The premise is that Lookism, (discrimination based on looks – appearance bias), is a major cause of criminal activity and leads to poor cultural and economic outcomes for those deemed ugly, unique looking, or with an ethnic appearance. The book goes on to detail the history of plastic surgery in U.S. prisons as a quick fix to turn criminals into productive citizens. I find this proposed solution disturbing.

Lookism is a term that came from the fat acceptance movement of the 1970s. Bodies remain the same, but body types go in and out of style. In the era of Botticelli’s Birth of Venus, (1485-1487), and the Rubenesque period of the 1500s-1900s, a round body was considered ideal visually and sociologically. Thinness was seen as weak, sickly, and unliberated. In the 1950s, curves were in. A thin Twiggy-type body became the rage in the 1960s. Now with various societal influences including reality TV shows, dangerous trends like liposuction with fat transfers to the buttocks are popular. These procedures are fraught with risk, including death.

Is surgery a solution for appearance fads and racial bias in or out of prison? What is being done to educate people about nutrition, fitness, self acceptance, and BMI? "Plus-Size: A Memoir of Pop Culture, Fatphobia, and Social Change," is an excellent book that covers these topics.

The Breast Implant Illness movement is so strong that in 2021 the FDA took action to strengthen breast implant risk communication. This is just the start of what needs to be done to protect the public.

Liposuction is done as part of many procedures. Removal or destruction of fat cells causes long-term health and aesthetic problems. With the innovation of liposuction, the cosmetic aspect of fat was targeted; the systemic health impact ignored. Removal of SubQ fat causes increase in disease producing visceral fat. Remaining fat cells increase in size regardless of diet and exercise.

Much harm occurs in years following liposuction as the body struggles with losing part of an organ that plays a role in metabolism and affects every aspect of health. Killer Looks does not mention this.

In prison programs, students performed surgery to make noses conform to a Western image to supposedly lessen recidivism. I know many people suffering from pain and structural problems and identity issues post-rhinoplasty or facial surgery. At times in history, an aquiline (Roman) nose was considered stronger than and superior to a snub nose rather than something to be fixed.

Having doctors tap into vulnerable populations to direct societies' view on attractiveness is troublesome. Prisoners of African decent may have broad, flat noses. This population was targeted by the prison plastic surgeons as if operations instead of racial bias awareness are a viable answer for humankind.

The prisoners signed up surgery. The program focused on removing unwanted facial tattoos or improving facial scars and altering noses. I support people being comfortable in how they look, but is prison the place to do this? What is the cost when surgery harms instead of heals?

Surgery has risks. Victoria Meppen had a mole removed from her forehead and was left in untenable nerve pain. After years of suffering with no relief, she committed suicide. Reports about her life were sensationalized; gossip newspapers twisted her story and blamed her. Victim blame is common. I know many people in situations like Victoria Meppen's due to plastic surgeons.

Physical attractiveness has benefits and downsides; beauty can lead to unwanted attention and increased sexual abuse. Narcissists are often physically attractive and charismatic or believe they are. By that token, should society take it upon themselves to mar the appearance of narcissists to hamper malignant tendencies?

Doing surgeries on a vulnerable prison population has ethical considerations. In the 2020 documentary Belly of the Beast (BOTB), filmmaker Erica Cohn details the fight attorney Cynthia Chandler and her team took on to stop involuntary, illegal sterilizations on female prisoners in California.

Some doctors believe women in prison or on welfare shouldn’t have kids; this incarcerated population is treated as if their lives and futures do not matter. Dr. JH, (who has a history of settled lawsuits from cases that involve permanent deformity to women and children), was insistent that females get their tubes tied.

A whistleblower sent Cynthia minutes of a CDC meeting that discussed “cost effectiveness” of sterilizing women during labor and delivery even though federal and state laws prohibit prisons from sterilizing women for birth control; this is Eugenics.

In BOTB I learned that 92% of women are incarcerated not due to lookism, but due to domestic violence. Kelli Dillon, (a remarkable woman), was a young, black mother of two in prison for that very reason when she was sterilized and castrated via hysterectomy and didn’t even know it; a doctor in prison told her she had abnormal cervical cells, but she never had cancer.

Afterwards, Kelli had panic attacks, weight loss, night sweats, which are classic symptoms of surgical menopause. When there’s a big drop in estrogen, women may have hot flashes, mood changes, and menses ceases. These hormonal problems can happen with fat removal (that is done for supposed medical or cosmetic reasons) because fat is an endocrine organ.

In 1931, the American Medical Association (AMA) guidelines stated that surgeons who performed elective cosmetic surgeries were unethical. In 2022, there are many people that still consider cosmetic surgeons quackish, dangerous, and disreputable, but the propaganda machine has had time to lure people in via groupthink.

