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Post by En on Nov 13, 2003 17:20:09 GMT -5
*looks rather flattered* Wow, and I didn't even tell you about the girl who got her tongue ring ripped out through the front of her mouth during a car accident.
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Post by Nie on Nov 13, 2003 19:23:46 GMT -5
Heh, piercing is now becoming much more mainstream and people are looking for more extreme ways of body decoration. This is a rather thourough glossary of all the different piercings one can get and a few other means of body decoration have been thrown in as well. I'll just put the link here cos there are some rather graphical references in the descriptions.
And you can go here for a recount of one guy's experience of tongue splitting.
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Post by KoNeko on Nov 14, 2003 0:27:47 GMT -5
Hmmm, oh, I was watching some really quality TV like Guiness primetime or something and there's this guy who thinks he's a tiger (no, no relation, really ) and he got tiger stripes all tattooed over his body and got his teeth capped with longer canines and had plastic surgery to alter the shape of his face to look more feline- like, they split the skin between his nose and top lip, like how cats have that in between bit, and they pulled up the skin around his eyes so they looked more slanted. Then, he went and got whiskers done- basically, 10 madonna piercings (like, the ones around your top lip) with screws on the outside so they could screw in fibre-optic whiskers, and he wants an animatronic tail surgically attached to his backbone!
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Ceridwen
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Post by Ceridwen on Nov 14, 2003 4:33:04 GMT -5
Urg, yeah, I've seen a picture of that guy. I think it's on a site called www.anomalies-unlimited.com, under 'Plastic Surgery for the Mentally Impaired', or something. It's quite a good site, if you're bored. That guy really, really needs his head read. As does that woman who's made herself look like a lion? Creepy...
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Post by En on Nov 14, 2003 15:56:14 GMT -5
I don't know that I wouldn't do full-body art like that -- I mean, it's not like I have kids who will be too embarrassed to speak to me, and not like I'd date anyone who isn't already okay with me being transgendered and therefore not having a traditional body image -- but I would draw the line at those whiskers, definitely, and -- it's the spirituality behind the thing that I find rather, well, suspect. As the writer on that site points out, umm, there aren't any tigers on North America....
There's already a running joke about how easy it would be to give me elfin ears (the cartilage breaks in the same place on both sides, so that all a surgeon would have to do would be to tighten the skin on one side of my ear, and presto, elf). I've honestly thought about going ahead with it if I ever had the money to burn; it would just sort of -- visually symbolise the person I feel like I am. Devoted to wisdom and beauty, and not quite "normal." Then I'd grow my hair long enough that nobody would ever notice unless they saw me in a wind or I pushed my hair behind my ear. That would suit me. There, but not obvious.
But to become a tiger... that's a bit farther down the road than I'm willing to go. I mean, check out those incisors. Girls, would you kiss that?
I didn't think so. I'll keep my teeth normal then.
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Post by Nie on Nov 14, 2003 19:20:48 GMT -5
While we're on the subject, there is some woman who has been going through masses of plastic surgery to look like the Egyptian Queen, Cleopatra. She seriously thinks she is her reincarnate. I spose it's not as extream, because it's person she's changing her looks to be like, but still... What happened to just being yourself?
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Calantha
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Post by Calantha on Nov 14, 2003 21:33:32 GMT -5
A tiger? I have enough problems with freckles, I don't think I would ever tatoo myself with spots or strips.
I've got a friend who'd like to become an elf so I bought her pointed ear pieces to put on with spirit gum that match her skin tone...look quite realistic. They also had spock ears which I bought for another friend who loves Spock.
Hmm...I don't know. Maybe it's more exciting to be someone else...or maybe they're unhappy and they don't want to find the problem and accept it or try to fix it so they figure changing themselves is the easiest way around it all...
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Post by En on Nov 16, 2003 14:30:04 GMT -5
Possible; but I don't think there's anything wrong with the idea of the body as a canvas for art. I mean, that's what clothes are all about, right? Piercings, tattoos and body modification are just another (more dangerous and permanent) way of expressing oneself.
Pity so many people use that to try to express an ugly self (like, the Barbie lady and people who get their lower ribs removed to look thinner), and pity more people don't take them aside and say, hey, you look like crap, are you doing okay?
But I do think that it gets to be a problem when one's acts of self-modification cause harm, e.g., that girl's tongue piercing ripping out, my ear piercing freezing, Michael Jackson's nose dying, etc.
