Are Some Mums More Beautiful Than Others?

StarMag

By DAPHNE LEE

Tots to Teens

A MEMBER of an online children’s lit discussion group I belong to recently highlighted a vanity press publication called My Beautiful Mommy. She had written to The Boston Globe criticising an opinion piece the newspaper had run.

In the piece (www.boston.com/bostonglobe/editorial_opinion/oped/articles/2008/05/15/the_mother_of_perfection), the writer, Abigail Jones (co-author of Restless Virgins: Love, Sex, and Survival at a New England Prep School) talks about how more and more women, including mothers, are turning to plastic surgery and implies that this situation has given rise to the need for books like My Beautiful Mommy.

The letter, written by Rebecca Rabinowitz in response to this piece, points out the book’s dubious message, as well as the fact that My Beautiful Mommy is a vanity publication – it’s arguable that the book might not have seen the light of day had it not taken the vanity press route to the bookstores.

I doubt we’ll see the book in Malaysian chains but it’s there on amazon.com if you’re curious.

Oh, by the way, in case you haven’t guessed, My Beautiful Mommy discusses plastic surgery and is supposed to (from Amazon.com) “help patients explain their transformation to their children.”

The cover shows a new, improved mum sporting long, glossy locks, a button nose, large eyes (presumably double-lidded), perky breasts, tiny waist, flat tummy and curvy hips. Good lord ... she’s ... why, she’s beautiful!

So, what was she before the surgery? Less beautiful? Not too bad? Perfectly hideous?

The book implies that beauty is simply about attaining the desired physical measurements and dimensions.

In fact, should beauty be something that we even attempt to measure in such exact terms? Or even at all?

Kids do say things like “My mum is the most beautiful in the world!” but the lucky recipients of such an accolade have earned their children’s praise simply by being loving, caring mothers. It’s not based on a tick-box survey that the kids have done: Good teeth, check! Good for cash handouts, check! Shapely legs: check! Doesn’t nag, check! Smooth skin, check!

It really gives me the willies that there should exist a children’s picture book that promotes plastic surgery.

The author, Dr Michael Salzhauer, is a plastic surgeon with a practice in Miami, Florida. The surgery’s website has a link to another site, devoted solely to the book, which is described as a “must-have for any mother with young children considering plastic surgery”.

Hmmm ... that sentence makes it sound like the young children are the ones who are considering plastic surgery and I suppose it’s entirely possible that the children of parents who choose to be “improved upon” surgically might grow up to see it as quite a normal and even routine life option.

Whatever next? Perhaps a book called How We Got Rich Quick about daddy’s adventures as a traffic cop?

The problem with vanity presses is that they will publish anything for a fee. So, yes, you could fork out to see your guide to shoplifting laid out on fine paper and bound in gold-tooled leather!

It just seems particularly odious that any company should publish a children’s book that might cause damage to a child’s self-esteem.

Of course, just having a mother who plans to have surgery in order to look better (and so, presumably, feel better) is already potentially problematic.

The product description on Amazon says: “Undergoing a plastic surgery procedure can be an exciting and stressful time for you and your family. After you’ve picked a board-certified plastic surgeon and a surgery date, take a few minutes to read through this book with your child. This book will make your plastic surgery experience more understandable to your little ones.”

It goes on to assure parents that “If you follow this advice, you will be able to calm your children’s fears, address their concerns, and help your family to sail easily through the plastic surgery experience.”

I won’t insult my readers’ intelligence by commenting on the above. But I’d like to suggest to the good doctor that he might like to write another book in which a mum who’s made herself “beautiful” through surgery explains to her little ones why they shouldn’t do the same. Or maybe why they should!