Beginning in 1932, cosmetic surgery was done for free in prisons. Cosmetic surgeons earned a six-figure salary. Residency programs were in high demand. Operating on prisoners became a valuable recruiting tool for universities, especially in Texas and Utah. Surgeries were also done in Sing Sing and on Rikers Island. Inmates were fed an unhealthy diet, but hey, they got plastic surgery.

As part of the rehabilitation studies in a Texas prison, doctors performed liposuction and skin removal on Fred Marshall. “His whole body ached, like he’d been run over by a truck. Even his arms and legs were tender—and the doc hadn’t even touched those! He tried to sit up straight and gasped; it felt like he was being pulled apart.” Nurses referred to him as "grumpy and demanding." Well, sure - he was in pain.

Dr. Martin Lewin assured patients in prison, “The operation in of itself will not be a painful experience, however, it’s likely that you will feel some discomfort after the procedure and may be sore and tender.” He mentioned bruising. Bad to tragic aesthetic and health outcomes are customarily minimized or denied by surgeons.

Cosmetic surgery often worsens the look of the subject in their own and subjective viewpoints. The internet is filled with gossip magazine listings of actresses who “ruined their careers and their looks via plastic surgery.” People get procedures because they trust the medical profession. No one chooses to get ruined.

Powerful doctors’ lobbies, tort law, and failure of medical boards allows physicans to get away with bad practices. I did searches on the doctors thanked or mentioned in this book. Within minutes I found desperate reviews by former patients of some of these doctors. This is consistent with what I find in my studies about the plastic surgery field and is of concern in the push for surgeries.

In some of the referenced studies there was slight improvement in recidivism rates; these were not longitudinal. In other studies, there was no improvement or an increase. The research in this book only goes so far. It fails to portray the truth about the cosmetic field or the damage plastic surgery may cause to individuals and society.

Medical malpractice is a lead cause of death in the United States. Plastic surgeons cause death and bodily harm to healthy people. What is the definition of a criminal? Inmates locked up at Sing Sing, or cons who wear a white coat and those that protect them? ( )

First I have to ask, did any of you know that they did this? I had no idea until I saw the email for the tour! Killer Looks was definitely a fascinating read for me! It's well researched & the writing style is engaging & entertaining but also easy to understand! The author has brought to light an interesting part of history that isn't just about our past but something that still affects us today! Overall it was a great read!

Thank you Random Things Tours & Zara Stone for sharing this fascinating read with me!
( )

KILLER LOOKS by journalist and author Zara Stone is a fascinating look back at the history of plastic and cosmetic surgery in the last century, with a specific focus on procedures performed on inmates. Half a million inmates had cosmetic procedures done from the 1920s to the 1990s, something I was completely unaware of. The novel presented information in a very easy to read and relatable manner with individual stories and experiences shared. I especially connected with the story of Dr. Llewellyn and John, the baby who suffered meningitis and as a result had a nasal deformity causing his young parents to fear he would cause their family to be shunned in the community, and the resulting surgery that united their family. The history presented of the belief that certain unappealing physical attributes, deformities, scarring and characteristics believed to be more common in the prison population caused social rejection and that plastic surgery could help prevent recidivism was something I would never have thought about. I was further surprised (though perhaps I shouldn’t have been) that the theory turned out to be right and prisoners who received plastic surgery fared better once they reentered society. This was just a very interesting and well researched book and really caused me to think a lot about how societal bias about beauty and looks impacts one’s outlook, from a newly released prisoner on parole who might be given a second chance, or not because of looks, to a delightful baby whose parents refuse to take him home if his doctor won’t perform plastic surgery—entire futures swaying in the balance because humans are so caught up on looks. The author did an outstanding job weaving the stories together into a cohesive whole.

I received a complimentary ARC copy of Killer Looks from the author. This is my honest and voluntary review. ( )

I did not know about the practice, through most of the 20th century, of offering plastic surgery to over half a million (mostly male) inmates in order to rehabilitate them/make it easier for them to reintegrate after release. That’s about what I can say for this book, which is roughly chronological, occasionally anachronistic (there were no “red states” and “blue states” in the 1950s), and somewhat digressive though understandably so in its discussion of the evidence of how physical attractiveness—both racialized and within racial categories—affects how a person is treated. Stone attributes the elimination of most programs to a combination of punitiveness/anti-“free stuff” for prisoners attitudes; unwarranted denigration of rehabilitation as a concept; and concerns about experimentation on prisoners, since many surgeons practiced on inmates. I did learn that prisoners have almost five times as many head injuries as nonprisoners, and that facial trauma accounts for 1/3 of inmate ER visits, compared to 0.7% for the general population. ( )