Resumo

CAVALCANTI VERSIANI DOS ANJOS, Júlia. Victims of the doctor's knife: Media, gender and the sharp edge of biopolitics. Trama comun. [online]. 2021, vol.25, suppl.1, pp.143-158. ISSN 1668-5628.

Plastic surgery is a widespread practice worldwide and, especially, among brazilian women, which has led Brazil to lead the global ranking of interventions. The intense affinity between medical knowledge and the media is one of the factors that contribute to the trivialization of these practices, obliterating the existing risks. In order to investigate the consequences of the articulation between press, biopolitics and gender, this paper analyses the media coverage on the death of a woman after an aesthetic procedure. The case of Lilian Quezia Calixto was chosen because it attracted great media attention and raised the uncomfortable discussion about the risk of death presented by this type of procedure. The examination of this news pointed to a process of blaming the victims of bodily interventions, as a way of reducing the responsibility of the medical field in such cases. The discussion of the results proposes that this type of statement is immersed in a somatic culture that normalizes the action on the body, strengthens the idea of individualization and builds subjectivities - especially female - around the fulfillment of the demands of a mediatic and commercialized medicine.

Palavras-chave : Medicalization; Plastic surgery; Media; Gender.