One in five women aged 19-49 living in Korea are reported to have gone under the knife. These days, cosmetic surgeries are done everywhere around the world. Why do you think people do this? Usually, the patient’s purpose of it is to reach social beauty standards. It is commonly said that beauty is in the eye of the beholder, but in the real world, there seems to be an agreed standard about what people consider beautiful.

Power is the source that shapes the standards of beauty in life. Over the past, the white race had held the most power in the world. They had authority over the black by treating them as slaves, and were extremely influential in the Second World War. Due to the power they have possessed, it naturally made them the first to advance on technology. The white race were the first to produce films, and until now, Hollywood produces the most movies in the world. And according to a study from the USC Annenberg, 70.8% of Hollywood’s film actors are white. This made the world think that western features are more attractive, since all the heroes were of the white race. This resulted many other races to do cosmetic surgeries related to western features, including the double-eyelid surgery, skin bleaching surgery, and the nose sharpening surgery.

Beauty standards can clearly be seen in marketing and entertainment industries. According to the KOSTAT, 80.2% of marketing businesses model people who are considered “beautiful” in the society’s point of view. Although we know that the image of the model and the attributes of the product are irrelevant, consumers are attracted to the product simply because the model, who is considered to be beautiful, is advertising the product. This is why many model auditions require beauty enough to get attracted to the product, proving there is a certain standard of beauty in the society’s point of view. Many marketing models who are considered beautiful have big eyes, sharp jaws, and other Western features that I have mentioned above.

Many philosophers in the past agree that beauty is objective. Although Plato and Aristotle disagreed on what beauty was, they both understood it as objective in the sense that it is not contained in the response of the beholder. These classical philosophies treat beauty as a matter of relations of body parts or particular characteristics. They believed beauty was expressed in mathematical ratios, for example the ‘golden ratio’. A sculpture known as ‘The Canon,’ by Polykleitos, as an example, was held up as a model of harmonious beauty.. A famous philosopher, Plotinus said, “This is the spirit that beauty must ever induce: wonderment and a delicious trouble, longing and love and a trembling that is all delight”.

As you can see, it is clear that beauty is not in the eye of the beholder, at least in the modern society. So if you want to look beautiful at school tommorow, consider adjusting yourself to social beauty standards.