Text interpretation activity, proposed to ninth grade students, about the text “The dictatorship of aesthetics: The search for the perfect body”.
This Portuguese activity is available for download in an editable Word template, ready to print in PDF and also the answered activity.
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Plastic surgeries, various treatments, excessive physical exercise and a multitude of cosmetics. They promise to help in the 'search for perfection' and enslave millions of women, youth and teenagers every day. When this becomes an obsession, the end can be tragic. How valid is the search for the perfect body?
Joana Vilhena, Coordinator of the Beauty Diseases Center of the Interdisciplinary Research Laboratory and Social Intervention (LIPIS) at PUC-Rio, believes that current society directly influences this behavior of people. Part of the blame for the excesses comes from the media. According to her, all the time, stereotypes and perfect bodies are broadcast on television, in newspapers and magazines, which end up imposing these models on society. The seductive beauty market attracts, every day, more people with the promise of solutions for any slip of nature or punishment of time. Anorexia and bulimia are also part of the list of diseases that are influenced by “imposed beauty”. In both pathologies, the desire to lose weight and a distorted view of the body are common features. In anorexia, the patient loses a lot of weight, as he refuses to eat, to maintain the average weight due to a distortion he has of his own image, which is below what is indicated by the doctors. Anorexic people have an enormous fear of gaining weight, even though they are extremely thin. Bulimia has a different characteristic. In it, the person does not lose weight. She eats too much, and soon after uses methods such as self-induced vomiting, laxatives and diuretics, and exercises exhaustively due to an exaggerated fear of gaining weight. But that's not the only problem; lack of nutrients causes physiological disturbances, leading to malnutrition, kidney failure, and cardiac complications.
Judgments around “the perfect body” are increasingly severe. Less and less is tolerated and this is accompanied by a very derogatory moral assessment of those who do not care for their own aesthetics. To moralize beauty is to say that those who do not take care of their own bodies are sloppy, without character. Also with the development of weight-loss techniques and the increase in the number of plastic surgeries, immediacy overcame sacrifice and the many hours of working out.
For Sérgio Levy, plastic surgeon and president of the Brazilian Society of Regional Plastic Surgery of the Rio de Janeiro, people resort to surgeries not only to feel satisfied with their own shape physics. They don't just want to be good about themselves, they think the surgery can solve the marital problem, the employment problem - she says. Also according to him, perfection is not something that can be achieved on an operating table. – When a person is looking for perfection, the result is never good because he will always be dissatisfied. It is very difficult to get the exact result the patient wants. The perfect doesn't exist.
According to psychologist Joana Vilhena, the aesthetic dictatorship of thinness is a social phenomenon within the culture of the cult of the body, being one of the elements of the consumer society. Along with the promise of beautiful curves is the profit of the beauty industry, which moves billions a year.
– This cosmetic industry is the perfume industry, the cult of the body, which includes creams, regimens, light products, diets, liposuctions, gyms. It is a heavy industry that invests in the feeling that the subject has of being able to satiate or sanction the discomfort he feels when he is not adequate to social standards.
She also points out that today cosmetic products are no longer considered superfluous, and beauty is appreciated as a first-need item.
This excessive search for the ideal body brings another problem. For Levy, people forget that having an enviable silhouette is not necessarily synonymous with health.
– We must worry about finding a balance. I believe in the search for well-being for the body as a whole, not forgetting mental health. Being healthy is not simply having a body free of disease, shapely and thin, it is a combination of feeling good about yourself and what you do...
Levy believes that some of the people who turn beauty into an addiction need medical care. According to him, they blame their unhappiness on possible physical defects.
– They believe that their incompetence in being happy is the fault of their nose, which they think is big; or fat, which they think is excessive. In these cases, it is recommended to refer the patient to a therapist - she concludes. Another aggravating factor is the number of victims who die each day due to complications in cosmetic surgery.
Andressa always spoke openly about the aesthetic procedures she underwent to show off her guitar body. “I came from the countryside and dreamed of being a great presenter. Then I thought: how can I be seen? I was born ugly, so I had all the plastic surgery possible. I was ugly, big-bellied and big-nosed,” she said in August in an interview with TV Fama, on Rede TV!.
Shortly after turning 27, celebrated in October this year, Andressa allowed herself to be photographed at an aesthetic clinic, where she applied Botox to her face. “I'm afraid of getting old,” he said at the time.
Source: http://gcn.net.br/noticia
1. According to the text, how does current society directly influence the behavior of people looking for a perfect body?
2. What are the diseases that are influenced by “imposed beauty? Have you ever heard of these diseases? Do you know anyone who suffers from any of these illnesses? Comment.
3. How and where should the person who suffers from any of the diseases mentioned above seek help?
4. Do you think the person who doesn't take care of his own body is sloppy, without character? Comment.
5. Do you think a person gets fat because he wants to? Comment.
6. What is a perfect body for you? Comment.
7.Explain what surgeon Levy meant in the sentence: “…also with the development of weight loss techniques and the increase in the number of plastic surgeries, immediacy overcame sacrifice and the many hours of Workout."
8. According to Sérgio Levy, plastic surgeon, why do people resort to surgery?
9. Also according to Sérgio Levy, perfection is not something that can be achieved on an operating table. Because? Explain in your words.
10. For Levy, people forget that having an enviable silhouette is not necessarily synonymous with health. Why does he say that? Explain in your words.
11. Within the culture of “cult of the body”, which is imposed by our society, by the media, comes the promise of beautiful curves. Who makes billions a year from all this? Explain in your words.
12. What advice does the surgeon give to people who make beauty an addiction? Explain in your words.
13. Do you think many people's unhappiness is to blame for physical defects or fat? Comment.
14. You are on which side: the side that seeks well-being for the body as a whole without forgetting mental health and above all feels good about itself and what it does…; or is it influenced by the “beauty imposed” by society? Comment.
15.Andressa almost died in this surgery. Today she is an evangelical, and says her life has changed completely, "beauty isn't everything" she says. Do you agree with the presenter? Comment.
16.Write a text giving your opinion, to what extent is the search for the perfect body valid?
Minimum 15 lines. I will evaluate: punctuation, accent, paragraph, spelling, cohesion and coherence.
Note: Before after some celebrities after surgery.
By Rosiane Fernandes Silva
At answers are in the link above the header.
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