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MagPie
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Post by MagPie on Nov 16, 2003 21:18:58 GMT -5
You can all feel free to totally shoot me down on this one, but does anyone think that maybe it's possible that the people who go a little overboard--and I don't just mean the aforementioned tiger person, Barbie woman, etc.--are engaging in some attention seeking behavior? Listen, I'm all in favour of self-expression through this medium, but where is the line drawn between doing it for yourself and doing it for attention and/or shock value?
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Ceridwen
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Post by Ceridwen on Nov 17, 2003 4:39:31 GMT -5
Yeah, I totally agree. There has to be a whole 'attention-seeking' drive behind extreme plastic surgery - I mean, that man who wants to look like a cat - he must be doing it so that he can say 'I am the only person on earth to look like this'. It's a pity he doesn't realise that he's the only person on earth to look like he does, anyway, because we're all unique. However, people who have ordinary plastic surgery (and I admit that the concept of 'ordinary' plastic surgery is completely subjective) - I can't place those people in the same category. I just think they're vain, and rather sad. I think plastic surgery is of immense help to those who have been injured, or who may be in some way 'deformed' (I can't think of a better word - I'm not trying to be offensive) but is an utter waste of time otherwise, and that a naturally aged human being is far more beautiful than a botoxed, facelifted human being. I'm not too sure whether surgery, etc., is a way to express oneself, as much as it is a cry of extreme dissatisfaction with oneself. It actually upsets me to hear perfectly lovely people say 'I was so ugly before; look at me now. Five years of painful operations and thousands of dollars/pounds/euro later, and I look the way I always wanted' - and they look like the same scared person as before, just looking out from a weird, immobile face.
Just my thoughts. Perfectly rambling, as ever.
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Post by En on Nov 17, 2003 11:54:22 GMT -5
Weeellll... I also feel sad when I think of how many interesting human faces have been lost under the heavy hand of pop culture, but I guess... if they're seeking attention, it's probably to correct a lack of attention they suffered before... a case of the pendulum swinging the other way. So I'd suggest that the way to get people to stop doing destructive things for attention is to give them attention in the first place... but we can't catch them all, I guess.
Mneh. What's that quote... I think it was Ed Abbey... "If we had made these convicts feel wanted before, would they be WANTED now?"
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MagPie
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Post by MagPie on Nov 17, 2003 17:38:56 GMT -5
Ooh, that's a good quote! Yes, I agree with En about the pendulum swinging the other way. A lot of what I do IRL deals with kids who engage in various types of attention-seeking behavior, and A LOT of them seek negative attention because it's the only kind they got at home and they don't even know the difference anymore. It's very hard to kind of change their hardwiring. So it's a tough job, but someone's got to do it....
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Ceridwen
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Post by Ceridwen on Nov 18, 2003 9:07:24 GMT -5
Wow, you know, I never thought of that. It's such a sad world, then, if people really feel they can generate enough positive attention to make themselves feel good and fulfilled by changing their appearance, sometimes grotesquely. But MagPie - I really admire your work, and I hope that you get through to as many kids as possible. It must be so hard, though... Do you know - I read something a while back that made me really afraid. There's some place in South America (don't ask me where, I don't have a clue, but I think it may be Brazil) where a doctor performs all manner of plastic surgery for free, so that young women can conform to the 'perfect body' image, and young men can emulate their sporting or acting heroes by being the typically atypical musclebound hero. Apparently, there's such pressure down there for the perfect body, that this doctor believes he's performing a vital public service, and that these people would go crazy without surgery. I mean... am I the mad one here?
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Post by En on Nov 18, 2003 9:44:09 GMT -5
*nods* Three cheers for MagPie... that is admirable work, all the more so because it is so difficult... negative attention can be as addictive as a drug.
*shudders* I have heard something like that... also saw a fellow being interviewed on television once (back in the days when I didn't compulsively shut the thing off in disgust ) about how he'd given his own daughter a nose job "because it's the least a parent can do, to help his child's self-confidence." That's pretty near vomit-inducing, right there. Can't you try, say, loving the child and teaching her to look for healthy kinds of love?
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MagPie
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Post by MagPie on Nov 18, 2003 17:47:10 GMT -5
*blushes* Aw, thanks guys Well I wouldn't be surprised if it was Brazil where this happened...after all, aren't they the geniuses who came up with thongs, which in turn resulted in the Brazilian bikini wax? As for the father...do you mean HE did the nose job, or paid for one? The paying for them is actually frighteningly common in my area. As is the sight of a 12 year old girl carrying a REAL Coach bag in school or wearing loads of Tiffany's jewelry. Again, let's try the loving them thing instead. And also, what are they going to have to get as they get older to match and surpass the gifts they're getting now???
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