Perfection costs $15,000

I think it might be that streak of perfectionism coupled with the shrinking and homogenizing of the world as mass media brings a small number of ideals to a wide number of people. From today's NYTimes:

Many women struggle with the impact of aging and pregnancy on their bodies. But the marketing of the “mommy makeover” seeks to pathologize the postpartum body, characterizing pregnancy and childbirth as maladies with disfiguring aftereffects that can be repaired with the help of scalpels and cannulae.