Extreme facial reshaping- cultural trend or freaky sideshow act?
Plastic surgery trends are strongly influenced by cultural standards of beauty. Nowhere is this more apparent right now than in East Asia, where extreme facial sculpting is gaining popularity.
Women are lining up at plastic surgeons’ offices to have “V-Line” surgery in an effort to create a triangular doll-like face. While this kind of facial reshaping is rare in the rest of the world, it is commonplace in Asia. To be fair, some of the women start with fairly masculine jaws that actually benefit from a feminizing reduction. But, in my opinion, many of them are taking a natural variation in facial shape and turning it into something distinctly un-natural.
Take this South Korean reporter (click here for more images).
Before surgery, she had a full, heart-shaped face with lovely proportions. I think most people would agree that she was beautiful. After her extreme mandibular shave, her absurdly sharp chin unambiguously gives away its surgical origins. She looks cartoonish and a little freaky, especially in the photo where she doesn’t have full hair & makeup.
Obviously my opinion of this trend is shaped by own cultural bias, which favors Western beauty ideals. I’m sure that some of our routine procedures wouldn’t gain traction in other parts of the world. For example, the breast augmentation patient I saw yesterday might not notice her small breasts if she lived in Korea or Japan. Then again, she might come in demanding to have her face turned into an octagon. Maybe her jaw would end up in this crazy clinic’s thousand bone tower displayed for all the world to see.
