’s marketing department.
“I would like a big and nasty roast beef pussy and can you add a slice of swiss cheese on that?”
“yes, for fifty cents extra sir.”
“Thanks.”
ha. yes, we are consuming whores.
“Nasty roast beef pussy”…thanks for the vivid imagery for my early Friday morning.
I heard about this procedure from that horrid TV show Dr. 90210. A couple was going in for plastic surgery - the girl was getting labiaplasty and the guy was getting his hanging scrotum altered. That’s about as shallow as you can get.
From aesthetic and ascetic extremes, both books prove the patently obvious truth that consumerism is a fundamental part of our way of life. For many people, what they buy is their sole mode of expression — most people are not writers, artists, or pundits.
One of the main aesthetics of consumerist ideology is rebellion. Purchasing superfluous goods and services has become an act of self-expression, even dissent. The values of individualism and anarchy have become co-opted by the capitalist system. Choosing a particular beer or car manufacturer is now a mini-revolution. Just notice how the values of the sixties are used to sell products.
“When the free market dictates that industrial megafarms can choke out the small local farmer, and farmer’s markets dry up (a good example of where Government intervention could apply, busker) as an alternative source for healthy food for families using food stamps or WIC, the faults of the free market absolutism become apparent.”
I think you have to take a look a the government policies that support factory farming. Subsidies are there to prop up the big boys(campaign donors). The small farms are now under threat of the National Animal Idendification System. There is no sign of a free market here; you cannot blame a free market system that is not allowed to work.
OH! My ears…my ears! Did I want to know that? I didn’t need to know that!
Interesting point Mike. You bring up a big question about whether or not any of the markets in America or anywhere else are actually “free”. From what I understand, various international groups have been trying to encourage the US and some EU countries to drop their farm subsidies because of the unfair position in which it places other 3rd world, primarily agrarian economies. However, this question of the actual free-ness of the farm market is not an isolated situation.
From giant subsidies to Big Oil during their most profitable phase ever, to preventing the collective purchasing power of the Medicare system to negotiate lower drug prices, to the protectionist measure of the Republicans in the pocket of pharma-interests blocking cheap drug imports shipped from Canada, to the even more extreme measure of confiscating drugs being brought across the border by individuals who went there to purchase them, there are many facets of our markets that are considerably less than “free” and “open”.
However, the problem arises when large portions of the general populace take “free market capitalism” on as a type of religion, in that they do not understand what it is they advocate. They simply parrot what they are told by groups like the Cato institute or Brookings or the WSJ without understanding that those groups exist to convince them of a position that may not necessarily be in their best interests. The think tanks have the interests of their financial backers at heart, not the public. The financial backers of the think tanks, and therefore the thinkers themselves profit at the expense of our collective ignorance.
Until we as a country understand that markets cannot be “free” in the sense we have come to understand the word, we will not move to a point where we are able to talk with large companies openly and honestly about their social obligations to responsibly provide their services, even at the expense of their profit margins.
Absolutely wonderful posts you have had the last couple of days.
You nailed it with this comment:
“Indeed, that pretty much says it all about our hollow fucking lives as American Consumers. It’s not just empty calories we are consuming, it’s empty lives we are leading”
I could not agree more.
I saw that program about the husband and wife that had the labia reconstruction…and the scrotum fix. I thought it an icky thing to do…but apparentlyu he was rather freakish in the area…in fact the doctor said he’d not experienced this guys needs before. My feelings are this…sometimes you have to walk in their shoes if they really are feelings freakishly ugly and can pay for…let them knock themselves out. I think there are more shallow things than this. I’m just trying to give them a little understanding…I know I’m never comfortable wagging my inner workings to the public…we can’t all be Britney Spears getting out of the car. Heh heh!