"Ethnic" Cosmetic Surgery

All cosmetic surgery is ethnic cosmetic surgery.

You know how you open your email sometimes and everyone and their mother will send you the same article? That's how it was this weekend with an article in the New York Times on "ethnic differences in cosmetic surgery." The article, by Sam Dolnick, talks about how cosmetic surgeons in New York who cater primarily to Dominican women are performing a lot of butt lifts while surgeons that cater primarily to Chinese women are doing a lot of eyelid surgery to create double folds. According to Dolnick,

As the demand for surgical enhancement explodes around the world, New York has developed a host of niche markets that allow the city's many immigrants to get tucks and tweaks that are carefully tailored to their cultural preferences and ideals of beauty. Just as they can find Lebanese grape leaves or bowls of Vietnamese pho that taste of home, immigrants can locate surgeons able to recreate the cleavage of Thalia, the Mexican singer, or the bright eyes of Lee Hyori, the Korean pop star.

Do Chinese Moms Raise the Best Kids?

Being a mom isn’t easy. I say that not from experience, but from countless hours watching Life Goes On and exactly six months of babysitting in middle school. You have to make some tough calls. Let. Me. Tell. You.

Which is probably why everyone’s up in a tizzy over this Wall Street Journal column from Amy Chua, Chinese mom extraordinaire whose idea of good parenting is to starve her children until they can play the piano. On her long list of things her kids were not allowed to do: attend sleepovers, watch TV, or come home with any grade lower than an A.

This type of strict parenting is, according to Chua, proof that she cares more about her kids than Western parents “who seem perfectly content to let their children turn out badly.”