More than 10 years ago I wrote about Kristina Rei, 22, of St. Petersburg, Russia. She wanted to look like Jessica Rabbit, the cartoon character, so she got herself a pair of huge—lips.She has undergone over 100 silicon-injection procedures, and considers it just the initial step in her quest to look like Roger Rabbit’s Toon wife from “Who Framed Roger Rabbit?”. ” At the time, I asked whether it ethical for a plastic surgeon to give her the ridiculous lips she coveted, since plastic surgeons are subject to the Hippocratic Oath like other doctors. My own position then and now, was that it is unethical, though I tried to give both sides of the issue.

“If Kristin can eat, drink and breathe with her mega-lips,” I wrote, “and there is no risk that they might explode, killing everyone near her, the decision to do what she wants is probably ethical, at least by medical ethics standards. The fact that her Chap-Stick costs will be astronomical is not the doctor’s concern, however.” Nevertheless, I concluded that “a plastic surgeon who assists a patient, especially one so young, in disfiguring herself to this extent is unethical. Autonomy is to be respected always, and beauty is in the eye of the beholder.  Kristin’s lips are so far beyond reason that a plastic surgeon debases his profession by assisting in what can fairly be called self-mutilation.”

My bias regarding fake puffy lips does not involve such extreme disfigurement; indeed most would agree that young women getting their lips puffed up isn’t disfiguring at all. However, it is increasingly becoming apparent to me that this particular form of supposedly aesthetic enhancement is becoming a norm, and a harmful one.

Here, for example, is Dee Dee Gatton at the beginning of her newsreader career and now:

I hadn’t seen her for a while, and was briefly stunned by her appearance this morning, which is the photo on the right. Here is rising 23-year-old actress Lizzy Samuels, as she appeared as a young teen on “The Walking Dead” and now:

The ethical problem with such widely disseminated versions of presumed feminine beauty is that they influence young girls and women and become the standard against which our children measure themselves and their self worth. The big lips are no different from the extreme thinness fad that led so many into eating disorders (and sometimes death) or the giant breasts period that made so many women, especially models and actresses, pay surgeons to make them look like Jessica Rabbit…

…below the lips.

Lizzie and Dee Dee are victims, in one respect, but accessories in another. When I see a young woman who has capitulated to Puffy Lips Mania, my reflex instinct is to regard her as having a weak character, a compulsion to conform, and the kind of person who spreads social contagions.

The phenomenon reminds me of ta“Twilight Zone” episode that disturbed and haunted me like no other. I’ve alluded to it before: authored by Charles Beaumont, one of the series’ best writers, it is called “Number 12 Looks Just Like You.” The story was about a future America where everyone can be beautiful, thanks to a procedure that typically takes place in one’s teens. A smart, strong, independent girl, perfectly nice looking but not model-gorgeous, wants to remain as she is, while everyone she knows—all beautiful, thanks to the procedure—try to persuade her that she is asking to be a lifetime pariah and and repulsive to all around her. Finally, she is coerced into conforming, and ends up looking like a clone of her pert, shapely, vapid best friend Valerie (played Pamela Austin, later briefly famous as “The Dodge Girl”).  Worst of all, her mind has been cleansed of all that troublesome individualism, for she is delighted with her transformation. “And the nicest part of all, Val,” she exclaims, admiring herself in the mirror, “I look just like you!”

[Post Script: Almost as disturbing to me as “Number 12 Looks Just Like You” was the attrition of commenters I saw in the comments to my post about poor Kristin (I wonder what she looks like now? I’m afraid to find out). Of the commenters, only current veterans Tim LeVier and Dwayne Zechman remain, and I am so grateful for their loyalty and tolerance. As for the rest—Danielle, Proam, Marlene, Karla Marie Robinette, and Mike Martin—they are gone with the wind. (Another, the late Karl Penny, is represented here periodically by his son Neil.)