Ok folks, I wasn’t gonna do it, but after receiving some provoking messages after a tweet I sent out about Heidi Montag, I’m doing it. Let’s start talking: is plastic surgery good for your career?
We’ve all heard it before: good looking people are more likely to be hired and more likely to get higher salaries. I must admit, I would probably choose to hire someone who manages their appearance over someone who does not if given the choice. If the candidate can’t manage their appearance, how are they going to manage their job?
Back to Ms. Montag…
10- TEN- procedures in one day! US News & World Report (can you believe Heidi made this publication?!) reports that Dr. Frank Ryan performed the following procedures (which took 10 hours) on 23 year old Heidi: mini-lift of the brow, Botox in the forehead, nose job revision, fat injections in cheeks and lips, chin reduction, neck liposuction, ears pinned back, breast augmentation revision, liposuction on waist and thighs, and a buttocks augmentation. For those of you who didn’t know, Heidi had a nose job and a boob job 3 years ago.
The scary part is that the Dr. says everyone in Hollywood is doing the same thing Heidi did, but no one talks about it.
Ok, so there are several scary parts, bear with me…
Scary part #2- Heidi thinks that she needed this surgery to have the look of a popstar and that’s just “what people do in my industry.” The People magazine article quoted Heidi saying that she is competing with people like Brittney Spears while she was in her hey day. (Yeah but to our knowledge Brittney Spears was a wholesome, southern belle with talent, unlike you Heidi).
Scary part #3- She also tells Robin Roberts she hopes to get her own Barbie someday and seems flattered when Robin almost slipped and called her a Barbie…
Scary part #4- Her new album is called “Superficial,” (sorry, I refuse to link to it here) and she timed the announcement of all this surgery right as her album dropped. PR stunt anyone?
Scary part #5- Heidi really believes that this surgery will advance her career to fame and fortune.
How far would you go to advance your career? Do you believe that looks can advance someones career in industries outside of Hollywood?
Any one want to predict how long it will be before Heidi gets her next surgery? Or worse, what she will look like by 35?
Have you listened to her album? I did. It sounds like a copy cat of Brittney Spears but way worse and soooo digitized. I guess that explains why she wouldn’t sing in the Good Morning America interview..
I think that depending on your looks might help you land a job but keeping it and avoiding a sexual harassment suit is a whole different story.
Please let us know what you think about using plastic surgery as a way of advancing your career!
{ 7 comments… read them below or add one }
This is such a good post. EVERYONE is talking about Heidi. She is out of control and making a fool of herself. She needs professional help! She is going to look like Michael Jackson by the time she is 35.
As bad as it sounds, I think I’d be more likely to give her album a chance if I just thought she was magically looking great and bustier in her picture (rather than knowing that she got 10 procedures in 1 day!).
Part of the Hollywood allure is that we think these people are so unattainable and so naturally beautiful…her being so public has shattered that dream and shattered my view of her as well.
Heidi looks ridic and seems to no longer be capable of facial expressions! She’s in denial of reality- she will never make it as a popstar no matter how many surgeries she gets because she lacks talent! She’s wasting her money. I wouldn’t get plastic surgery to advance my career because looks mean nothing in my field. Thankfully I don’t feel the pressure although I would consider something after having childrenn yet that would be purely for my personal satisfaction and not society’s.
Yeah I kept looking at the pics thinking- wow barely being able to move for 2 months, 10 hours of surgery, and HONESTLY she doesn’t look THAT different after all that money and time she wasted.
So to your point- no, surgeries cannot change who you are as a person, nor your talent or make your career. It’s way bigger than that. Especially in today’s online world/transparent society- we knew who Heidi was before all this came out. People do business with people, not with plastic barbie dolls who don’t stand for much.
Bravo Nicole for shedding some light on this. They say that any PR is good PR…in the case of Heidi Montag, this PR has made a case for Plastic Surgery and the mental state of Young Adults who continue to struggle with their need to fit into modern day society. Not unfamiliar territory. We could all write a thesis about body image and self esteem-Heidi’s case is no different than thousands of girls around the world. Who wouldn’t want to get some neck fat reduced or their thunder thighs trimmed down? We’ve all thought about how we could be a better version of ourselves, but she was “ambitious” enough to go ahead and blow her money on 10 procedures and create a media frenzy…right as she released her latest CD. Wait. What album? Who has time to listen to her music when there are graphic and invasive pictures splashed in Gawker and People Magazine?
Just asking…whatever happened to the good ol’ days of music when publicizing an album meant hooking up with actors/models/stepchildren/backup singers and generating cringeworthy headlines? Madonna would never speak about any work she had done when releasing an album-she just hooks up with models her daughter’s age. Let me go one step further on that point-what about producing an album that’s about the music and selling copies because it is genuinely enjoyable and speaks to the people? Clearly, Heidi could not accomplish either.
I have a feeling that deep down inside, just like her body is far from perfect, the Barbie girl wannabe’s album is too. That’s right. I haven’t even tired to put some effort to listen to it. But I did manage to shake my head in disbelief at the disturbing photographs in the People cover story and pat myself on the back for not torturing my body or bank account for the sake of plastic perfection.
And if we DID know about all the work Madonna had done, would we think of her differently? I think so. In the cases of mass-plastic surgery, I say it’s best to keep it to yourself. Small improvements, fine- re-doing your whole body- please spare us the details.
I want to think celebrities got their glam from an amazing personal trainer and a great makeup artist. Why? Because then it’s attainable for the average person. Also, if I’m going to buy someone’s stuff I want to think there is more to her than looks- maybe I’m weird?
I think Heidi just ruined her career doing what she thought would make it. Anyone who buys her album will be thinking, “hmm what plastic surgery am I financing next?”
When you think about it, Heidi is indirectly telling us about the irony – or perhaps sad reality – of Hollywood. What Hollywood wants is an unattainable ideal: immortal physical beauty. What Heidi doesn’t realize is that it doesn’t matter if you’re a living Aphrodite or Adonis; if there’s no substance behind the shell, that’s all you are.
Maybe it’s a reflection of what really amounts to poor self-image on Heidi’s part. She thinks all she has is her body. If you think like that, whether it’s 10 or 20 procedures, you’ll go at any length to main the thing that you think makes your identity.