Why are there too many plastic surgery procedure in South Korea? | Korean Celebrities Plastic Surgery | Forum

ames3j said
From my (undoubtedly limited) understanding of Korean culture, beauty is seen as both an important quality and something that can be 'achieved'. In most Western cultures, various qualities can be considered attractive on different people. While some people may have a 'preference' (e.g. they like green eyes more than blue eyes), all eye colours have the POTENTIAL to be considered gorgeous, all hair colours, all skin colours, different nose shapes, etc. However, unlike these Western countries, Koreans have a singular idea of what is beautiful: large eyes, small yet high-bridged nose, v-line jaw, small face, double eyelids, etc. There is one standard of beauty which most people strive to obtain.

But Koreans aren't born looking identical. Just like in the rest of the world, Koreans are born unique, and some people may have small faces but large noses while others may have monolids but a square jaw, and so on. There is no single 'solution' that could apply to every person's perceived 'problem'.

Enter plastic surgery!

Personally, I think that Koreans are interested in self-improvement in all areas of their lives, and indeed it could be considered to be part of their national identity (go research how they went from a 3rd-world country to a global leader in the fields of technology, fashion, music, and more in just a couple of decades!). This extends to their physical appearance, and so surgeons began offering their services on the basis of individual customers' needs. (Note also that Koreans believe being beautiful increases your chances of getting a job and getting a husband or wife.) As the popularity of surgery increased, more clinics came into existence to take advantage of the booming industry. Some clinics chose to specialise in just one area of the body (e.g. nose), while others decided to employ enough skilled surgeons to cater to all potential clients. Fast forward to the present day, and you have hundreds of clinics in Seoul alone declaring that they can transform you into a classically beautiful Korean.

Wow, that turned into a long post. The short answer to your question is that it's because Koreans naturally have different facial features, and in order to fit the one-and-only idea of 'beautiful' they will each need a different procedure.

I would love to hear a Korean individual's response to this! But in the meantime, I hope this helped :)

Your explanation was awesome and I agree 100% :)

Mitchie said
For me to have plastic surgery is a matter of choice but I still don't get the reason why there are so much procedures in korea 

I think Koreans are really really obsessed with their appearance. According my friends in Korea, women would wear heavy makeup even they're just going to the market. Some guys would wear makeup too. And Koreans love mirrors, they can't stop checking how they look all the time, with anything can be used as a mirror, like window glass, or even a spoon.

I guess that's why a lot of Koreans want to improve their look with plastic surgery.